Parched

Leena Yadav's "Parched" begins as a faithful document of three women's emotionally intertwined lives and later veers into an incisive character study. But it finally couldn't find any way to end except as a rosy fantasy in which the subject is sidelined for plot convenience.

The film takes place in what appears like a Rajasthani desert village that is still skeptic about anything that thrusts them towards advancement including television, and where patriarchy still reigns in its aboriginal glory. We are taken into an India where still women are no more than child rearing machine....