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A Year After
While the world remembered filmmaker Hrishikesh Mukherjee on his first death anniversary yesterday, most admit that the maker of films like Anand, Satyakam and Golmaal left behind a void that would be hard to fill
Premankur Biswas
The master of Wodehousian comedy, Hrishikesh Mukherjee didn't believe in wasting raw stock. " I remember once during the shooting of Alaap, Amitabh Bachchan walked up to him and asked for a retake. Hrishida refused point blank and said he was perfectly happy with the shot. He laughed and asked Amitabh if he would provide the raw stock. This is how he was. Hrishida never let his creative impulses get the better of him," reminisces Lily Chakraborty fondly on the filmmaker's first death anniversary yesterday.
For Chakraborty, Hrishida, who directed her in Chupke Chupke and Alaap, will always be a filmmaker who balanced the various aspects of filmmaking with "magician like grace". "He would take care of everything with remarkable ease. From sets to costumes, nothing escaped his meticulous eye. Yet, never did he seem hassled," says Chakraborty.
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Writer Nabendu Ghosh, Mukherjee's long time associate and collaborator in films like Majhli Didi and Abhimaan, remembers that very trait of the filmmaker. "I had known him since our Kolkata days and he was the same person throughout. He would always try to make good sensible films without risking the money of the producers. Each and every aspect of filmmaking was taken care of. He was always grounded in reality," says Ghosh.
Yet for most film lovers, the world of Mukherjee's cinema is coloured in idealism and simplicity. " It's amazing how his films conveyed the most complex human emotions with such consummate ease. He also managed to create a space for the middle class audience, where they could identify with characters they saw on screen. They could actually laugh and cry with an Anand or a Mili," says filmmaker Anjan Dutt.
For ardent Hrishikesh Mukherjee fan Mainak Bhowmick, a young filmmaker, the idealistic nature of his films was a result of the times. "Those were the days of idealism. While a Mrinal Sen or an Adoor Gopalakrishnan was making political statements through their films, Hrishikesh Mukherjee too made potent comments on the society in his own language. Most of his films were statements rather than just feel-good entertainers. Yet the genius of the man lies in the fact that he managed to package everything so neatly," says Bhowmick.
Indeed, no one can accuse the director of not being true to his times. If the freewheeling and lighthearted Khoobsurat can be seen as a shrewd reaction against the Emergency, then the idealistic Satyakam is a metaphor for the Nehruvian dream gone sour. "Hrishida was a very sensitive filmmaker. Things around him would trouble him a lot. In many ways his most memorable characters like Anand and Satyakam were actually autobiographical. After him there has been a void in the world of sensitive middle-of-the-road cinema," says Chakraborty.
Yet, many feel that the legacy of Mukherjee will live on in filmmakers like Rituparno Ghosh. "Though Ritu is a distinctively different filmmaker, in his films I see the same kind of middle class sensibility that was a hallmark of Mukherjee's films," says Dutt. Bhowmick echoes the sentiment. "Rituda has the ability to portray human relationships with the same simplicity."
http://cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=253261
A Year After
While the world remembered filmmaker Hrishikesh Mukherjee on his first death anniversary yesterday, most admit that the maker of films like Anand, Satyakam and Golmaal left behind a void that would be hard to fill
Premankur Biswas
The master of Wodehousian comedy, Hrishikesh Mukherjee didn't believe in wasting raw stock. " I remember once during the shooting of Alaap, Amitabh Bachchan walked up to him and asked for a retake. Hrishida refused point blank and said he was perfectly happy with the shot. He laughed and asked Amitabh if he would provide the raw stock. This is how he was. Hrishida never let his creative impulses get the better of him," reminisces Lily Chakraborty fondly on the filmmaker's first death anniversary yesterday.
For Chakraborty, Hrishida, who directed her in Chupke Chupke and Alaap, will always be a filmmaker who balanced the various aspects of filmmaking with "magician like grace". "He would take care of everything with remarkable ease. From sets to costumes, nothing escaped his meticulous eye. Yet, never did he seem hassled," says Chakraborty.
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Writer Nabendu Ghosh, Mukherjee's long time associate and collaborator in films like Majhli Didi and Abhimaan, remembers that very trait of the filmmaker. "I had known him since our Kolkata days and he was the same person throughout. He would always try to make good sensible films without risking the money of the producers. Each and every aspect of filmmaking was taken care of. He was always grounded in reality," says Ghosh.
Yet for most film lovers, the world of Mukherjee's cinema is coloured in idealism and simplicity. " It's amazing how his films conveyed the most complex human emotions with such consummate ease. He also managed to create a space for the middle class audience, where they could identify with characters they saw on screen. They could actually laugh and cry with an Anand or a Mili," says filmmaker Anjan Dutt.
For ardent Hrishikesh Mukherjee fan Mainak Bhowmick, a young filmmaker, the idealistic nature of his films was a result of the times. "Those were the days of idealism. While a Mrinal Sen or an Adoor Gopalakrishnan was making political statements through their films, Hrishikesh Mukherjee too made potent comments on the society in his own language. Most of his films were statements rather than just feel-good entertainers. Yet the genius of the man lies in the fact that he managed to package everything so neatly," says Bhowmick.
Indeed, no one can accuse the director of not being true to his times. If the freewheeling and lighthearted Khoobsurat can be seen as a shrewd reaction against the Emergency, then the idealistic Satyakam is a metaphor for the Nehruvian dream gone sour. "Hrishida was a very sensitive filmmaker. Things around him would trouble him a lot. In many ways his most memorable characters like Anand and Satyakam were actually autobiographical. After him there has been a void in the world of sensitive middle-of-the-road cinema," says Chakraborty.
Yet, many feel that the legacy of Mukherjee will live on in filmmakers like Rituparno Ghosh. "Though Ritu is a distinctively different filmmaker, in his films I see the same kind of middle class sensibility that was a hallmark of Mukherjee's films," says Dutt. Bhowmick echoes the sentiment. "Rituda has the ability to portray human relationships with the same simplicity."
http://cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=253261
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