key scenes from “Gandhi”

1. assassination scene

In this scene is shown how Gandhi is shot down. The scene is found not only in the beginning, but also at the end of the film. Normally the viewer expects not Gandhi´s death in the beginning, but showing this scene first of all, the spectator knows what will happen to Gandhi and thus he´s able to concentrate on other things, for example how it amounts to this kind of death and to the whole situation.

2. Gandhi in South Africa – burning the passes

In this scene Gandhi is in South Africa where he advocates for the rights of the Indian minority. He protests against an existing unjust law. He starts burning the passes, the Indians have to carry all along. He gets to know the brutality of the police officers, but that doesn´t bar him from going on to burn the passes.

3. Life in ashram

I think his life in the ashram was very important for Gandhi. It has something to do with the Hindu religion and, because it´s of place of retirement in a way, Gandhi can also reflect and meditate on many things.

4. The second meeting – passive resistance

At this second meeting Gandhi tells many other Indians about his dream of independent India and how he wants to achieve this. The only way to the independence of India is the passive resistance. Gandhi appeals for their help and gets much support.

5. Visit at poor & starving farmer

Gandhi visits a poor and starving farmer. He catches sight of the bad conditions, which exist for many people. He tells the farmer, that he´ll do his best. Thus Gandhi informs himself and gets to know more and more about the situation. His decision to take action against the British and particularly their behaviour towards the Indians stronger.

6. Gandhi´s fast

Gandhi did fast some times. He has done this as his personal form of protest. He wanted to point out, that the independence of India can only be reached, if there is no violence. The resistance has to be passive. While his fasts he pushed the envelope, but he reached, what he wanted. The people stopped fighting and also stopped using violence.

7. Salt march

Gandhi went with many other people to the sea for extracting salt. He said that it was the salt of the Indian people and the British aren´t entitled to extract salt and sell it for many money to the Indian people. Thus the Indians now extracted the salt from the sea.