I have not had much opportunity to see many short films that are dance films. 'Country of Bodies, Bombay In Dance' is wonderful to watch for about five minutes of it's full eight minutes length and then you realize it is too long and has not been saying much. It makes for a hard watch as you try to understand the narrative that director Puneet Rakheja is trying to deliver. The dancers are certainly watch-able up to a point as the repetitive choreography causes you to start losing interest. Set in a vibrant city like Mumbai, the film is greatly helped by the location and yet you begin to ponder why the dancers are not all Indian. Yes, I realize Mumbai is an Indian metropolis and must have citizens from all over the globe but somehow the non-Indian dancers dominate the aesthetic, which I think detracts from the tale. Since you are left asking what the director is trying to say, I suppose Rakheja complicates his tale with too many stories. The simplicity of something like Del Mak's 'The Shift' and a shorter running time would have lifted this short greatly.
----------------------------------------COUNTRY OF BODIES, BOMBAY IN DANCE was one of eight short films nominated for the Satyajit Ray Foundation Short Film Award, that I watched on Tuesday the 15th July 2014 as part of the London Indian Film Festival at the ICA in Central London. Unfortunately I can't post reviews on three of the eight shorts: RANI, ALCHEMY & DEVIL IN BLACK STONE as they don't have supporting IMDb pages.
