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Photo: S. Mahinsha

On the job, all the time: Gautam Ghose.

“No, I do enjoy life,” quips Ghose sheepishly, when caught getting too serious. “Look, there are problems that are more difficult to solve you know…” he attempts to justify his “stand-alone” gesture.

But those who know him well swear that he has always been like that. He lays his hands on “issues”, explores ways of making the world a better place and if he can’t do that through cash or kind, he does it through his feature films and documentaries.

Ghose, they know, is never happy with just hypotheses. With his experiences of life and his vision, he can often predict the future of, say, a new movement. For instance, recently he spoke his mind when he was invited by the veteran artist Jatin Das to Bhubaneswar to attend the Second National Short and Documentary Film Festival on Art and Artists.

“You think this festival will become a movement? Impossible! The reason is that India is a heterogeneous country. Every State has its own language and culture. A movement takes shape when everyone thinks alike. And this diversity is our recognition. See, they advertise ‘Incredible India’ and we choose to ignore it. It is actually incredible. I was in Mexico recently; I was surprised to see that it has changed so much. Spanish culture is dominant there because Spain ruled them for 200 years. The British ruled us for so long and yet couldn’t destroy our culture. That’s what I love about India,” finally he smiles.

Ghose-da, as he is fondly called, has earned fame and “some fortune” with his films, “Maabhoomi” (1979) in Telugu, “Dakhal” (1981), “Paar” (1984), “Antarjali Yatra” (1987) “Padma Nadir Majhi” (1992), “Patang” (1993), “Gudia” (1997), “Abar Aranye” ( 2003) and “Yatra” (2006). Most of his films have won awards at various film festivals, even though he has never taken any formal training at institutes of filmmaking.

He didn’t study formally because he was a bhalo chele (a good boy) for his family of six — parents and four brothers. “I was the eldest,” he rewinds hesitatingly. “I had a burning desire to learn filmmaking.” The family’s deep interest in music (his mother used to play the violin and many others were good singers) further ignited this urge but “we used to manage at subsistence level. If I had gone to Mumbai to train, it would have put pressure on my parents. My brothers were studying and I was a meagrely-paid stringer photojournalist with a newspaper.”

So, this “film buff” and a passionate traveller would steal time out of his assignments to learn Indian and Western classical music. In early 1970s, he also started making documentaries and ad films. “Learning Western classical music was a great help because the structure of a symphony is just like that of cinema. I think learning on the job is always more fruitful than in a classroom.”

And when Ghose made his first documentary, he borrowed a 35mm camera from his guide and guru, fondly called “Maiz-da”. “How should I do this?”, he asked Maiz da. “‘Have you heard that song, ‘I have confidence, confidence, confidence…’ Just keep that in mind and go ahead’ he said to me.”

That’s how his first documentary, “New Earth” was born in 1973. It won several awards. Fame started chasing Ghose soon after his “Hungry Autumn”, the second anti-establishment documentary on the politics of hunger, was screened at various film festivals, film clubs, trade unions and offices in 1974. “This film would have got banned during the Emergency. So a friend, Sukhdev, advised me to stop showing it. I quietly sent it abroad and screened it at every possible film festival. It brought tremendous response.”

“Unless you identify and accept there is problem, how can you solve it? This is the problem with our policy makers. They are scared to listen to the problems of the people and hence they never get solved.”

Ghose is again at it — making an issue-based film. Tentatively titled “Encounter”, “it is about the resilience of a displaced boy who supports his family and opposes the dam construction in his village. The encounter here is between the boy and a European filmmaker who comes to India and finds a real character in that boy for his film. It’s about celebration of love and the smile on the face of the humanity despite insurmountable pressures. Somewhere I am trying to re-look at things through this boy. It would be quite ‘Chaplinesque’.” The film, in English, is arguably the first co-production between India and Italy.

Simultaneously, he is also working on a documentary based on William Jones’ “rediscovery of great Indian civilisation”.

Did any one say, India is beautiful place to live because of people like Ghose?

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