I have a special interest in movies. I keep track of the upcoming releases, make a check list of the movies I need to watch and , on the lighter side, keep a tab on the gossips of the industry. Movies have been a major influence of my coming-of-age. So much so, that for many years I dreamt of being a film director. Though I have not forgotten that dream, it seems remote now. The closest I can get is pursuing a hobby in still photography.
They say, the initial years of your life shapes you up as a person, as a human being. I don't know how I developed the passion for movies, especially in those days of government-regulated broadcast of Doordarshan, when only two movies were telecast in a week. On the hindsight, I think , like many other good things in my life, my grandmother had a role to play here, albeit, unknowingly, When my parents were away in Bhubaneshwar for my father's job, I spend the initial years of my school life with grandparents. My grandmother used to teach me. Saturday and Sunday evening, the time when the two movies were telecast, it was study leave for me as my grandmother watched the movies. I joined her. I doubt whether I understood anything, because now I don't remember anything about the movies I watched then. But, no doubt, that was my first introduction to movies and it left a deep impact somewhere deep inside.
As I studied in standard three and four, I became an ardent fan of the director, late Mr. Satyajit Ray. Then I used to watch his movies whenever I got the slightest opportunity. (After my job, I bought DVDs of all his movies and have watched at least a dozen times or more since then.) I fancied becoming a film director one day. When he died I was in standard six I think. I remember the day very well. Big critics and film stalwarts had so many things to say about him in the obituary. I mourned inside as I thought a guiding light had faded into oblivion. Sad day. But his movies left an ever lasting impression on me. His movies definitely influenced my thoughts and views when it mattered most. To a young mind in a small town of rural India his movies were the rays of light from the vast world outside.
Through the years, my love for movies grew. Hindi movies, Bengali movies, English movies, foreign movies I used to gobble whatever good and interesting movies came my way. Study pressure and the socio-economic situation forced me to opt for a more "promising" academic and career path. I landed up in engineering college and went on to pick up an engineering degree. The dream of becoming a director was shelved; my shelves were stacked with books on complex electrical circuits and prehistoric electrical machines. But none could take away my love for movies.
In college days I again started watching movies, this time in cinema halls. I revisited the old hindi classical movies from time to time. What fascinated to me were the human emotions and complex relations that existed among people - between couples, between lovers, between generations, between friends...and how they were captured in the frames. When any veteran actors, actresses, directors, musicians from the film industry died, I was sad. As if, they took along with them a minuscule part of my years of growing up.
Today when I heard news that one of my favourite directors, Rituporno Ghosh, was dead, I felt the same way. I started watching his movies from my college days. His death news flooded me with the memories of my college days and onwards. How I used to eagerly wait for his new release.
But like movies, everything is so temporary. in our lives. When we are alive, we are so possessive about our things, our work, our property, our family, about ourselves. We are proud, we are egoistic, we quarrel, we fight to prove our point.We closely and vehemently guard the territory that we think is ours..And then one day that moment comes and everything fizzles out! The gush of wind comes and extinguishes the flame. There remains no sign of the ignition, no warmth. What remains is only a pinch of ash and an endless eerie silence. Once the physical existence ceases to exist, everything is in the virtual world - be it on the silver screen or in our memories. All those men and women who once tread on Mother Earth will never ever return. The world will not hear their laughter or cry ever again. None will be able to see their smile or tears. The though that haunts me then is, was everything that the person did and say when he was alive, for real? Was everything about the person real?
There is no denying the fact that the person's existence is real. But everyone sees him differently through his own prism. The way I see Mr. Satyajit Ray or Mr. Rituporno Ghosh or, for that matter, any other person in the universe, is different from the way you or any other person sees. This blend of facts and each individual's conceptualised and personalised thoughts is what makes every character who performs in the world stage unique to everybody. A smoky screen of life and death, of truth and imagination, of fact and fiction exists. At the end of the day, it is the gloomy grey shade and not black or white, that is pervasive.
All characters, in life, like in movies, are to some extent fictitious or "Shob Choritro Kalponic". ("Shob Choritro Kalponic" is a Bengali movie by Rituporno Ghosh, meaning "All Characters are fictitious").
They say, the initial years of your life shapes you up as a person, as a human being. I don't know how I developed the passion for movies, especially in those days of government-regulated broadcast of Doordarshan, when only two movies were telecast in a week. On the hindsight, I think , like many other good things in my life, my grandmother had a role to play here, albeit, unknowingly, When my parents were away in Bhubaneshwar for my father's job, I spend the initial years of my school life with grandparents. My grandmother used to teach me. Saturday and Sunday evening, the time when the two movies were telecast, it was study leave for me as my grandmother watched the movies. I joined her. I doubt whether I understood anything, because now I don't remember anything about the movies I watched then. But, no doubt, that was my first introduction to movies and it left a deep impact somewhere deep inside.
As I studied in standard three and four, I became an ardent fan of the director, late Mr. Satyajit Ray. Then I used to watch his movies whenever I got the slightest opportunity. (After my job, I bought DVDs of all his movies and have watched at least a dozen times or more since then.) I fancied becoming a film director one day. When he died I was in standard six I think. I remember the day very well. Big critics and film stalwarts had so many things to say about him in the obituary. I mourned inside as I thought a guiding light had faded into oblivion. Sad day. But his movies left an ever lasting impression on me. His movies definitely influenced my thoughts and views when it mattered most. To a young mind in a small town of rural India his movies were the rays of light from the vast world outside.
Through the years, my love for movies grew. Hindi movies, Bengali movies, English movies, foreign movies I used to gobble whatever good and interesting movies came my way. Study pressure and the socio-economic situation forced me to opt for a more "promising" academic and career path. I landed up in engineering college and went on to pick up an engineering degree. The dream of becoming a director was shelved; my shelves were stacked with books on complex electrical circuits and prehistoric electrical machines. But none could take away my love for movies.
In college days I again started watching movies, this time in cinema halls. I revisited the old hindi classical movies from time to time. What fascinated to me were the human emotions and complex relations that existed among people - between couples, between lovers, between generations, between friends...and how they were captured in the frames. When any veteran actors, actresses, directors, musicians from the film industry died, I was sad. As if, they took along with them a minuscule part of my years of growing up.
Today when I heard news that one of my favourite directors, Rituporno Ghosh, was dead, I felt the same way. I started watching his movies from my college days. His death news flooded me with the memories of my college days and onwards. How I used to eagerly wait for his new release.
But like movies, everything is so temporary. in our lives. When we are alive, we are so possessive about our things, our work, our property, our family, about ourselves. We are proud, we are egoistic, we quarrel, we fight to prove our point.We closely and vehemently guard the territory that we think is ours..And then one day that moment comes and everything fizzles out! The gush of wind comes and extinguishes the flame. There remains no sign of the ignition, no warmth. What remains is only a pinch of ash and an endless eerie silence. Once the physical existence ceases to exist, everything is in the virtual world - be it on the silver screen or in our memories. All those men and women who once tread on Mother Earth will never ever return. The world will not hear their laughter or cry ever again. None will be able to see their smile or tears. The though that haunts me then is, was everything that the person did and say when he was alive, for real? Was everything about the person real?
There is no denying the fact that the person's existence is real. But everyone sees him differently through his own prism. The way I see Mr. Satyajit Ray or Mr. Rituporno Ghosh or, for that matter, any other person in the universe, is different from the way you or any other person sees. This blend of facts and each individual's conceptualised and personalised thoughts is what makes every character who performs in the world stage unique to everybody. A smoky screen of life and death, of truth and imagination, of fact and fiction exists. At the end of the day, it is the gloomy grey shade and not black or white, that is pervasive.
All characters, in life, like in movies, are to some extent fictitious or "Shob Choritro Kalponic". ("Shob Choritro Kalponic" is a Bengali movie by Rituporno Ghosh, meaning "All Characters are fictitious").
