Reflections in a Lens

A Barbarian in Madras

Southern India pretends to know nothing about the North. Its language is different, its very nature too. In Madras Louis Malle discovers a striking example of that world of opposites to be found in traditional India: thousands cramming the streets at a strange ceremony centuries old, and a family planning clinic; a film studio making folk-lore musicals, and the famous Kalachetra dance school where dancing is itself a language, a prayer, an invocation to God.