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Magazine
CINEMA
Ray of nostalgia
VIJAY NAIR
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Film making ought to be an intellectual pursuit, not a commercial enterprise.
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The Director’s Mind: A step by step study of the process of film making; Ujjal Chakraborty; Alchemy; Price not stated
Cinephile Ujjal Chakraborty from Kolkata lives and breathes the cinema of Satyajit Ray. That much is evident from his work The Director’s Mind, A Step by Step Study of the Process of Film Making. Not only because the cover of
the book depicts a young and thoughtful Ray on one side, juxtaposed against three smaller pictures of Charlie Chaplin, Akira Kurosawa and Alfred Hitchcock on the other. But because most of the illustrations and examples contained inside, pictorial and written, are also from the masterpieces directed by Ray. Apart from being an academic treatise on the craft of cinema, the book also serves as a tribute to the Master.
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Although cinema qualifies as the national pastime of our country, it has received scant attention from academics and writers. Most Indians perceive cinema to be a frivolous medium, no doubt encouraged by the amount of trash Bollywood as well as regional cinema churns out year after year. A vicious circle is created whereby most film professionals in India consider their vocation to be nothing more than a commercial enterprise and the complexities of the craft one must master to wield the camera is forgotten, thereby leading to more trash generation. Most students of cinema in this country rely on American and European texts to understand the theories related to good filmmaking. Chakraborty’s work is a welcome sign that cinema is finally getting its due as an intellectual pursuit.
The book covers all the aspects of filmmaking a director must engage with. Ranging from Characterizations to Dialogues, Close-ups to Film Language, Musical Quality to Editing.
Although it is evident that this is a serious book, the language used is simple and lucid and that adds to its strengths. Chakraborty has an easy style that invites the reader into the world of films. The scenes from the films he takes up to highlight a particular point are delightfully evocative. This is not surprising considering the sources from where these vignettes are drawn are all masterpieces. Ray’s best known work “Pather Panchali” is used numerous times and so is the delightful under-rated gem “Aranyer Dinratri.”
What could be a matter of minor quibble are the scant examples from the works of other directors that the book purports to use. Instead of trying to write an academic book, Charaborty may have well written a book about Ray and his cinema and achieved the same objective without short changing the other world masters. After all, the prolific Ray was an institution by himself and had a deeper understanding of the medium than any Indian director who came before or after. Another thought that struck me while I was reading this book was if Chakraborty wanted to look beyond Ray in his research, he should have included other Indian directors. There is a mention of one of the films of Mrinal Sen who competed with Ray in his life time but it would have been great to see the same privilege extended to some of the accomplished directors from other Indian states like Aravindan, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Shyam Benegal and Mani Kaul.
However despite these shortcomings the work is a commendable effort. Any serious lover of cinema in this country who knows his Godard from his Fellini should be proud to display this one on her book shelf. The book is artistically designed and visually appealing with excerpts from the scripts of Satyajit Ray and countless pictures from film classics that tug at the strings of nostalgia. Just as we cherish Ray for helping us learn the power of cinema, Chakraborty too deserves kudos for making us comprehend yet again what good cinema is all about.
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