The film is based no Dostoevsky’s The Idiot. The action has been moved to contemporary Bombay, but the names of the characters and the essence of the issues at stake have been retained. Kaul sees a parallel between the social and political situation in 19th-century Russia and that of contemporary India. He is not just interested in the story, but also in the way Dostoevsky wrote it. For the moments when the author used literary means to evoke a state of chaos, Kaul has sought cinematographic equivalents. He based himself partially on the notebooks which Dostoevsky maintained as he wrote the novel. The film has consciously been shot in chronological order and Kaul has deliberately left room for improvisation. He wanted to evoke the effect of a film ‘being made’ instead of a film that ‘has been made’.Protagonist is Prince Miskin, who returns to Bombay after a long absence. He has lived in London for a long time to receive treatment for his epileptic attacks. In Bombay he soon meets two women who evoke his love: Amba, the cultivated youngest daughter of a senior civil servant and the beautiful and wayward Nastassya. The latter is desired by several men, among them Raghujan who tries to buy her with his recently -acquired legacy.Paul Willemen, working for the BFI (British Film Institute) on an encyclopaedia of Indian film, argues that this is among the most important from the history of Indian film.
