Hollywood thespian Harvey Kietel will play a role based on Australian missionary from Orissa who was burnt alive by Hindu fundamentalists

Subhash K Jha (MUMBAI MIRROR; March 15, 2011)

Secretly, tucked away in picturesque Panchgani, debutant director Kranti Kanade is currently shooting Against Itself, an English-language film starring Harvey Keitel.

Considered one of finest in the acting business Keitel has been hiding in India for months preparing for a controversial role inspired by the Australian Christian missionary Graham Staines. It is the role of a lifetime.

Staines was burnt alive by Hindu extremist Dara Singh in Orissa on 22 Janurary 1999. Staines’ sons, aged 10 and six, were also charred to death when their station wagon outside a tribal education camp was set aflame by Dara Singh and his mob of fundamentalists.

The film casts Kietel as a secular expatriate, American schoolmaster Edward Baker, who struggles against a tide of anti-Christian sentiment that threatens his students, his school and his life. The film’s cinematography is by Baris Ozbicer.

His last film, Bal, won the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival. The screenplay of Against Itself has won the IFFLA film fund development grant instituted by the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles.

The grant jury included acclaimed screenwriters Gill Dennis (Walk The Line), Anurag Kashyap (Dev D, Black Friday) and Sooni Taraporevala (Salaam Bombay, Mississippi Masala, The Namesake).

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