You’d be forgiven for expectingLionto be another foreign film drama with a predictable slumdog-rises-on-high plotline.
Yet despite the ideas planted by its preceding visuals, Lion is actually the incredible autobiographical adventure of Saroo Brierley.
At five years old, Brierley found himself lost at a train station in India. He fell asleep on a train and woke up in Kolkata, nearly 1,600 kilometres from his home. 20 years later, long after he was adopted by Australian parents, he traced a journey back to his natural family using Google Earth.
Naturally, such a feat would see people empathise without hesitation. What they might not anticipate, however, is the core-shaking and theatrical embodiment of not only Saroo’s plight and the trauma he endured, but some very real, very overlooked issues in India as well.
In his feature film debut, director Garth Davis captures a long-standing sociopolitical issue. Not only does he address the difficulties faced by Saroo from childhood through to adulthood, but he exposes the reality faced by the children, those complete innocents across India, who are lost or taken every day. Each year, 80,000 children in the country are separated from their families.
Davis points out, however, that covering the issues of missing children was never the aim of his film. “It was through the making of the movie that we realised that we made something critical and brought about a greater awareness to the treatment of children,” he says. “Through Saroo’s honesty we’ve exposed a very big question about what is happening – [but] I didn’t realise just how powerful it was going to be.
“Look, the story is impossible not to love, clearly – the miracle of the story. The thing that got to me was I could feel the spirituality of the story; a love the characters held that was unique and powerful that engineered the tale.”
Forming a connection to Saroo’s history was something Davis felt essential to the making of Lion. “One of the things I did was retrace Saroo’s steps,” he says. “But when you actually stand at Kolkata Station, imagine you’re three feet tall, five years old, can’t speak the language… it’s terrifying.
“I imagined myself as a young Saroo, where I would take shelter or ask for help. Very quickly I stumbled across homeless children. Lo and behold, there was a child asleep on the railway line. There’s Saroo’s story everywhere, but the thing that shocks me is the child trafficking.
“We’re actually all born very pure – Saroo is pure innocence and pure light. Despite the poverty, they haven’t been damaged, and all children are like that. It becomes about the environment. I tried to cast children that had light in them, because that’s what we need to protect on this planet, children and their light – they have this light and quality that adults so often overlook.”
Indeed, the cast of Lion reflects some bold decisions. One could argue that British actor Dev Patel – who plays the adult Saroo – gets typecast as the underdog Indian boy fairly frequently. However, in Lion, Patel reveals a talent for undertaking a more brooding and tormented character than we have previously seen him play. Matching him on screen are Rooney Mara and Australia’s own Nicole Kidman (below).
“There are definitely more Indian actors emerging internationally and I met a lot of them, but for me, Dev had this incredible light and likeability,” says Davis. “I didn’t want to start with this tortured Saroo – he accepted his fate with gratitude and wasn’t someone who was constantly tortured. I was very excited to take him into an internal performance and I had to work hard on him.
“[Patel] was ready in his life and career to try something where he wasn’t typecast and worked very hard. He just flew. I saw this beautiful man find these performances within himself.
“I got interested in those very still moments, and how as people we connect psychically and spiritually,” Davis adds. “A lot of times we see these characters in moments of stillness and you can see them connecting. Saroo was always connected to his birth mother and brother, connected to things that weren’t in the film.”
Davis’ research for the film put him on first-name terms with almost all the people who inspired its characters. “I met and connected with everybody, really, everyone that’s alive,” he says. “I went to India and I was there when [Saroo’s adoptive mother] Sue met [his birth mother] Camella. I met all the people in his Indian life and went back to Hobart and spent time with Sue and John [Saroo’s adoptive father].
“Let the film speak for itself,” he finishes. “It does speak to everybody, this film. If we can get people in the doors, they’re going to love it.”
[Lion stills by Mark Rogers]
Lion is in cinemas Thursday January 19.
