Filmmaker/cartoonist Nina Paley deliberately released her 2008 feature debut to multiple platforms on a public-domain basis; anyone can download, copy or burn the media, making Sita Sings the Blues an extremely easy addition to film collections. But is it any good? In fact, it is splendid.
Sita Sings the Blues is mostly done in line art and computer-assisted simplified animation overflowing with Hindu imagery, references, and exotic patterns and shapes. The low-budget, high-imagination, cross-cultural, all-ages feature holds its own against any expensive competitor from Disney/Pixar. Writer-director Paley, using a diversity of styles and tones, humorously retells a version of the Ramayana, a national epic of India concerning the mythic exile in the forest of warrior-prince Rama and his curvy wife Sita. The story details Sita’s abduction by villain Ravana and eventual rescue by her husband (with the assistance of Hanuman, the beloved monkey god).
But Sita continues to be wronged as a victim of her culture’s patriarchy and Rama’s jealousy. The story is told from the heroine’s sad-funny POV, brilliantly rendered through musical inserts – not Bollywood-style production numbers, but recordings of American Jazz Age vocalist Annette Hanshaw (endowing Sita with a slightly Betty Boop-ish appeal). Hanshaw was a torch-song diva who died in 1985 and had a habit of ending every song with a cheery “That’s all!” She receives no less than star billing here.
The tale is also accompanied by hilarious modern-vernacular commentaries on the unfolding legend from a trio of shadow-puppets (coming across as the ancient world’s first podcasters) and is paralleled by Paley’s autobiographical account of the wrenching end of her own marriage, which expired as she and her husband spent an extended career sojourn in modern India.
Mildly risqué humor, completely unrealistic cartoon violence, and infidelity ingredients would barely merit worse than a PG, in a perfect world where the likes of Sita Sings the Blues could have won a wide theatrical release. The home release now remains accessible to the widest possible range of viewers. Besides the natural appeal for broad-minded, all-ages animation library shelves, the material should apply to students studying feminism/women's studies, mythology and religion, and Hindu and Indian heritage. Highly recommended.