1. Program
  2. /
  3. Asian Presences in the Colonial Metropolis of Berlin
  4. /
  5. Das indische Grabmal - Die Sendung des Yoghi

Das indische Grabmal - Die Sendung des Yoghi

The Indian Tomb - The Mission of the Yoghi
Joe May, Germany 1921, 132 Min.
Followed by a talk with Anujah Fernando, Dr. Kien Nghi Ha and Dr. Subin Nijhawan

Original version with BluRay cinefest 2018 edition music

The screening will be introduced by Dr. Subin Nijhawan. Introduction: British Empire, German Illusion – About Tigers and Tombs in Colonial Times

"The world's greatest film" – this large-scale production with colonial ambience was a crowd puller. In it, Joe May conjured up mystical India, transforming the film city of Berlin-Woltersdorf into an "Indian" space with magnificent temples and palaces, populated by dummies in fantasy costumes and elephants. Enriched with sexualized female exoticism, it tells an intricate story in which the evil maharajah seeks revenge on his native wife and her British lover. This setting was so fascinating that after a German remake in the 1930s, Fritz Lang, who was already involved in the first production, filmed this narrative again in 1959.

Dr. Subin Nijhawan is a research associate at the Institute of English and American Studies at Goethe University Frankfurt. His postdoc project gravitates around the nexus of multilingualism and sustainability, incorporating literature and media, in order to facilitate an intersectional view. This also includes new models for global justice and a cosmopolitan world citizenship, for preventing a Eurocentric dominance in discourses.

Anujah Fernando works as a cultural scholar and curator based in Berlin. Her work focuses on the politics of collective memory as they relate to migration and colonialism. She produces research-based exhibitions, publications and documentary film projects. Her particular interest is on the practices first and second generation of migrants use to negotiate language and culture. Most recently, she co-curated the exhibition "Despite All: Migration to the Colonial Metropolis of Berlin" at the FHXB Museum.