By Aminta Kilawan Narine, Esq.
Heartening. Hilarious. Harrowing. Humbling. Ian Harnarine’s feature film “Doubles,” is all of those things and then some. The film, adapted from Harnarine’s short film “Doubles with Slight Pepper,” was screened on Saturday, February 10th at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s (BAM) Caribbean Film Festival, to a jam-packed audience including the office of the Consul General of Trinidad and Tobago, the office of the Consul General of Canada, and a representative from Council Member Rita Joseph’s office.
Harnarine holds a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) from New York University’s Graduate Film Academy and a Masters in Nuclear Physics from the University of Illinois. He conceived of the film while grappling with his own father’s terminal illness.
Set in Trinidad and Tobago and Toronto, Canada, “Doubles” tells a story that will have even the stoics among us crying and laughing. The story is set around a working class Trinidadian street vendor named Dhani, played by actor Sanjiv Boodhu, who in reality is a practicing attorney based in Trinidad. Dhani travels to Toronto to visit his estranged, dying father with the hope that he will sign over the deed to their land back home. Errol Sitahal, who poignantly plans Dhani’s father, has appeared in Hollywood films including Tommy Boy and Harold and Kumar go to White Castle.
The film hit home for many in the audience, prompting deep reflection. After viewing Doubles, District Leader Richard David, who represents a large Indo-Caribbean population in Queens and is a founder of the Indo-Caribbean Alliance said: “I appreciated the film’s focus on fathers and their sacrifices.” David said he fondly thought of his late dad the entire time watching Doubles. “Ian really captured the nuances and complex emotions of migration, relationships, and loss,” he said.
The film presented a rare treat: a raw inside-look into Indo-Caribbean culture paired with a universal immigrant story. “The movie Doubles is illustrative of many shared stories from the Caribbean diaspora. It is beautifully written and carefully crafted to reflect our delicious food, dynamic people, and the rhythmic patterns of our music.” said Support Magistrate Christine Perumal. Sherry Padilla, an organizer for Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM), hopes that there will be a screening of Doubles in Richmond Hill in the future. Padilla said: “I felt proud to watch such a film on the big screen that represents the Caribbean in such a way, in language, food, culture, and music. I also love that it touches on family separation and some of the struggles they face when they emigrate to foreign countries.”
Visually gripping from start to finish, the cinematography of Doubles is worth not blinking an eye. Rohan Narine, organizing consultant for Hindus for Human Rights said, “With no green screen effects, the depth of storytelling glued my mind to a movie that spoke to my religion, culture, and made me question how things are even with my own father.”
Doubles highlights the need for us to forgive our parents for simply being human. It also alludes to many systemic challenges, such as the paradox of the caste system in the Indo-Caribbean identity, where even being among the highest among the hierarchy has no bearing on financial or educational attainment. “It [Doubles] raises awareness of the perception people have back home about everyone here being successful and living in riches, but most are just surviving,” said writer and organizer Will Depoo.
There were some unforgettable moments in the film. The theater was roaring with laughter at high points, including when Dhani’s even-tempered character let out an expected exclamation: “I LOVE Canada!” while surrounded by female club-goers gyrating to soca music during one of his few nights out on the town. “Once a man twice a child,” was epitomized in another scene where Dhani must clean his helpless father’s diaper.
Academics, officials, and organizers alike had positive reviews of Doubles. CUNY professor Anita Baksh said, “Every aspect of Harnarine’s film – casting, scenery, narrative, language, music, and more – is intentional and beautiful. It’s also impressive to see how the film expanded and grew from the short into a full length feature; the two projects overlap and, yet, are distinct.” Doubles with Slight Pepper won the Best Short Film Award at the Toronto International Film Festival and the Canadian Academy Award.
Cristine Khan, a researcher at CUNY Graduate Center, saw the film Doubles with Slight Pepper when it was originally released in 2015 as a short. “It was so inspiring for me to see our stories being told in a different light—not just about attaining the American dream or material wealth but the realities of carrying these legacies of harsh migrations and generational poverty and not really knowing how to get out of it.” What was most striking to Khan was “the very real story of seeing people leave and assimilate into a North American lifestyle they don’t enjoy or benefit from.”
Khan appreciated that the film highlighted how in the larger Caribbean diaspora, “people from all backgrounds merge and find community due to shared realities.” Among various friendships that defied racial and ethnic boundaries, the film chronicles the endearing relationship between Anita, an Afro-Jamaican played by Rashaana Cumberbatch, and Dhani, an Indo-Trinidadian. It also uplifts existential questions that the lead actor must reckon with. “In some ways, Dhani chose to resist that Canadian or North American ‘dream,’” making the film that much more powerful for Khan. Annetta Seecharan, Executive Director of Chhaya CDC surmises that, “Doubles will no doubt claim its place as one of the most important pieces of work about the Indo-Caribbean experience.”
With a poetic simplicity and gripping scenes that span from heart-wrenching to heart-warming, Doubles is a must-watch for Caribbean people across generations and cultures. The film, which leaves some existential questions open-ended, gives viewers much to ponder about their own lives, mortality, and legacies. What must be sacrificed from our histories to achieve the immigrant dream?
Harnarine’s Doubles answers these questions by demonstrating that we can proudly retain our culture, traditions, and even religion while climbing the ladder of success.
