Lalit Mohan Joshi’s documentary ‘Merchant Ivory Film Wallahs’ unravels the fascinating story of a film company that emerged from three continents –USA, India and Europe. It is hailed as one with the longest record of film production in the world of cinema. The driving force behind the Merchant Ivory Film Company was Ismail Merchant from India, James Ivory from USA and Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, from a family of Jews who had fled from Germany to Britain during Hitler’s holocaust.
The film is dedicated to Indian cinema icon, Shyam Benegal who, in one of his last appearances, also features into the film. The documentary will start with film experts commenting on Merchant Ivory’s debut film ‘The Householder’ and move on to cover their main Indo-British films and documentaries between 1963 to 2001.
It will highlight some prominent common features of Merchant Ivory films such as the mix of Indian and western actors and people of talent who contributed to their films.
At the same time, it will also point out what was unique and distinct about the films made by them and the main people behind them.