Posted: 17 years ago

Mrinal Sen, one of India's greatest directors, will be honoured with the Dadasaheb Phalke Award in New Delhi on February 2. In this excerpt from a conversation with Samik Bandopadhyay, Mrinalda discusses three familiar actors he has worked with.

Smita (Patil) knew she wanted to do the role. And Shabana (Azmi) knew she wanted to, too. They knew that I was working on this film. They were then acting in Mandi. Shabana was the landlady. Smita was the prostitute. And Sreela (Majumdar)was in it too. Both of them called me up and said that they wanted to act in my new film. And Sreela too, following their example, pitched in with her request. I told her to calm down. 'You are practically family. Stop worrying.' I sat down and wrote to both Shabana and Smita. 'You are definitely acting in my next film. But unlike Shyam (Benegal), I cannot move about with a harem, like a Mughal Emperor. He can take plenty of women at a time, but I can't take more than one woman at a time. I start with you. After you, I'll take on another actress. You are a great actress. So is the other one.'

I wrote 'Dear Shabana' on one and 'Dear Smita' on the other. I deliberately interchanged the envelopes and sent them off. I got to hear of the end result much later, from Shyam (Benegal). They were at the dinner table. It was during the filming of Aarohan (produced by West Bengal Film Development Corporation). (They had exposed 10,000 feet in order to shoot some lightning. I was told by the best laboratory of West Europe that they had never seen lightning shot this way before. I had borrowed some of that for Genesis.) Shabana came to dinner, wearing a long face. And told Smita, 'This is a letter for you.' And Smita too, pulling out a letter from her wallet, said, 'Here, this one's yours.' (Laughs.) They confessed that they'd had a big laugh about it.

Shabana could really put one on the spot. One couldn't say no. One never had a chance to do so. I was visiting Shabana once at her father's place in Juhu. As I got up to leave, she gave me a rose. We exchanged kisses and left. This was before Khandahar (1983). The moment I stepped out, I met Smita who had come to collect her parents. They were on the way to Prithvi Theatre to watch a play. There I was, outside Shabana's house, clutching a rose to my breast. Like a Mughal Emperor on his way to war! 'Mrinalda, I've caught you at it!' she exclaimed and hugged me. I didn't know what to say. 'I'm sorry. Do forgive me.' 'No. I've caught you this time. There is only one way you can atone for your sins. You must watch my film Umbartha tomorrow.' 'But my plane leaves at noon tomorrow.'

She was not to be swayed and fixed it up so that I could watch it at the laboratory itself. Somewhere near the Film City. It took an age to get hold of a print and by the time we began watching it, it was almost ten thirty. The film was a long one, and Smita's parents were there too. I sent off a young man who was with me, to the airport, to check in. The moment the film ended, I ran to the car. 'I cannot speak with you now. I must be off or else I'll miss my flight. Well done.' I patted her on the back and was off. 'Next time I come I'll have puran polis with you,' I told her parents, her mother in particular.

She used to make them for me especially and send them over. Smita's mother used to tell me about how she had spent a lot of time traveling with her husband, on political work for the Congress. She said to me, 'I would like to be with your team when you work. I can cook. I have heard so much from Smita. All of you become like one big family. I would like to be a part of it.' I promised Smita that I would call her when I reached home. But she called me first. 'How did you like it?' 'I thought you did very well, although I have my reservations about the film as a whole,' I said. 'I forgive you then, since you did make time to watch the film,' she replied.

After that, when I completed Khandahar, I received a long fax from Cannes. My faxes would come to the Grand Hotel, in those days. They had written that although they had seen Khandahar, they could not accept two films from the same country. They had heard of Ray's Ghare Bairey. And wee convinced that this was his last film because he had fallen sick while filming. They had started this festival with Pather Panchali. Let the Cannes festival end with Ghare Bairey, they requested. No one had seen his film yet. And everyone was worried – if my film won an award and his didn't, then that itself would perhaps kill him off. They said they would extend every support to me and my film but that I must concede to this one request. They screened it, but out of the competitive section. I had nothing to say.

The people at Venice were enraged. 'Why didn't you give it to us?' Anyway, then it went to Montreal. Where it got the Second Prize. And to Chicago where it got the Best Film Award. Then, it was also included in the Film Guide -- where the five best films from all over the world are chosen every year.

Gilles Jacob, director of the Cannes Festival, was present at the Montreal Festival. It is a French-speaking region and Smita was part of the jury too. Gilles called me up one morning: 'Mrinal, though I am leaving this morning, and a friend of mine from India is also leaving, can we meet over breakfast? We perhaps have no time for lunch.' I agreed. I also knew that the friend she wanted to bring for lunch would be none other than Smita. She congratulated me warmly, and said, 'Mrinalda, I simply have to tell you this. I have never seen Shabana look so beautiful before.' It was such a compliment and such an honest confession. Although there were undercurrents of tension between those two leading ladies. Just before that, referring to Smita, Shabana had told me, 'Mrinalda, this woman is sick in the head.' That was the difference between the two. Geeta was very fond of Smita.

Gilles Jacob said, 'You've taken her for one film which won an award at Berlin. I want you to make another film with her, which you must give to me. To my festival.' I agreed. Smita quickly picked up a paper napkin and wrote down this decision. And I signed it, putting down the place and the date. Gilles signed it too and so did Smita. And I remember absolutely clearly, how lovingly and gently she folded it and put it away in her handbag. Three months later she was dead. I was getting hourly updates on her condition. The moment I heard about her death, I sent off a fax to Jacob. And he called me back immediately. 'Whom can I call up, to pay my condolences?' I gave him Smita's husband's number. It was very sad.

(

It was so unexpected, so unnecessary…)

Yes, absolutely. One of the city's most famous doctors had confided to me -- a gynaecologist -- 'One of us is responsible for her death. I visit Bombay frequently and have heard about it. She died because of gross negligence.'

* * *

One morning I visited Khwaja Ahmed Abbas (1914 to 1987, journalist, columnist, scriptwriter and filmmaker), who lived next door. 'Abbas-saheb,' I said. 'I'm making a film.' 'Yes, I've heard.' 'And everyone in it is new. If I go to the Films Division, I know I will get plenty of people – Pratap Shama and the like – whose voices I can use. But I don't want to. We are all such old friends. I want a new voice. Since everyone else is new, I would like this person to be an unknown figure too.'

There was a young man there, amongst many others. Tall. Thin. 'Mrinalda, aami Bangla jaani. Aami kolkatay chhilo,' he said. (Mrinalda, I can speak Bengali. I used to live in Calcutta.) I told him, 'Your Bengali is lousy but your voice is great. And for your information, my film is a Hindi one. The name is Bengali and the protagonist is also Bengali, but it's a Hindi film. I need your voice for a few words a little after the movie begins and then a little bit again, towards the end. Are you willing?' I had to trade with his director.

This young man was working in a movie called Saat Hindustani, at that point. His director, Abbas, said the chap was being loaned to me on condition -- that I would get him Utpal in return. I agreed. I took the young man to Jagdish Banerjee's house -- he had done some work for the Films Division -- who agreed to do the recording. We had a budget of only one and a half lakhs and so had to skimp at every turn. Oh, what a trial that was. The sound of fish being fried next door and then the smell of that same fish wafting past us. It was impossible. I said, 'What the hell! Let's spend some money anyway.' So off we went to Blaze, where we finished the recording in twenty minutes. There was a Hindi translation of Sonaar Bangla. The young man asked me, 'Mrinalda, shall I say "sonaar Bangla"?' I agreed.

When I went to pay him, he refused. 'This is my very first work in films. I simply cannot accept money for it.' I reasoned with him. 'Look, all of us are accepting payment. You cannot insult us like this. Take it professionally. Is this your profession?' 'Yes,' he replied. 'Well then, make a start with this.' So those three hundred rupees were his first earning in the world of films. When I asked him for his name, for the credit line, he simply said, 'Amitabh.' At that point he was still undecided about whether he would keep the Bachchan part of it.

Amitabh Bachchan had spoken the commentary for Bhuvan Shome.

Posted: 17 years ago
Mrinal Sen

Mrinal Sen (Bangla: ????? ???) is a Bengali Indian filmmaker. He was born on (May 14, 1923) , in the town of Faridpur, now in Bangladesh. After finishing his high school there, he left home to come to Calcutta as a student and studied physics at the Scottish Church College and at the University of Calcutta. During his student days, he got involved with the cultural wing of the Communist party. Though he never became a member of the party, his association with the Indian Peoples Theatre Association ( IPTA ) brought him close to a number of like-minded cultural people.

His interest in films started after he stumbled upon a book on film aesthetics. However his interest remained mostly intellectual, and he was forced to take up a job of a medical representative, which took him away from Calcutta. This did not last very long, and he came back to the city and eventually took a job of an audio technician in a Calcutta film studio, which was the beginning of his film carrier.

Mrinal Sen made his first feature film, (Raatbhor), in 1955. His next film, (Neel Akasher Nichey) (Under the Blue Sky), earned him local recognition, while his third film, Baishey Shravan (Wedding Day) was his first film that gave him international exposure.

After making five more films, he made a film with a shoe-string budget provided by the government of India. This film, Bhuvan Shome (Mr. Shome), finally launched him as a major filmmaker, both nationally and internationally. Bhuvan Shome also initiated the "New Cinema" film movement in India.

His next few films were overtly political, and earned him the reputation as a Marxist artist. This was also the time of large-scale political unrest throughout India, particularly in and around Calcutta. This phase was immediately followed by a series of films where he shifted his focus, and instead of looking for enemies outside, he looked for the enemy within his own middle-class society. This was arguably his most creative phase and won him a large number of international awards.

Mrinal Sen never stopped experimenting with his medium. In his later films he tried to move away from the narrative structure and worked with very thin story lines. After a long gap of eight years, at the age of eighty, he made his latest film, Aamar Bhuban, in 2002.

During his career, Mrinal Sen's film have received awards from almost all major film festivals, including (Cannes, Berlin, Venice, Moscow, Karlovy Vary, Montreal, Chicago, and Cairo). Retrospectives of his films have been shown in almost all major cities of the world.

In 2004 Mrinal Sen completed his autobiographical book, Always Being Born.

[edit]
Selet Filmography:
Raatbhor (1955)
Neel Akasher Neechey (1959)
Baishey Sravan (1960)
Punascha (1961)
Abasheshe (1963)
Pratinidhi (1964)
Akash Kusum (1965)
Matira Manisa (1966)
Bhuvan Shome (1969)
Ichhapuran (1970)
Interview (1970)
Ek Adhuri Kahani (1971)
Kolkata 71 (1972)
Padatik (1973)
Chorus (1974)
Mrigaya (1976)
Oka Uri Katha (1977)
Parasuram (1978)
Ek Din Pratidin (1979)
Akaler Sandhane (1980)
Chalchitra (1981)
Kharij (1982)
Khandahar(1983)
Genesis (1986)
Ek din Achanak(1989)
Citi Life - Calcutta My El Dorado (1989)
Mahaprithibi (1991)
Antareen (1993)
100 Years of Cinema (1999)
Amar Bhuban (2002)
Edited by Qwest - 17 years ago
Posted: 17 years ago
Bengali Cinema
Mrinal Sen
 

Sen was born in 1923 in Faridpur ( now in Bangladesh ). He studied with Physics major in Calcutta University. In his young age he got interested in Marxist philosophy. He was used to write film reviews. In 1943 he joined Indian People's Theatre Association (IPTA). His interest in film was sudden when he came a across a book titled "FILM" by Rudolf Arnheim. His films were influenced by leftist idealism and mostly focused the social and political , the crisis in middle class life. Mrinal's first movie was "raat bhor" in 1956. His second movie "Neel Akasher Nichey ( Under The Blue Sky)" was  banned by Govt for two months in 1958. He made "baisey sravan"(A wedding day) in 1960 which was a love story ending in famine. In 1956 he made Akash Kusum (The Daydream). His most remarkable films include Ekdin Pratidin(1979) and Kharij(1982) where he depicted the middle class urban life complexity. In 1980 he directed Akaler Sandhaney( In Search of Famine).  The political unrest in Calcutta was portrayed in his movies as in, Interview, Calcutta 71, Padatik. He made some movies in languages other than Bengali - Oriya, Telegu and Hindi.
 Sen lives in Calcutta and has mot made any movies for quite some time now.


Baise Sravan


Akash Kusum


Genesis


Khandahar


Calcutta 71

Awards:

National : Swarna Kamal (Gold) -- Best film of the year - 4 times, Rajat Kamal (Silver) - Best in various categories/ crafts - many times.

International : Major and minor prizes in International Festivals (Gold, Silver, Bronze) at Cannes, Venice, Berlin, Moscow, Karlovy Vary, Mannheim, Chicago, Montreal, Valladolid (Spain), Avillino, Naples (Italy), Carthage (Tunis), Colombo & Delhi.

Other Awards : Nehru Soviet Land Award, 1979, Padma Bhusan (India), 1981, Commandeur de l'ordre des Arts et letters (France), 1983, D Litt (Honoris Causa), Bardwan University, D Litt (Honoris Causa), Jadavpur University, Calcutta, 1996.

Miscellaneous : Served as member of International Jury at Cannes, Venice, Berlin, Moscow, Karlovy vary, Tokyo, Tehran, Mannheim, Nyon, Chicago, Ghent, Tunis, Oberhausen etc.

Edited by Qwest - 17 years ago
Posted: 17 years ago
indian parallel cinema

Mrinal Sen

Mrinal Sen entered the world of arts through Indian Peoples Theatre Association (IPTA) in 1943. He made his first film Raat Bhor in 1956. Deeply influenced by the leftist ideology, most of his films dealt with social and political themes. His second film Neel Akasher Nichey was banned by the Government for two months in 1958. In most of his films he discussed the complexities of the middle class urban life of Bengal in depth. He also made films in Oriya, Telugu and Hindi.

Mrinal Sen won the National award for best film four times. His films were screened in a number of International film festivals and also won several awards. He has served as a jury member at the Cannes International Film Festival.


Filmography:

    Raatbhor (1955) Neel Akasher Neechey (1959) Baishey Sravan (1960) Punascha (1961) Abasheshe (1963) Pratinidhi (1964) Akash Kusum (1965) Matira Manisa (1966 - Oriya) Bhuvan Shome (1969 - Hindi) Ichhapuran (1970) Interview (1970) Ek Adhuri Kahani (1971- Hindi) Kolkata 71 (1972) Padatik (1973) Chorus (1974) Mrigaya (1976) Oka Uri Katha (1977 - Telegu) Parasuram (1978) Ek Din Pratidin (1979) Akaler Sandhane (1980) Chalchitra (1981) Kharij (1982) Khandahar(1983 - Hindi) Genesis (1986 - Hindi) Ek din Achanak(1989 - Hindi) Mahaprithibi (1991)
  • Antareen (1993 - Hindi)
Edited by Qwest - 17 years ago
Posted: 17 years ago
Mrinal Sen on his credo


''My films are popular failures at the box office. With every failure, I collapse a little. But I still keep on making films'' -- this was Mrinal Sen, one of the greatest directors of our times, at an interactive session at India Habitat Centre in New Delhi on Tuesday.

The renowned film-maker is quite candid in admitting that every director wants to reach the widest possible audience. ''Those who say that they do not care for their audiences are not telling the truth. It is only a kind of defence mechanism they build within themselves,'' quips Mrinal, who after 26 feature films, 2 documentaries and a number of television films, feels he still is experimenting with the medium.

Here in connection with a retrospective of his films, Mrinal Sen says he has worked out a simple formula for himself: ''My films are popular with the minority. If I can gather the minority spectrum scattered across the world, I would be commanding a wide audience.''

According to the veteran film-maker, ''cinema to a large extent is a technological performance''. However, experimentation and non-conformity are critical to evolve with the medium. ''You cannot always go with what your predecessors have told you''.

However, Mrinal Sen says it was important for people to develop a taste for the kind of films that he makes. ''It is very much like reading a book. You have to get attuned to the structure of the story''. Giving an example, he said he found it quite difficult to read the first few pages of Arundhati Roy's ''God of Small Things''. ''The media hype too contributed to the initial hesitation. But then, it is one of the most delightful books I have read''.

His ''Bhuvan Shome'', released in 1969, marked the advent of the new wave of film-making in India.''Though the new cinema did start in India, there are good film-makers are all over the world,'' he says. ''We have been unnecessarily talked about''.

Known for taking up non-conventional themes, Mrinal Sen says he sometimes even departs from the usual beginning, middle and end approach to a narrative. ''Most of my films are as much made spontaneously as they are carefully planned out. When I confront a set or location, some kind of chemistry operates and sometimes I just do not know what is going to happen''.

Notable among his films of over a three decade period are ''Padatik'', ''Antreen'' and ''Ek Din Pratidin'' in Bangla and ''Bhuvan Shome'' and ''Ek Din Achanak'' in Hindi -- all of which are being screened at the India Habitat Centre as part of the month-long Mrinal Sen retrospective.


In an interaction with the audience before the screening of ''Antreen'' on Tuesday evening, the film-maker justified his decision to cast Dimple Kapadia, a Bollywood star, in the movie. ''I wanted a face which should give me a picture of desolation. If you watch the movie, it becomes physically palpable in Dimple's face,'' he says.

While Mrinal Sen is now working on a new script, he refuses to divulge details about the venture. ''Do you ever ask a writer about his new work of fiction or for that matter, do you ask a scientist about a new experiment that he might have decided to conduct?''

Interestingly, the film-maker is candid enough in admitting that he does not have flair for any other language except Bengali and English. Yet, he has made a film in Oriya and Telugu as well. ''My film in Telugu was based on a story by Munshi Premchand. When Premchand wrote the story, he had an Utttar Pradesh village as a model. My script had a Bengal village as a model and the entire thing was then transplanted in Telengana,'' he observes, ''Though I did not know the language, I was very clear about the theme which was grinding poverty and exploitation''.

Looking back on his four decade long journey into the world of film-making, Mrinal Sen says: ''I see myself as a logical extension of what I was 30 years ago. Things might have changed physically but then the intellectual concerns have remained the same.''

By K. Kannan




Posted: 17 years ago
Great articles! I especially liked reading the first one, I like to hear directors talk about actors/film making...it is always so interesting.
Thanks for posting them!
Posted: 17 years ago
Masters of Indian Cinema
 
Name of the Film: Ek Din Achanak (Suddenly One Day)
 
Name of the Director: Mrinal Sen

Plot Summary: Ek Din Achanak in Hindi can be loosely translated as, "One day, without warning." This movie beautifully captures the vagaries of life in a typical middle-class home in a nondescript city in India. The subject of the movie is a retired professor who walks out on a rainy day and disappears without any reasons. The story unfolds as the family reacts to this disappearance first with shock, then sorrow, resignation and finally acceptance. This story is told with the lyrical background of rain and the pace is leisurely. No explanations are given, nor any analysis performed. The director tries to keep the movie focused on the central theme without degenerating the plot to a thriller.

Filmmaker Bio:
Date of birth (location): 14 May 1923 Faridpur, East Bengal, British India. [Now in Bangladesh]

Sen is one of his nation's most politically active filmakers. In the mid-1940s he joined the Indian People's Theatre Association and at that time began to read about and study film. Sen used location shooting and non-professional casts in his early films. By the 1970s he was making wider use of symbolism and allegory. Sen's films have won numerous international awards. Kharij (1982) is a scathing look at the hypocritical reaction of a bourgeois Calcutta family to the death of a servant boy, took home the Jury Prize from the 1983 Cannes Film Festival.

Cast and lead cast bios:
 

Cast Name

Character

Shabana Azmi Neeta
Shreeram Lagoo Professor (Neeta's father) (as Dr. Shreeram Lagoo)
Aparna Sen Professor's student
Uttara Baokar Neeta's mother
Roopali Ganguly Seema (Neeta's sister) (as Roopa Ganguly)
Arjun Chakraborty Neeta's brother
Manohar Singh Neeta's uncle
Anjan Dutt Neeta's boyfriend (as Anjan Dutta)
Lily Chakravarty Neighbor
Anil Chatterjee Arunbabu
Moon Moon Sen  
   
Year made: 1989

Language: Hindi

Length: 105 Min

Edited by Qwest - 17 years ago
Posted: 17 years ago
World within, world without GOWRI RAMNARAYAN
Mrinal Sen has been chosen for this year's Dada Saheb Phalke award, for his outstanding contribution to Indian cinema.
PICTURES: BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

Mrinal Sen directing Anjan Dutta on the sets of Chalchitra.
CALL the veteran Bengali filmmaker Mrinal Sen on the day the government announces the Dada Saheb Phalke Award for him, which is to be conferred on February 2, and the man almost does not hear your congratulations. He is more anxious to know if you have been personally affected by the tsunami, and to hear details of the relief measures. "What terrible suffering, and not over yet, by no means," he muses sadly. "There are indications of tremors to come, and who knows, how many more disasters. No certainty of dying peacefully or naturally any more, for anyone in the world." His forebodings infect you with gloom. You shake your head and sigh. But what is this? Sen's voice is no longer blue, but sunny, exulting. "Do you know what happened when the award was announced?" he asks like a wonderstruck child. "My wife kissed me. Not on the lips, no, but she did kiss me. Has not happened in a long time, you know! And she said the award was long overdue." Then he falls silent. It is the silence of a happy man. This quicksilver, un-pin-downable quality makes Mrinal Sen endearing. You can see it in his films too. Take the first of his city trilogy Interview (followed in turn by Calcutta 71 and Padatik). It was made around the same time as Satyajit Ray's Pratidwandi, and with the same theme of an unemployed young man, but there the similarity ends. While Ray's film follows a classic, subtle path of satire, Sen has stylistic devices ricocheting off the screen, not always making hits, but eager and robust. They question and castigate the socio-political system, unable to extricate itself from its feudal, regressive, post-colonial shackles. He demands reappraisals of individual and community. In the film the young man fails to get the job, because along the way he is caught up willy-nilly in a street demonstration and loses the suit he had borrowed for the interview. How can he make an impression without it? Sen records gleefully that he even made his protagonist speak a line from Ray's film that had come to him through the grapevine, but modified to suit his purpose. Interestingly, Sen had the Pratidwandi debutant Dhritiman Chaterji play a young extremist in Padatik, committed to party ideals but disillusioned with the smug leaders. The overtly political film spewed debates and controversies for critiquing Left leadership.


Directing wife Gita in Akaler Sandhane.
The trilogy also testifies to the filmmaker's deep devotion to Calcutta (Kolkata). He had been dispatched to the metropolis at age 17 to study physics, from hometown Faridpur, now in Bangladesh, where he was born (1923) among seven brothers and five sisters. The city's milling crowds, its apathy and anonymity, instilled fear in the country lad, who underwent arrest and inquiry for suspected links with the underground movement. The terror was soon replaced by love. Although he never lost his feeling for rural, village life, and has made films on even marginalised tribal people facing unspeakable injustice as in Mrigaya and Oka Orie Katha (Telugu), Calcutta became Mrinal Sen's home. He was to make an unforgettable journey to a changed-beyond-recognition Faridpur in 1990, and stand in front of his old house as a 'foreigner'. The local people gathered around in silence. A smiling woman walked out of the house and offered flowers to Sen's wife Gita saying, "You are in the house of your father-in-law." She turned to Sen and said, "Come, you will see the memorial at the water's edge." Through the decades, his sister's memorial (she had drowned as a child in the same pond) had been preserved by the occupants of his ancestral home. Being Mrinal Sen, he could not see it as a moving individual experience. Its impact widened to include vast political issues: if only the Mahatma were here now, he exclaimed. He would know that Partition had not robbed simple folk of their essential values, their humanity. Sen searched for this humanity in every one of his films, and agonised over the forces that tried to destroy it. Ekdin Pratidin shows a different side of his city when a young woman, the sole breadwinner of the family, does not return home until dawn. We are not told why she was absent through the night. Sen had decided to turn the pointing finger at himself, his own selfish, conniving, conformist patriarchal community. The film had the bhadralok up in arms. Asked by irate viewers "Where did she go?", Sen replied blandly that he did not know, they had to suffer not knowing, thereby provoking Ray to write to a friend that never before had a filmmaker shown "such ignorance about characters authored by him". Such barbs were part of the Ray-Sen bond. They circled each other like wary lions, snapping and roaring at intervals, but knowing that they belonged to the same fraternity. They longed for the approving nod from each other. Sen gave it unreservedly for Ray's Aparajito, calling it a rare masterpiece for being so localised in its village mother-son relationship, but universal in emotional appeal. However, when you reported to Sen that Ray was visibly happy to note how "Mrinal Sen came up to me after the screening of Agantuk and said it was wonderful," the younger filmmaker retorted, "I mentioned only the dialogue. Not the whole film."


In action, 1978.
Their polemics included a two-month exchange of letters in 1965 (Sen calls them bombs and missiles) in the columns of The Statesman over Sen's tragi-comic Akash Kusum, where a young man spins lies about his wealth to a girl. Sen's arguably best known, best-loved film Bhuvan Shome was dismissed summarily by Ray for its conventional wish fulfilment theme, "Big Bad Bureaucrat Reformed by Rustic Belle". The film had been acclaimed in India and abroad as a neo-fable of erotic motifs, a human comedy shot with pathos, and credited with launching the New Wave movement of the 1970s. Sen described it in his inimitable way: "In a desperate drive, we ran wild and made a film. De-emphasising plot and structure, we told a human story - within the framework of a simple story line. All done on location, made with a throwaway budget." The same approach characterised Sen in most of his projects. He remained unpredictable, trying to delink cinema from well-made plot and well-defined structure. Many found the influences of the humanistic Italian neo-realist mode and the more intellectual stylistics of the French New Wave on his perspective an uneasy blend. But failure and criticism could not make Sen abandon experimentation. He was most alive when he took the boldest risks. He refuses to be anything less than an auteur, lovable for his dauntless spirit. Had he not outlined his credo, "By taking chances you achieve or perish, playing safe you just survive?" The making of Bhuvan Shome is a typical example of the Sen method of filmmaking. His famous hit-or-miss improvisations struck pure gold here. Outlined in three hours when an insistent friend virtually locked him up with an old typewriter, and funded by the Film Finance Corporation, low-budget Bhuvan Shome had a boring, obnoxious, self-righteous, about-to-retire martinet bureaucrat (Utpal Dutt) taking leave for a brief duck-shooting holiday on the sand dunes on a remote rural outpost. Meeting an unsophisticated village girl (Suhasini Mulay) brings drastic anagnorisis. He realises what he has missed in life, but cannot transform his identity.
NEMAI GHOSH

With Satyajit Ray, Barbs were part of the Ray-Sen bond.
With Dutt and Mulay living their roles, Sen mirrors a real-surreal world, sweet and sour, fleeting, poignant. Stumped over the finale, the director created magic with a memory of his own, long-ago personal experience. During his short stint as a medical representative, young Mrinal once found himself at a lonely, boulders-strewn spot in Jhansi's Hindi belt, shouting in Bengali, "I am an exile here!" Back in the hotel room he stripped himself and stood before the mirror, babbled to the image, broke into sobs. Sharing this experience with Utpal Dutt was to make the actor take off brilliantly on the image, a vignette of inspired insanity. A journalist-turned filmmaker, Sen has often talked of his disastrous debut in Raat Bhore, made just when Ray's Pather Panchali astonished the world. He recovered somewhat from the humiliation with Neel Akasher Neechey juxtaposing the anti-colonialism with anti-fascism. The film was banned briefly owing to a goof-up over its period and field of reference. His first memorable film, Baishey Shravan, followed, pointing to the later Akaler Sandhane. Both deal with famine, a nightmare reality in Bengal. Akaler Sandhane had a huge cast of professionals, and villagers playing themselves. It was the kind of situation to stimulate the director to use the script as a mere guideline, and to shape the result at the editing table. The compassion you see goes above the techniques of its film-within-film sequences. Did it reflect the director's disturbance when he heard a villager exclaim on the arrival of the crew on the rural location, chosen to depict the 1943 drought - "They have come from the city looking for famine. But we are the famine". Khandahar develops the theme of exploitation. Mother and daughter living on the edge of poverty in the ruins of a mansion are deceived by urban male visitors, all the more callously for their twinges of conscience. Here Sen avoids the direct approach, allowing fragile wisps to tangle, ready to snap at close scrutiny, but looming like a beam-lit web. Although Sen swore to avoid turning his features into documentaries, his party ideologies are often blatantly reflected in his work. But when he rose above the slogans as he movingly did, what you saw was his empathy with the deprived and the marginalised. That empathy had made him espouse the party he thought came closest to working for their betterment. He did not shirk critiquing the government when it faltered, or became self-complacent, either. Unswerving in his allegiance to the Communist Party since his early link with the Indian People's Theatre Association, he was able to share his profound distress with this writer when the Soviet Union splintered. "I am confused, CONFUSED!" he reiterated, like a fan watching his adored hero toppling from the pedestal.


Shabana Azmi, Gita Sen, Naseeruddin Shah and Pankaj Kapoor in Khandahar.
Although violence was foreign to him, rebellion was part of his nature, inheritance, environment. In his youth, did he not have Subhas Chandra Bose as the houseguest, to treat his toothache in the middle of preparing a speech for the All-Bengal Conference? Politics was so ingrained in him that his first gift to Gita, a fine actor whom he was to marry after seven years of courtship, was Notes from the Gallows by Julius Fuchik, a Czechoslovakian communist who was tortured and executed by the Gestapo at the age of 40. He carried a manifesto to a later rendezvous in the middle of a lonely bridge, cooled by the breezes and the ripples. And then "I clasped her hand for the first time and drew her closer. Instantly A Case for Communism slipped from my hand and dropped into the darkness below." The Sens' home on Beltala Road remains unostentatious. An international celebrity for decades now, counting among his friends across the world men of commitment such as Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Gunter Grass, Mrinalda can be childlike. Concerned about global issues, he can still take pleasure in simple matters. When I visited him 10 years ago, he broke off in mid-interview to call his wife and say, "Would you have guessed that this young woman has a college-going daughter? Give her another sandesh."


With wife, son Kunal and daughter-in-law Nisha in Chicago.
He loves to talk endlessly, and is delighted to be told that he is more handsome than ever. At the Locarno International Film Festival where his last film Amaar Bhuvan (2002) was shown, he did not walk, but strode across the aisle to interact with the audience, engaging them in banter and serious discussion. Even today you can see that his zeal for ideals has not diminished despite many upsets, nor has his zest for life. Looking at Mrinalda is to feel that he would know just what the forgotten poet Leigh Hunt meant when he wrote: Jenny kissed me when we met, Jumping from the chair she sat in; Time, you thief, who love to get Sweets into your list, put that in:... Say I'm growing old, but add,

Jenny kissed me.

Edited by Qwest - 17 years ago
Posted: 17 years ago
Mrinal Sen - A Neglected Genius

In my School and College days, I was an ardent fan of Amitabh Bachchan. Scarcely would I miss any of his starrers, and not content with a single viewing, usually I ended up watching a Bachchan starrer a number of times. Around that time, quite naturally, I had an apathy towards the "other Cinema." The "art cinema", I found, was very slow paced, mostly shot in dark making the characters invisible, based on themes of poverty, hunger and famine and the treatment very confusing. 

After College, I went to the University. My love affair with Bachchan continued. One day, quite by chance, I saw the film "CALCUTTA 71". The experience was a mind-blowing one. This Bengali film, directed by Mrinal Sen, was a highly intense feature based on four short stories by eminent Bengali writers like Manik Bandopadhyay, Samaresh Basu and others, against the backdrop of Naxalite movement. It was my initiation into the world of Mrinal Sen, Gautam Ghosh, Bhaben Saikia, Arinbam Shyam Sharma and other realistic 'Indian Filmmakers.' I developed an interest in their work and whenever I got an opportunity to see more of their works, I availed it. 

I found that Mrinal Sen, with a career spanning four decades, had an impressive filmography of highly intense and disturbing original works, arguably the finest specimen of Indian films ever made. I felt both disturbed and enlightened by watching his masterworks like 'Baisey Shravan','Bhuvan Shome', 'Padatik', 'Kharij', 'Ek Din Pratidin', 'Akaler Sandhane','Mrigaya', 'Khandahar','Oka Orie Katha' and many more. His films have, quite naturally, been honored at the most prestigious International Film Festivals like Berlin, Cannes, Venice and others. His films have evoked a keen interest in all major filmmaking Countries.

Unfortunately, in his own country, he is one of the lesser known personalities, and hardly any of his masterworks have been released in a big scale, or enjoyed a good run at the Theatres. In retrospect, even the Indian Govt. seems to be neglecting this septuagenarian genius. National Honors like Dadasaheb Phalke, which is long overdue, still seems to be eluding, whereas cine personalities of much lesser depths are being honored by the Govt. each year. When will our National Committees honor such gifted people, whose numbers are dwindling with every passing day?

Edited by Qwest - 17 years ago
Posted: 17 years ago
M A I N   N E W S

Dada Saheb Phalke Award for Mrinal Sen

New Delhi, January 10
Noted filmmaker Mrinal Sen will be the recipient of the Dada Saheb Phalke Award for 2003 for his outstanding contribution to Indian cinema, it was announced today.

President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam would present the award to the director at the 51st National Film Awards function here on February 2.

The octogenarian filmmaker achieved national and international fame directing an array of films in Bengali and Hindi like "Neel Akasher Nichey", the Kolkata trilogy "Padatik", "Interview" and "Kolkata Ekattor", "Oka Uri Katha", "Genesis," "Mahaprithivi," "Kharij", "Ek Din Protidin," "Bhuvan Shome", "Akaler Sandhaney", "Khandahar", "Ek Din Achanak" and "Antareen".

"Kharij", starring Mamatashankar and Anjan Dutta, took home the jury prize in 1983 in the Cannes, Venice, Berlin, Karlovy Vary film festivals.

A Padma Bhushan awardee, Sen was a member of the Rajya Sabha from 1998 to 2003.

Born on May 14, 1923, in Faridpur, now in Bangladesh, Sen made his first feature film "Raat Bhore" followed by "Neel Akasher Neechey" starring Kali Banerjee. Retrospectives of his films have been shown in many countries across the world.

Known for his pro-Left ideology, Sen has made feature films in Hindi, Bengali, Oriya and Telugu. He has also made several documentaries


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