The map of world cinema is fast evolving these days. Where one day the only three types of cinema that crossed national borders was of the Americas, South-east Asia and to a certain extent western Europe and India, today a whole new breed of cinema is making its mark, internationally. The increasing number of film festivals accepting low budget international entries and the wider perspective of the global media is creating an entire new entity of cinema. This entity is characterized by a personality that is more accepting of the changing social scenario and the ethos of a new world society. Emerging from this pseudo revolution is a film called Khuda Kay Liye, from Pakistan.

Now when KKL released in India, it made news for one wrong reason, and not one of many possible right reasons. The one wrong reason being it being the first Pakistani film to have a wide theatrical release in India, and the many right reasons are the attributes I've detailed here. Khuda Kay Liye, or In The Name of God, its English language title, is a simultaneous depiction of life on three continents, directly before and after the twin towers incident in New York. It is also about fundamentalism, and addresses it very close to its core, in the effect it has on the mindset of the liberal subjected to fundamentalist ideologies and their pressure every single day. The movie is (naturally) entirely from a Pakistani perspective.

Fawad Khan (lead vocalist of Pakistani rock band Entity Paradigm) and Shaan star as Sarmad and Mansoor, two brothers and singers who live in Lahore in a very liberal Muslim family. Sarmad faces an internal conflict when a priest (Rasheed Naz) indoctrines into him a belief that music is considered sinful in Islam. Using his gullibility in this regard as a starting point, he goes on to convince him that nearly everything in his way of life is against the principles of Islam. So strong is his word that Sarmad abandons his family on the word of his teacher and begins to live, in his view at least, the life of a good Muslim.

Mansoor, on the other hand believes in being good and using logic to discern sin according to Islam as opposed to blind faith in every interpretation of the Quran. Following his brother's change of heart and life, he leaves for Chicago to study music. Here he meets and falls in love with an American girl Janie.

As a contrast to this conflict within Pakistani Muslims, the film-maker Shoaib Mansoor presents the life of Mary, a Pakistani English Muslim, who was born and raised in England and is culturally an English-woman. She has even been raised by the English wives and mistresses of her Pakistani father, and naturally assumes nothing wrong with her decision to marry an Englishman. This proves to be her naivette, and her trials, along with those of her first cousins Mansoor and Sarmad, cleverly interwoven by the film-maker form the crux of his film.

KKL is a brilliant film for more than one reason. The screenplay is incredibly well-finished, and the film jumps from Asia to the UK to America very smoothly. The different perspectives of each of the lead characters is portrayed skillfully and realistically. Another area where I think KKL scores high is its seamless editing. In a film like this, with parallel stories, for example, the recent Indian disaster Salaam-e-Ishq, poor editing and screen-writing often leave you confused. In this film, there is a very natural progression, from scene to scene, and even the gross torture scenes are edited skillfully to avoid being explicitly gory.

Amongst the actors, Shaan and Iman Ali are the only two who seem like seasoned actors. Both put in very convincing performances (though Shaan should perhaps consider joining a gymnasium at the earliest). Fawad Khan is earnest but needs to learn a lot about acting. Naseeruddin Shah packs in a powerful performance in the very brief role he has. His diction and charcterizations are impeccable. Rasheed Naz is sufficiently menacing. There isn't a perfect film though, and I would love to see a few things about the film a little differently. Some of these seem likely to have been decision made to appease the sensibilties of the target Pakistani audience, and don't significantly mar the film's attributes. I still think it's important to mention them though.

SPOILER ALERT!!!
Iman Ali's character, after the brutal torture she is put through, in the end decides to stay back in Afghanistan. Somehow, this seems incongruous with her character's nature.

No punishment is meted out either to Sarmad nor Mary's father, and even the Maulana goes scot free. This makes the courtroom-sequences seem to be an exercise in futility.
SPOILERS OVER!!!

However, the film succeeds in its intention of portraying a Pakistan divided along the lines of the progressive and the regressive, and the dilemmas thrust upon an entire religious communtiy, relegated to assocaition with terrorism, often unfairly.

On an ending note, the use of Urdu, especially through the Maulana characters (Naz and Shah), is so beautiful that even though you don't understand a lot of it, you just want to keep listening.

For this, and for being perhaps the most complete film of the year so far, I think Khuda Kay Liye is DEFINITELY a must-watch. On a scale of 1-10, I'd score it at an 8.5.