Margaret Atwood defines ustopia as space where utopia and dystopia merge or, as she claims, exist in one another. Given this sense of crossover, she asserts that there is no single narrative encompassing all angles, concluding that ustopia is a constructed reality that brings together contradictory perspectives, as it suggests and analyzes a more meaningful interpretation in its entirety. Raj Kumar Hirani’s Indian science fiction film, PK, involves the titular AI-driven alien protagonist, who, after being stranded on Earth, is caught in a myriad of chaotic situations in his rationalized search for God, as he challenges the ethics and misappropriation of power by institutional religion. Sujoy Ghosh’s science fiction film Anukul, based off Satyajit Ray’s short story “Bankubabur Bandhu”, recounts the story of Nibaran, an Indian school teacher, who employs a robot, Anukul, as a housekeeper, in a utopic, non-hierarchical master-servant relationship. Situated in the acute dystopic reality when humans are losing their livelihoods to the robots, the film delves deep into the tracks the relationship between nuances of human nature, machine responses, instinctual reactions and questions surrounding duty and loyalty. This paper argues that these two films leave us in an Atwoodian “ustopic” space, that prioritizes neither utopic nor dystopic possibilities but draws on both, in their fascinating denouements. Through such two-fold cinematic interventions, these films create a space of “ustopic” ambiguity layered with ethical dilemmas.

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Inhabiting Ustopia: Indian Science Fiction Films, PK and Anukul

  • Aparajita Nanda

摘要

Margaret Atwood defines ustopia as space where utopia and dystopia merge or, as she claims, exist in one another. Given this sense of crossover, she asserts that there is no single narrative encompassing all angles, concluding that ustopia is a constructed reality that brings together contradictory perspectives, as it suggests and analyzes a more meaningful interpretation in its entirety. Raj Kumar Hirani’s Indian science fiction film, PK, involves the titular AI-driven alien protagonist, who, after being stranded on Earth, is caught in a myriad of chaotic situations in his rationalized search for God, as he challenges the ethics and misappropriation of power by institutional religion. Sujoy Ghosh’s science fiction film Anukul, based off Satyajit Ray’s short story “Bankubabur Bandhu”, recounts the story of Nibaran, an Indian school teacher, who employs a robot, Anukul, as a housekeeper, in a utopic, non-hierarchical master-servant relationship. Situated in the acute dystopic reality when humans are losing their livelihoods to the robots, the film delves deep into the tracks the relationship between nuances of human nature, machine responses, instinctual reactions and questions surrounding duty and loyalty. This paper argues that these two films leave us in an Atwoodian “ustopic” space, that prioritizes neither utopic nor dystopic possibilities but draws on both, in their fascinating denouements. Through such two-fold cinematic interventions, these films create a space of “ustopic” ambiguity layered with ethical dilemmas.