Movie Murmur

Sushma, my wife, had agreed upon this one bedroom-kitchen-hall abode that we are presently residing, mainly because our colony, Satellite Park, has a lot of open spaces – a rare commodity in a land starved city like Mumbai. Besides, it is just a stone’s throw away from the Jogeshwari Railway Station. But after having lived here for over a year, I have no option but to conclude that it takes some sort of courage to make an existence here. For example, I can say, with a certain degree of confidence, that only the strong willed and the brave hearted can manage to complete the short but adventurous journey from the Jogeshwari Railway Station to my house at Satellite Park. The ordeal starts right away when you get down from an auto at S.V. Road, near the railway crossing in Jogeshwari West. But before you can even think of getting down, you might encounter some quick-reflexed passengers trying to get into your auto to grab seats. If you are not fast enough, you might just be pushed out! Th...

The other day, I showed my 105 minutes Tulu film SUDDHA to a few friends in Mumbai. Among the viewers was Srinivas Jokatte, a Mumbai based Kannada short story writer and journalist at ‘Karnataka Malla’, a Mumbai Kannada newspaper. After seeing the film one of his reaction was that it is an “Art Film” and some of the subtleties that such ‘Art Films’ would posses might not work with ordinary filmgoers. He gave examples of some ‘Art Films’ that had come from Bangalore at the height of the New Wave Movement a few decades back. ‘People did not understand what the filmmakers were trying to say’ he lamented. He added quickly, ‘There is no such communication issues with your film, but will the layman get the meaning of, for example, the general village shots that you have inserted between various sequences?’ In SUDDHA, as an editing pattern, there are some general village shots that I had inserted in between some key sequences. These are shots showing villagers going about in their daily routi...