Moinak Bose, a former student of Scottish Church College and St Xavier’s Collegiate School, is the film’s sound designer while Gobardanga’s theatre actor Bhumisuta Das has done its voice over.
Kapadia, Ranabir and Bose are alumni of the Film and Television Institute of India while Bhumisuta graduated from the National School of Drama in 2019.
Bhumisuta Das
Among the cinematographers from Bengal who inspired Das are Subrata Mitra and Soumendu Roy. Besides, he is also inspired by the photography in all Ritwik Ghatak films, Ranjan Palit and Avik Mukhopadhyay.
“I have observed Avik da work, and there so much to learn even beyond creating beautiful images. That includes the way he collaborates with the directors and conducts himself on set, quietly and efficiently going about his work,” he said.
Described by the director as a “found footage film”, the documentary was screened as part of the Directors’ Fortnight section, which runs alongside the main festival. In the documentary, L, a university student in India, writes letters to her estranged lover while he is away.
Through these letters, we get a glimpse into the drastic changes taking place around her. Merging reality with fiction, dreams, memories, fantasies and anxieties, an amorphous narrative unfolds.
“While I did shoot a lot of the film, we also received a lot of footage from friends and other archives. So, in a way it became a found footage film. We even treated the footage shot by Payal and me as found footage. We shot our friends and our daily lives. So, it was perhaps easier for us to be more intimate than in other situations. We spent most of the pandemic editing the film in our apartment. As we had a lot of footage, it took a long time,” Das said.
With the material they had, it became very important for them to choose the form they wanted to give to the documentary.
“We had in mind what we wanted to express, which was what many of us who had the privilege of going to public university were feeling. We decided it was best to use the unsent letters throughout the film, which would lend a personal touch to the very complicated situations we found ourselves in,” he added.
Describing his Cannes experience, Ranabir said, “More than the red carpet, just being at the festival was such a great experience, more so after months of restricted movement. It is great to get to watch the films of the masters I have idolized and so many exciting new filmmakers. What is more special is to present your film to an audience that is so appreciative and hungry for cinema.”
Ranabir’s parents still live in Kolkata. Director Anik Dutta took to Facebook to share how Ranabir was his “favourite model” after he bought his first SLR and was the youngest crew member of ‘Bhooter Bhobishyot’.
“Ray could not go to receive the Palme d’or personally in 1956 but he would’ve been happy to see a boy from his city walking the red carpet at Cannes,” Dutta wrote on Facebook. Touched by this comment, Ranabir said he learnt a lot while working on ‘Bhooter Bhobishyot’.
“It was the first feature-length film I worked on. I learnt most of the basics of cinema, both in terms of form and practice, from Dutta and cinematographer Avik Mukhopadhyay,” he said from Marseilles where the documentary is being screened at FID.
Growing up in Kolkata has, of course, inspired/influenced him. According to Das, Kolkata is the most “culturally forward” city in the country.
“One is encouraged to participate in the arts from a very young age. So that will always be with me. We have a history of protest and fighting for what is right. Having said that, even in a relatively more progressive city like Kolkata, I feel we have a long way to go. Privileged people tend to romanticize the city to an extent that they don’t see its problems. The resolve to fight must not disappear until we can achieve a more equal society for all strata of people in our city,” Das added.
Incidentally, L’s character is Bengali, but she lives in Pune. Bhumisuta, who has done the voice over for L, could not make it to Cannes.
She is extremely happy with the news of the award. Primarily associated with Gobardanga Naksha, she has acted in productions like ‘Binodini’ and ‘Shubha’ and also worked in Anuradha Kapur’s ‘Daughters Opera’ and Devashis Makhija’s short film.
“This is not like a regular documentary. I went to Mumbai for 10 days of work. My voice over was partly in Hindi and partly in Bengali. Instead of a professional voice over artist, they wanted someone who could relate to their experience. It was a nice experience for me to work on this documentary. I am happy that it won this award at Cannes,” she said.
Talking about the number of contemporary Indian films being officially selected at important international film festivals, Das said, “A lot of Indian films have been selected at important festivals in recent years. What we also have to consider is that here is the opportunity to make cinema in a country that is not part of the ‘industry’. Industrial filmmaking depends on formulas and that doesn’t always interest an international audience. If a market can be created for non-formula films, both in terms of production funds and distribution, then we will see more such films being made and more representation in international film festivals,” he pointed out.
While it would be fantastic to have greater representation in big film festivals, Das highlights the importance of being able to “create a market for good films with local content for local people”.
That would mean films made by and for the people.
“Right now, cinema is controlled by money and profits in the hands of a few people,” he pointed out.
On being asked about the biggest takeaway from Cannes, he said, “Although it is nice to be at film festivals in Cannes, we have to realise that the most important thing for filmmakers is the opportunities to make films, regardless of which festival will pick them up,” he said, adding that he has noticed that countries that have a lot of public funding in films and art are able to produce the films of directors who work fearlessly without the commercial success of the film in mind.
“Producers also support this. I hope that in India too, we can have funding to support cinema made by creative people who may not have the access or means to do so. Then our cinema will truly thrive,” he signed off.
Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kolkata/tracing-golden-eye-winners-kol-connect/articleshow/84715877.cms
