Movie Murmur

Sometime in January, 2013, Jayashree Rajagopalan got in touch with me regarding an article that she was writing on Children's films in India. She had picked up four films for a detailed analysis - Santosh Sivan’s Tahaan (2008), Jayashree Kanal and A. S. Kanal’s Chota Sipahi [Little Soldier] (2005, in Hindi, Vinod Ganatra's Harun-Arun (2009) and my Putaani Party (2009).    Here is the link to the entire article by Jayashree Rajagopalan... Heal the World, Make It a Better Place: Social and Individual Hope in Indian Children’s Cinema  I am pasting the relevant portion of what she has written about Putaani Party .....   By involving children in politics, Ramchandra P. N.’s Putaani Party presents a completely different kind of idealism that deals with substance abuse at the rural household level and covers the larger argument of a child’s ability to reason with adults. Ramchandra P. N. reveals that his child protagonists “have discussions and dialogues thr...

 The Children of Kannur In the month of July, 2011, Deepak Paramanand and a few of his friends ran a summer camp for a few under privileged kids in the village of Kannur, in Bijapur, North Karnataka, India. They conduct these courses every year, where teachers volunteer to teach the next year portion for the kids. The children are also engaged in a few cultural activities. In 2011, they showed 'Putaani Party'. The children who acted in the film were called for the screening. After a healthy discussion with these children, the next day the children of Kannur marched through the lanes of their village making a case against alcoholism. They petitioned the Gram Panchayat (Village Governing Body) asking them to stop units in their village that sell illegal liquor. The insistent children brought the government officials and the police to the scene. The children were aided by self help and some women's groups. The Panchayat then decided to ca...

Manohar Patel is an agriculturalist and a self styled wild life documentary film maker. He is outspoken and direct in his communication. Srikant Kelahatti is soft spoken, persuasive, methodical and a practicing charted accountant. Both are environmental activists, both love theater and are avid film buffs. They run an institution called 'Maithreya Institute for Environmental Studies.' Conservation of grassland ecology around the Tiptur region in Central Karnataka, illegal quarrying that have all but destroyed the nearby villages and the dumping of third rate environmentally harmful industrial technology by the west are some of the day to day issues that they deal with. Thus, both face physical threats from the anti environment lobby that they have pitched themselves against. In the evenings when they get bored with their day to day existence they call up each other and identify a nearby village – making sure from the electricity board that there is no scheduled power cut in...

Links to my new feature film in Kannada language... If you are looking to arrange a screening for your club / college / house / office please click HERE Trailer Official Site Facebook Page 'Putaani Party'