THE ‘FOUR YEARS LATER’ LOVE STORY CAPTIVATES VIEWERS UPON ITS OCT. RELEASE
Upon it’s release, ‘Four Years Later’ has compelled its audience through the narrative navigation of enduring love through the polarity of differing cultures, identities and ideals. ScreenHub Australia provided the show a gushing four-and-a-half-star review… ‘Often the big strength of telling a love story is that audiences are already familiar with how the story goes. You don’t have to spend time spelling everything out; you can skip the obvious and focus on other things.
Initially Four Years Later seems more interested in the culture clash angle of its tale of a newly married Indian couple together again in Australia after years apart. But looks can be deceiving; this is a sharply insightful look at the nuances of love, relationships, and the way everything else in life can crowd them out.
Four years ago, Sridevi (Shahana Goswami) and Yash (Akshay Ajit Singh) met in Jaipur. They weren’t merely going through the motions as far as meeting a prospective partner, but neither were they ready to jump into each other’s arms. Independent and free-spirited, Sridevi might have been considering settling down, but she definitely wasn’t willing to settle. With a hard-driving father pushing him into a medical career, Yash’s focus was mostly elsewhere.
Now Sridevi has arrived in Sydney, having jumped on a plane to be with her now-husband Yash. Four years ago, they pair made it work. She chose him, and having chosen him she stuck by that choice even when, seemingly the moment they were married, he was whisked off to another country for a medical traineeship. His family persuaded him that having her with him would be a distraction. Seeing how tough he has to work, it’s hard to say they were entirely wrong.
Four Years Later: time shifts
Constantly shifting back and forth in time, and with plenty of information concealed from us, Four Years Later is intriguing from the moment Sridevi touches down in Sydney. What kind of connection does she have with bowls club pick-up artist Matt (Luke Arnold, hopefully not playing the same character he’s currently appearing as in Last King of the Cross)? For that matter, what’s going on with Yash and Jamal (Taj Aldeeb) the cleaner he’s befriended at his hospital?
Their past, at least, seems more settled, though for most viewers alarm bells will be ringing almost from the moment the two lovers meet. She’s barely ready to settle down, and though she throws herself into her marriage – going from someone who doesn’t cook to bringing Yash a perfect hot lunch at work – it’s clear that one of the things she wants out of a relationship is new experiences.
Yash, on the other hand, is barely coping with the experiences he already has. He’s obviously not excelling at his job, and living alone a continent away from everything he’s known has him fraying at the edges. His domineering father has set him on a course that brings him no joy; it’s hard to know whether he sees Sridevi as just another part of that burden, or an escape from it. After years apart, it’s possible he doesn’t even know himself.
Love stories traditionally thrive on quiet moments, scenes where the lovers can open up and connect. Here they hardly get a moment to themselves. In India, they’re constantly surrounded by family; in Australia, no sooner has Yash brought Sridevi into his home than he’s called into work. There’s a constant sense here that if they could only spend some quality alone time together, maybe they could work things out – or even just realise they have things to work out.
Four Years Later: India and Australia
Four Years Later takes full advantage of its Indian and Australian locations, both as striking (and sometimes oppressive) settings and as a way to explore character. On an early date, Yash takes Sridevi to an Indian zoo, a somewhat old-fashioned establishment where he sees the animals as symbols of freedom and power while she’s increasingly appalled at their captivity.
In Sydney, travelling home after a fumbled attempt to reconnect, she suddenly finds herself passing a beach. Jumping off the bus and jumping into the ocean, she’s once again embracing new possibilities – until passing surfer Gabs (Kate Box) bluntly warns her about the dangers of the ocean currents.
Sharply observed and full of telling details when it comes to love (and occasionally lust), this is compulsive viewing even when you just wish Yash would get a grip. Surrounded by a top notch supporting cast, both leads are utterly convincing as authentically flawed human beings, people who are trying to find happiness in a world that expects them to figure it all out in what little spare time they’re given.
We’re used to Australian dramas that look good; rarely do we get one as well written as Four Years Later. It’d be easy to read it as a series about a couple who’ve grown apart, but as it digs deeper into their lives it’s increasingly clear that they never really found the time to come together. They’re not rediscovering their love, they’re still finding it in the first place. Maybe they won’t find it at all.
Anthony Morris, ScreenHub Australia
2nd of October, 2024
The Conversation discusses: ‘SBS’s Four Years Later is an immigrant love story that pushes the boundaries of onscreen representation’
SBS’s new romantic drama Four Years Later comes in the middle of an eventful week for cultural diversity in the Australian media.
On one hand, there was a scathing review that revealed systemic racism across the ABC. On the other, there was the release of Media Diversity Australia’s Race Reporting Toolkit, intended to give journalists tools to report without resorting to racial stereotyping.
Four Years Later, an eight-part series commissioned by Screen Australia and SBS, epitomises the tension of making and watching racialised media in the current climate. The series follows an Indian couple, Sri (Shahana Goswami) and Yash (Akshay Ajit Singh), as they reunite in Australia after being forced to spend four years apart so Yash can complete his medical traineeship.
The series comes 14 years after writer and producer Mithila Gupta first introduced an Indian family to the long-running soap Neighbours. But is an Australian audience ready for content that doesn’t translate the non-white parts for a white audience?
This question may be redundant because the Australian audience itself is changing.
The changing face of Australian content
My and my colleagues’ interviews with intergenerational migrant audiences have revealed it’s largely the children of migrants who wish for more onscreen diversity to reflect their own lives. We also found young people of colour were turning away from Australian broadcasters to find said diversity on streaming platforms.
Four Years Later comes at a time when South Asian-Australian stories are finally creating ripples in Australia’s art sector, led in no small part by the success of the epic 2019 play Counting and Cracking.
Following the success of Netflix’s diverse Heartbreak High reboot, it’s heartening to see a public broadcaster take the “risk” of producing a series led by two Indian-Australian characters.
As a scholar of migrants’ screen media, and someone who has been part of the Indian-Australian community for more than two decades, I’ve been party to countless conversations about how to authentically tell stories of Indian diaspora onscreen. This felt even more pressing in an Australian context as South Asian creatives in the United States and United Kingdom began gaining recognition for their outputs.
Having said that, it would be remiss to describe Four Years Later as just an Indian-Australian love story. Although it’s about migrants experiencing great precariousness while establishing themselves in Australia (and while still facing pressures from back home), the series has many universal elements.
It would appeal to most millennials trying to find themselves amid global crises and ticking clocks.
Countering stereotypes
While watching the show, I found the scenes set in India especially refreshing. The father’s typical patriarchal attitudes notwithstanding, the young characters display a kind of nuance that helps to counter common stereotypes about Indian people and culture.
For instance, Sri uses dating apps and attends meetings unchaperoned. And while she and Yash meet through a matchmaker arranged by their parents, their romance blossoms despite their families – not because of them. Also, despite being a stoic and dutiful son, Yash chooses Sri against his father’s wishes.
Both characters make mistakes and evolve during the four years between their wedding in India and reconvening in Sydney. However, Sri’s character stands out as being particularly flawed, making it an authentic and groundbreaking representation of a woman of colour onscreen.
The freedom Sri always craved – but only begins to inhabit in beach-side Australian settings in her late 30s – isn’t what you would expect from a kurta-clad Indian woman who has just arrived in a new country. You’re more likely to encounter images of such women behind a stove or a pram, rather than having a dip in the ocean.
Four Years Later is perhaps better described as a closeted feminist coming-of-age tale, rather than an immigrant love story. While there’s no dearth of feisty female leads in English-language literature coming out of India, seeing this narrative on Australian screens will be incredibly legitimising for local diaspora.
The series also signals how personal agency can and does exist within “collectivist cultures” that are viewed as highly patriarchal and hierarchical.
Opportunities for change
Four Years Later features a range of diverse peripheral characters. These include the second-generation brown anaesthetist who supervises Yash, a Syrian woman who works as a cleaner in the hospital (and doubles as Yash’s friend and love interest), and Sri’s white Australian friend who runs a café.
A second season could explore these relationships and story arcs in more depth. It could, for instance, investigate how many migrants of colour are vested in gaining social capital in new environments – and aren’t just chasing economic aspirations. It could also explore migrant stigmas around mental health, which are alluded to in Yash’s panic attacks.
Such shows have an opportunity to present nuanced narratives that both challenge and enrich viewers’ perspectives. They can also strike a balance between community-specific issues and universal themes in a way that Australia’s news media – grappling as it is with racism and bias – could learn from.
Sukhmani Khorana, The Conversation
7th October, 2024