Holy shit, not so soon!!!

-
It is almost like an odd-even scheme if you are seeing some of your work along with a group of selected and informed film buffs. Even - because you begin to see the graph of your journey and the connection between your seemingly different films. Odd - because the 'retrospective', so to say, gives you the feeling of being a 'senior citizen' and you end up saying, 'Holy shit, not so soon!!!'

Ashish Arora
Deepa Pathak
Gurpal Singh
Deepa Pathak and Ashish Aurora run a quintessential resort in the hilly Uttarakand village called Sonapani, in India. Well, it is not just a resort - they organise music festivals, food festivals and film festivals for select groups here. Gurpal Singh helps them curate some of these festivals.

Raam Reddy, Niharika Popli, Ramchandra PN
The film festival from 4th to 6th of March, 2016 was their tenth one in five years. Each time three film makers are invited and their select films screened. This time, it was young Niharika Popli who has made a wonderful documentary on the musical legend Ustad Abdul Rashid Khan called 'Rasan Priya'; the younger Raam Reddy, whose debut film 'Thithi' is making waves the world over; apart from myself.

The festival has its own quite pace - films are interspersed with music secessions, nature walks and serious and non serious reading secessions. The first day, it was Niharika's film that was shown. The second day was a bit hectic . The lineup included Raam Reddy's film, my documentary 'Miyar House' and my debut feature film 'Suddha' (The Cleansing Rites). 
Haal e Kangaal

'Haal-e-Kangaal' (The Bankrupts) was on the third day. So, was my documentary on the theater legend, BV Karanth. Judging by the responses that I got for 'Haal-e-Kangaal', it was by far the most satisfactory screenings of the film. I have had about twenty odd screenings of this film at seven to eight cities and towns. It is only in Kolkata and Manipal that I got such instant receptivity. 

Way back during the 1984-85, when I was still in college, I had asked my father if I could apply for the Film and TV Institute of India. I wanted to do the direction course. He was shocked, but he calmly asked me to complete my degree course first. 'Let us see, then.', he had said. 
BV Karanh: Baba

I was disappointed. I remember declaring to my classmate and neighbor Anil Nayak that I will at least complete one fiction feature film before I turn fifty years old - even if I am not allow to join the film school. It turns out that I got into the film school, I have made three fiction feature films, a host of documentaries and I have now just crossed fifty.

It is always useful to pause and look back on what you have been through - the good, the bad, the ugly, the dirty, the stupid and the indifferent. The Sonapani film festival has just been that for me. The magic of the 'Hills' is that it sometimes puts you in a reflective mode.

And I refuse to accept that I am inching towards becoming a senior citizen; not as of yet.


To screen any of my films in your schools, colleges, film clubs or even offices 
please contact 
HERE.

The first four photos are by Kanishka Prasad. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Short Fictional Journey - Part 3

-
Image
(My foray into the short fiction format) Shooting of a Short fiction film Coming to think of it, even a shot thirty second advertisement film is a short fiction film. A not so handsome guy wears a cream and the girl falls for him - this could be the one liner of the story of an advertisement film on a fairness cream. Not that yours truly did not dip his hands into such versions of the short fiction film. An advertisement film on a bindi, a hair shampoo and a greeting card were some attempts that I had done in the initial days of my career in this format. The only 'non-neoliberal' solace that I have right now is that the companies that manufactured these products were not large multinational corporations - they were run by small entrepreneurs. In 2008, Sameer Mahajan the cameraman of my first fiction feature movie ' Suddha ' (The Cleansing Rites) gave me a call saying that he was facilitating the making of a short promotional film that will act as an eye op
Read more

13\3 PMGP – Beginning

-
It was a 180 sq foot ground floor flat that I had purchased during my early days in Mumbai. It was just a stopgap arrangement, before I moved on to a bigger flat. I had planned to stay there for exactly two years. It took me more than thirteen years and a whole lot of persuasion to get out of 13\3, PMGP Colony at Mahakali, Andheri (East), Mumbai. Initially, when I brought the place, well-wishers had warned me that the number of the house was unlucky. But for me, the purchase was a huge accomplishment – acquiring a roof akin to making a film. In fact, my friend and classmate from the film school, Rajiv Katiyal did comment in jest, ‘Ram could not make a film, so he purchased a flat’. Yes, technically it was a ‘flat’. It had a living area, a tiny kitchen space and an attached bathroom cum toilet. Back home, my relatives were surprised and even impressed! This black sheep of the family had the presence of mind to buy a flat and that too, within a few years of moving into the city. But only
Read more

My Experiments with an Alternate Screening System

-
Image
At 1.00 A.M this morning, I had one of the strangest screenings in my life. An audience of around 650 Tulu speaking hotel laborers watched my Tulu digital feature film, SUDDHA (The Cleansing Rites) at the Vishweshwaraiya Auditorium, Matunga run by the Karnataka Sangha, Mumbai. Karnataka Sangha is one of the premium Kannada organizations culturally active in Mumbai. Mumbai, as many of you are aware, is the home for ‘Udupi Hotels’ – eateries that provide cheap and affordable food stuff to the city’s population. Most of the management staff as well as the labor force in these hotels are migrants from the Tulu speaking coastal belt of Karnataka. Over the years many of these hotels have graduated to being Beer Bars and are often kept open, till late in the night. The Karnataka Sangha, apart from being responsible for thought provoking programs relating to music, literature and theater, also caters to the entertainment needs of these migrant hotel workers, by letting out its premises to e
Read more