Ship of Theseus was a movie which left me thinking even days after I left the movie hall. The very first thought that came to my mind was; is everything only material; me and the other people; the table, the stone. All this is same isn’t it. All matter. Is there something that is we can say is ours? The decision’s that we make, are they at least completely our own. It kind of shook me completely stressing the fact that the more we think we know life, the more we move away from the answer.
All the three characters are sort of trying to gain something – Aaliya trying to be a complete artist in the medium of photography has overcome the fact that she cannot see by still clicking pictures. But when she gets a cornea transplant and she can see, she can’t be the artist she wants to be. Maitreya – the monk – who should not be having any desires, is fighting a case. However moral it is; he does have the desire to fight the case; due to which he wakes up early in the morning and walks all the long way to the court. He has his values he wants to stick to; he sticks to them even to the point of giving up his life, but cannot give it up. The third character is Naveen, who also has his own values about living life; as opposed to what others have. Some people mock him for his way of living but, he is adamant with it. Now, comes a point in his life when his quest of happiness starts. He goes to a distant country to search for the person who might be possessing the kidney of a fellow patient, whom Naveen isn’t even related to. The irony – all three of them sort of fail in their quests of finding the perfect happiness. And maybe that is life, it shocks you at the most uncertain point.
At the climax, all three stories/characters are related by one thread – they now possess parts of a completely different person; a person whom they haven’t even seen. Has this changed them? It was at this point the theme of the film – Ship of Theseus – was unveiled.
I feel this was a movie that presented discussions on a completely different subject. The ideas that society discusses as highly philosophical and with a sense of pride are expressed in a very natural way in the movie. There was a time when I considered that these ideas are shared through art like books, music and painting etc. But here is an example where in a media like film which comprises of all mediums of art; we have a movie which talks about such a different and complex topic. I would like to welcome this change and hope to watch more variety in movies we see.