The Hindu Business Line : The language of cinema

Rituparno Ghosh, who has just finished winning a National award for his first Hindi film, Raincoat, is all geared up for the release of his next film today.

Antarmahal, starring Abhishek Bachchan, Soha Ali Khan and Jackie Shroff, takes Ghosh back to 19th century Bengal. His last foray into that period was Chokher Bali, with Aishwarya Rai in the lead, which catapulted Ghosh into the rank of directors who get talked about in Mumbai, not just as those fringe regional filmmakers who win national awards, but as those who have the vision to cast static Bollywood divas in roles with substance.

Filmmakers out of the Mumbai grid react caustically to the natural assumption, some would say arrogance, that Hindi cinema is `national'. Internationally renowned directors like this year's Dada Saheb Phalke winner, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, who have a loyal following within Kerala and overseas, are disdainful of most of the products which come out of Bollywood; Ghosh may be equally dismissive, but is not above taking Bollywood stars for his movies, to be able to move out of Bengal.

In conversation, Ghosh comes across as someone who is bright and who knows it. Legitimate perhaps for a young director who won a national award for his second feature film, Unishe April; his first question to this writer prior to an exchange at a public forum at New Delhi's India International Centre last week was, `have you seen all my films'.

Ghosh is a `relationships' director, very good with small, intimate stories. In his best work, conflicts between people become a thing of nuance, effective for being understated. He enjoys, he says, `interiority', and likes to unravel people on screen; in a film like Utsab where the family is the hero, some of the interplay between the members reminds you of Bergman's chamber movies, where the characters and the drama stay resolutely indoors.

Interestingly though, the two films (Bariwali and Shubho Mahurat) he chose to show at the IIC, which prefaced the dialogue, were those which had popular Bollywood faces. The first had Kirron Kher in the lead; the latter starred Rakhee and Sharmila Tagore. Kirron won a national award but stirred up a controversy because she did not speak her lines; a Bengali actress dubbed for her. Kirron wasn't the first Bollywood actress he thought of; he had gone to Jaya Bachchan first, who `didn't want to play a victim' (it is about an elderly woman who lives alone in a crumbling mansion, who is duped by a film unit into using her house in lieu of false promises); Ghosh also believes that before Bariwali, Kirron was not that well known.

He can't quite claim the same for Rakhee and Sharmila, but there's no doubt that the two ladies, yesteryear heartthrobs both, were seen in a full-length feature after a long time. Says Ghosh, showing a flash of characteristic wit, "when people ask me who is the murderer in the movie — Shubho Mahurat is about a crime and a Miss Marple-like character who solves the mystery with the help of `clues' — I say it is Yash Chopra!" For those not clued in, Rakhee and Sharmila last appeared together in Chopra's super-hit Daag, and much to Ghosh's chagrin, or at least that's what he says, all the attention went to the fact of the pairing.

The most interesting part of the conversation happens towards the end, when Ghosh circles back to the fact that Antarmahal is releasing simultaneously in New Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, as well as Kolkata. That a film in Bengali can get a multi-city release the same day, that for me is a real crossover, he says. Well said, because this is something that genuine film-lovers face: to catch a Mani Ratnam, and Adoor Gopalakrishnan, a Buddhdeb Dasgupta, you have to wait for a film festival. In fact, you might find it simpler and faster to see their movies outside India, both on the festival circuit, as well as in theatres.

Antarmahal will also be helped by the fact that it has Abhishek Bachchan, currently among the hottest male stars in Bollywood. Ghosh is ready for this one: when he shot with me, he says, he was not such a big star at all; he had just finished Mani Ratnam's Yuva, and was going to shoot Naach. But some moviemakers have a great sense of timing, and Ghosh seems to be among those. Antarmahal should get a big opening because of Bachchan Jr's presence.

Another film, which is also ready for release, is Dosor, which he has shot in black and white. It is about a young woman, who discovers after an accident, which leaves her husband grievously injured, that he was having an affair. It has the talented Konkona Sen Sharma, also now a known face to discerning non-Bengali-speaking audience because of her roles in Madhur Bhandarkar's Page 3 and Shonali Bose's Amu, both of which have won national awards this year.

After this, he is off shooting for his new film, which will star a young girl, in a `return-to-innocence' story'. And after that, who knows, maybe an English film.

"I am not a Bengali filmmaker. I am an Indian filmmaker who happens to make movies in Bengali," he says with the sort of asperity that one has heard from other directors crassly called `regional' on national fora. In Hindi, too, he may have added: Raincoat, starring Ajay Devgan and Aishwarya Rai, in a story drenched with lost love and remembrance, has given the very Bengali Ghosh another national award, for the best feature film in Hindi: how is that for a crossover?

Picture by Sushanta Patronobish

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