‘Sita Sings the Blues’ - The Greatest Break-up story ever told
An entertaining 82-minute animation film. Can be viewed on YouTube broken into ten parts.
The film itself is a multi-layered affair using different animation styles reflecting a modern day story, a set of narrators providing cultural background, context, and sometimes humorous commentary, and two styles telling an edited version of the _Ramayana_, an Indian epic of great cultural significance. The story itself mainly revolves around events as viewed by Sita, wife of the main hero Rama. And the charming use of 1920s blues songs voiced by Annette Hanshaw.
The film is done in 2-D and Flash animation, and was initially released in its current form in 2008. Due to copyright issues around the use of the Annette Hanshaw music the film has a rather unorthodox distribution and is supported by limited DVD sales and donations. And it appears that the issues surrounding this have made the author, Nina Paley, a free culture advocate.
The film appears to have drawn severe criticism from right-wing religious groups in India about how it portrays the characters of the _Ramayana_. Which, given the creator, the film’s focus, and the use of Western media (music) in the presentation does not surprise me one bit.
Finally, the morning behavior of the cat Lexi in the opening few minutes exactly parallels how one of my cats behave. Cat Overlords apparently have been issued a manual.