Capturing Ladakh’s beauty

Frozen
Cast: Danny Denzongpa, Gauri, Skalzang Angchuk
Director: Shivajee Chandrabhushan
Rating:

Writer-producer-director Shivajee Chandrabhushan and director of photography Shankar Raman’s affection and fascination with Ladakh come across with stunning effectiveness in Frozen. Its stark beauty, remoteness, and the uncomfortable coexistence between spiritual peace and omnipresent conflict are beautifully captured.
The director’s reason for filming in black and white is interesting. The vivid ambers, blues and white of Ladakh do not convey a cold and hard environment, which was possible to transmit in black and white.

Karma (Danny Denzongpa), an apricot jam maker, finds that modern machinery is pushing him out of the market. Facing escalating debts and an impatient moneylender, he is troubled about settling his teenaged daughter Lasya (Gauri). His only asset is his ancestral home, much of which an army camp has occupied. The idyllic life of father, his daughter, and her brother Chomo is thrust into reality.

Denzongpa chips in with a strong  performance, but Gauri is a letdown – she neither looks nor sounds Ladakhi and behaves abnormally throughout. Frozen is a commendable effort, but what it gains visually, it lacks in storytelling.