London, Dec. 15: Gurinder Chadha's much talked-about film on Partition, Viceroy's House, "is not an Indian film, but a film for everyone", her spokeswoman said today.
Gurinder, best known for her 2002 movie Bend It Like Beckham, also provided the first details today about Viceroy's House, which will go on general release on March 3.
She has got a couple of British stars in lead roles.
One is Hugh Bonneville, who played the Earl of Grantham, head of the aristocratic Crawley dynasty, in Downton Abbey, probably the most successful British television drama of all time.
He is cast as Lord Mountbatten, the last British viceroy of India.
His wife, Lady (Edwina) Mountbatten, is played by Gillian Anderson, known throughout the world as FBI special agent Dana Scully in the The X-Files. But she is also a highly regarded character actress who has most recently played senior policewoman Stella Gibson in the psychological thriller, The Fall. She is in pursuit of a serial killer.
Gurinder appears to have used Viceroy's House to insert a political message appealing for greater tolerance towards refugees - a big issue confronting all European nations which are under pressure to take in more migrants from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and other nations convulsed by war.
She has also included a Hindu-Muslim love story in the movie to widen its appeal.
On the face of it, Viceroy's House appears to be a very different kind of film from Richard Attenborough's Gandhi, with which it is likely to be compared because of the subject.
There are other well-known names in the cast.
The Mountbattens' daughter, Pamela, is played by Lily Travers ( Kingsman); while Sir Michael Gambon (Harry Potter, Quartet) and Simon Callow ( A Room With A View, Four Weddings and a Funeral) feature as key civil servants.
The Indian and Pakistani cast is led by Manish Dayal ( The Hundred Foot Journey), Huma Qureshi (Gangs of Wasseypur) and Om Puri ( The Hundred Foot Journey, East Is East). The roles of the political leaders are played by Tanveer Ghani ( Nehru), Denzil Smith (Jinnah) and Neeraj Kabi ( Mahatma Gandhi).
The story is said to be "deeply personal" to Gurinder, whose family was caught up in the horror of Partition. She was born into a Sikh family in Nairobi on January 10, 1960, came to Britain with her parents when she was two and grew up in Southall.
Upstairs in the Viceregal residence, according to the details provided today, "lived Mountbatten together with his wife and daughter; downstairs lived their 500 Hindu, Muslim and Sikh servants. As the political elite - Nehru, Jinnah and Gandhi - converged on the House to wrangle over the birth of independent India, conflict erupted. A decision was taken to divide the country and create a new Muslim homeland: Pakistan".
According to Gurinder, she is attempting to send out "an inspirational message that celebrates tolerance".
"Many of the events depicted are either unknown or forgotten, but all have strong contemporary relevance in terms of lessons to be learnt concerning the politics of division and fear, the origins of religious extremism, and our moral responsibility towards migrants fleeing violence for a better life."
