Deepa
Mehta
Boigraphy
Canadian-based filmmaker Deepa Mehta was born in
Amritsar, India in 1949. She received a bachelors
and masters degree in philosophy from the University
of New Delhi, where she met her husband, Canadian
filmmaker and producer Paul Saltzman. Shortly after
getting married, she immigrated to Canada in 1973.
However, the marriage was short lived, and they
divorced. She has one daughter, Devyani, of whom
Mehta says: "I really admire her. She is proud
and satisfied of being who she is. That is something
lovely about her and possibly nurtured by her father
and mother's absolutely crazy life"(Ramchandani).
Because her father was a film distributor and theater
owner, Mehta grew up on movies. After school she
would go there with friends and watch movies for
free, yet she did not realize she had a serious
interest in films until after finishing her education:
"By the time I was in university I knew I wanted
to have nothing to do with film! I had been saturated
with itÖI was going to do my dissertation for
my PhD, and I met a friend who said they needed
someone to work part time in a place called Cinematic
Workshop, a small place that made documentary film
in Delhi. I learned how to do sound first, and then
I learned camera work; I leaned to edit and then
finally I made my own documentary and discovered
how much I loved it" (Craughwell F10).
Being raised in India yet living in Canada, Mehta
felt confused about her identity for a long time:
"I've never felt Canadian. I used to be upset
about being called an ovisible minority, that's
what they called coloured people there. I used to
come to India and was called an NRI [Non Resident
Indian] here. The problem was not about belonging
anywhere; it was a dislike for labelsÖNow I
feel very happy being who I am, Deepa Mehta"
(Ramchandani). Mehta views herself as a kind of
cultural hybrid. Quoting a character from Salman
Rushdieís collection of stories East, West
who is asked whether he is British or Indian, Mehta
says, " 'I refuse to choose.' That's how I
feel. I refuse to choose. I spend about half of
each year in each country. My daughter is a Canadian.
I'm an immigrant here, and I wouldn't stay exclusively
in either place" (Lacey C8).
Mehta's main point in making films is to challenge
blind tradition in India: "It was important
to set it [the films] in India because the story
is happening there. It is a microcosm of India,
the challenging of traditions. I seriously wanted
to break the stereotypes of India, the 'exotic'
India of the Raj and the princes and the mysticism.
Exotic India doesn't really exist" (Kirkland
11/24/97).
