Ismail Merchant

"Smile, cheriakutti--remember," calls out director Ismail Merchant as he coaches 7-year-old Arshia Rafique for a scene in the latest Merchant Ivory production, "Cotton Mary." Merchant is speaking Malayalam, the language of the south Indian state of Kerala, where the film is on location. He is talking gently, addressing the child as "little girl" in her own tongue.

"My Little Girl" (AMC Century 14, Beverly Center Cineplex and Monica 4-Plex) is a heartfelt story about a Main Line Philadelphia 16-year-old who takes a volunteer summer job at a temporary detention shelter for homeless girls. It marks the directorial debut of Connie Kaiserman, an associate producer for Merchant Ivory Productions, who helped back this film, and it also marks the final screen appearance of the late Geraldine Page.

Ismail Merchant captured a great deal of media attention recently when the film that he produced, "A Room With a View," garnered eight Academy Award nominations. "Room" wound up with three of those awards--best costume design, best art decoration and best screenplay adapted from another medium.

Richard Robbins, the composer who created memorable scores for such films as "A Room With a View," "Howards End" and "The Remains of the Day" during a quarter-century collaboration with director James Ivory and producer Ismail Merchant, has died. He was 71. Robbins died Nov. 7 at his home in Rhinebeck, N.Y., of Parkinson's disease, said Michael Schell, his longtime partner. Robbins created the score for nearly every Merchant Ivory film from "The Europeans" in 1979 to "The White Countess" in 2005.

The films of Indian producer Ismail Merchant, California-born director James Ivory and their writer, the German-born novelist Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, are almost invariably literary adaptations, witty and intimate, and reflect their own cross-cultural sensibilities. The partners are indeed expert at deceptively gentle depictions of cultural confrontations that reverberate quietly with implications.

Ismail Merchant had been pursuing the film rights to a book by the famously prickly Nobel laureate V.S. Naipaul for three years when, finally, the expansive, debonair producer-director tried the direct approach. "I wrote to Vidia and said I would come and see him," Merchant recalls. But word of Merchant's negotiating skill had reached Naipaul. "He wrote back: 'Don't come, because I know of your persuasive powers. Work it out with my agents.' Shortly afterwards, we bought the book outright."

Adapted from the first novel by eventual Nobel winner V.S. Naipaul, "The Mystic Masseur" is not only based on a book, it is also a love note to the impressive power of the printed word, a charming tale of how an obsessive devotion to literature was the making of a charismatic man of the people. "Mystic Masseur" is the fourth film to be directed by Ismail Merchant, also known as the producing half of the Merchant Ivory team.

Filmmakers Ismail Merchant, James Ivory and screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala will discuss the 1996 film "The Proprietor" on Saturday following a 9 p.m. screening of the film at the Museum of Tolerance, 9786 W. Pico Blvd. Tickets for the film and discussion are $5. For tickets: (310) 553-9036, Ext. 320.

Tina Turner will play an Indian goddess in a new Merchant Ivory film and sing Indian classical songs, a newspaper report said Tuesday. Famous for power-packed musical performances in high heels and leather miniskirts, the 64-year-old singer will star in "The Goddess," the Times of India said.