Page - 93 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Volume 06/01

lains notoriously bear Christian names like Robert, Peter, or John (Amar, Akbar, An- thony), scenes in Christian churches have become quite popular, with Hindu char- acters often praying in such settings (Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge). (See fig. 3) How might we understand these rather conflicted representations? Here again, Hindi popular film reveals certain tensions and contradictions. As with the Muslim representations, one of the dominant Indian imaginaries is the Christian as innately foreign. To many, Christians exist as a dishonorable remnant of the British imperial past and of Western ways of life. In this rendering Christian equals Western. As with Christians in the Middle East after the American response to September 11, South Asian Christians in India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka are often treated as Western prox- ies. It matters not that Christianity had arrived in South Asia by the fourth century (and possibly by the first century, with St. Thomas the Apostle); and it is immaterial that those converts to Christianity over the last five centuries are in fact indigenous to South Asia (and more often from low caste or Dalit backgrounds). Conversion to Christianity in some misty past seems to erect an ontological chasm between Indian (essentialized as Hindu) and Christian – as though one’s genetic structure is washed away in baptismal waters. Fig. 4: Parveen Babi as Anita, the Westernized vamp: Christian, oversexed, underdressed, and deracinated. At the bar with Amitabh Bachchan, Deewaar (Yash Chopra, IN 1975), 01:52:03. 92 | Kerry P.  C. San Chirico www.jrfm.eu 2020, 6/1, 73–102