Last October, I was given the opportunity to attend the Heartland Film Festival. I came away with a feeling of wonderment, and disappointment in myself that I had never before made an effort to sample the offerings of the festival. Among the many films that I enjoyed, I was especially struck by the passion of a “conflict’ photojournalist in 1,000 Times Good Night, and a man’s gut-wrenching despair as he searches for his lost 12-year-old son in Siddarth, a Heartland best narrative feature winner. I saw that Siddarth was available on the video-streaming service Netflix, a subscription service that my friend has at the home I was going to watch while she attended her niece’s wedding. I reacquainted myself with Siddarth, and a father’s pain.
Set in India, Siddarth opens as a “chain wallah” — a man whose occupation is to repair “chains, zippers . . . bags and jackets” — comes home to discuss with his wife about their son’s job at a “trolley factory.” The parents and their daughter speak to 12-year-old Siddarth on the phone. He assures them that the “food is good,” that he is being treated well, and that he will be home “in a month.” When Siddarth does not return as expected, we learn of Mahendra Saini’s decision to send his son to an unknown place, and begin to understand the economic forces that apply the kind of pressure that would cause a father to agree to send away his young child.
Mahendra makes his living peddling his services on the streets of a village near Delhi. He walks the streets with a duffel bag of repair parts, calling out to all on a portable loudspeaker that he can repair their bags, zippers, chains and jackets. We see him working on everything, including buggy wheels and cameras. His difficulties making a living, hitting “a bad patch,” caused him to consider his brother-in-law’s offer to have Siddarth work for a month at the factory.
Worry and despair grow as the time grows longer and Siddarth still does not return. When the family decides to report the son as missing, the police are initially less than sympathetic. The officer who takes Mahendra’s report looks at him with anger. “You people never learn,” she says, chiding him. She tells him that child labor is illegal and that the child should be in school, getting an education. Mahendra’s family starts to fracture and he travels to the place where his son was last seen and begins a search that, at every stage, exposes the dangers that his son has been exposed to, the results of his decision to contract out the boy’s services. Mahendra’s modest means hinder his ability to conduct an effective search for his son, but the family’s inability to produce a picture of the boy frustrate the police and highlight the poverty that that ultimately proves devastating to the family.
Siddarth is a compelling story about the difficult choices that poor families must make, worldwide, and how one man’s search for his lost son can heal great wounds and highlight ingrained misery.
The Heartland Film Festival will have its “Summer Rewind” — a sampling of films from previous years — from June 18th through June 25th, and Siddarth will be one of many quality offerings. I am looking forward to October’s line-up and more award-winning films.
(For more information, visit heartlandfilm.org.)