Ava Duvernay’s ‘Origin’ wants us to question our role in caste system. Will we make amends?

Race in US, Nazism in Germany and caste in India – Ava Duvernay’s adaptation of Isabel Wilkerson's book takes us to the root of societal divisions.

A still from Origin | YouTube screengrab

After reading Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents in 2020, the first thought that crossed my mind was whether a filmmaker could adapt it into a movie—and if it would have to be a trilogy. A dense and complex text, it traces a historical process spanning three continents and three different concepts – race, anti-semitism, and caste.

American talk show host and TV producer Oprah Winfrey included the title in her book club and sent it to the US’ top 100 CEOs. The New York Times called it an “instant American classic”. Then came the news that director Ava Duvernay (Selma) had acquired adaptation rights to the book.

That, however, was the era of Covid-19. The project got delayed and some of the footage was lost. Origin will now be released globally in January 2024, but I had the opportunity to watch it in Los Angeles, where it was shown in select theatres as part of a pre-release event.

I entered the AMC Century City theatre with many apprehensions. Not because I doubted the capabilities of the director—she has already established herself as an auteur extraordinaire with her Oscar-winning 2014 film. Yet, I couldn’t help but wonder how a mammoth book like Caste would translate into a two-hour movie.

Exploring divisions

Duvernay did the unthinkable. Instead of basing Origin on Wilkerson’s work, she made it about the author herself. Wilkerson became the protagonist, telling the story of her book’s beginnings.

The process of writing Caste became the script for Origin, and Duvernay got the opportunity to give a human face to Wilkerson’s book. The director, who also wrote the script, went beyond the book to tell many more stories—brutal, horrific, and heartwarming. She put things into perspective, hopping from the past to the present to weave a seamless narrative.

Origin uses Wilkerson’s story to show how societies divide people into different categories based not just on race but on ‘caste’. The protagonist (played by Aunjanue Ellis) poses a pertinent question: in the US, it’s easy to explain hatred and hierarchy based on race or skin colour. It seems simple and linear. But how can one explain Nazi hatred toward Jews? Jews are also White, and there’s no physical marker that separates them from other European races. And yet, Adolf Hitler’s Germany nearly exterminated them.

Duvernay further questions how, in India, where everyone is from the same racial stock, some communities are still treated as untouchables and relegated to work as sewage cleaners. She features Dr BR Ambedkar in her movie, who is played by Gaurav Pathania, a sociology professor. In a movie that is made to trace linkages between race, caste, and anti-Semitism, Ambedkar’s role is both powerful and symbolic. In one scene, for instance, Suraj Yengde, the author of Caste Matters, rightly emphasises Ambedkar’s significance in the fight for dignity and equal rights. Duvernay then questions the concepts of birth-based hierarchy, ‘purity’ and ‘impurity’ among the seemingly same type of people. Some Indians, she says, are so peeved about caste-based equality that they annually vandalise hundreds of statues of Ambedkar. She proceeds to show a statue of Babasaheb that is placed in an iron cage to prevent vandals from breaking or disfiguring it.

The film explores Wilkerson’s quest for answers, which took her to Germany and then India. She took on the role of a journalist, anthropologist, and ethnographer to prove her hypothesis that caste is the ideological infrastructure of racial and anti-Semitic hatred. It boxes people into different hierarchical categories and ascribes values like superior-inferior and pure and profane to them.

Origin uses examples from the past and present to show how discriminatory thoughts influence people.

Not ‘entertainment’

What makes Duvernay’s film special is that it shows Wilkerson looking at the caste problem from a personal lens. The film makes us feel like we’re right there with Wilkerson, seeing things from her perspective.

Origin is a strong film that gets us thinking about society’s labelling of people and the problems it causes. In fact, it’s more than a movie. It shows us how we can change things for the better by understanding and attempting to fix existing systems.

Wilkerson describes an old house that looks just fine from the outside but is crumbling from the inside. The current owner is not responsible for its construction but must pay for repairs. Similarly, today’s generation might argue that they have not subjugated anyone, so why should they be blamed for casteism, racism and related problems? Wilkerson answers that, just like in the case of the old house, the present generation must amend past mistakes.

Origin does not seek to amuse its audience. It chooses to disturb and question us—and does so brilliantly.

Dilip Mandal is the former managing editor of India Today Hindi Magazine, and has authored books on media and sociology. He tweets @Profdilipmandal. Views are personal.

(Edited by Zoya Bhatti)