Fire (1996)

Fire is a 1996 Indo-Canadian erotic romantic drama film written and directed by Deepa Mehta, starring Shabana Azmi and Nandita Das. It is the first installment of Mehta’s Elements trilogy; it is succeeded by Earth (1998) and Water (2005).

The film is loosely based on Ismat Chughtai’s 1942 story, Lihaaf (The Quilt). Fire is one of the first mainstream Bollywood films to explicitly show h0m0sex-ual relations, and the first to feature a l3sb!an relationship.

Sita and Radha, young Indian women whose husbands choose celibacy or mistresses over their wives. This makes them to fall for eachother and form an intimate, passionate relationship amidst a close-minded society.

Cast

Nandita Das as Sita
Shabana Azmi as Radha
Karishma Jhalani as young Radha
Ramanjit Kaur as Young Radha’s mother
Dilip Mehta as Young Radha’s father
Javed Jaffrey as Jatin
Vinay Pathak as Guide at Taj Mahal
Kushal Rekhi as Biji
Ranjit Chowdhry as Mundu
Kulbhushan Kharbanda as Ashok
Alice Poon as Julie
Ram Gopal Bajaj as Swamiji
Ravinder Happy as Oily man in video shop
Devyani Saltzman as Girl in video shop
Sunil Chabra as Milkman on bicycle
Avijit Dutt as Julie’s father
Shasea Bahadur as Julie’s brother
Meher Chand as Goddess Sita
Bahadur Chand as God Ram
Puran, Sohan Lal, Meher, Amarjit Chand, and Karahm Chand as ‘Ramayan’ theatrical troupe members
Kabir Chowdhury as Boy in video shop
Laurence Côte as French tourist at the Taj Mahal