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Critical Adoor….
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SUDDHASATYA GHOSH
(Kolkata, India)
EMAIL:
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Critical Adoor and a few more words for Mumbai industry
There is a series of recent releases in Bollywood as usual. With more to come in time I was thinking about a reaction from great Adoor Gopalakrishnan about the mainstream Hindi films. He, in a recent interview to The Telegraph (Graphitti), had said that very recently he was trying to see a Hindi film and he could not bear it for more than 10 minutes. He said that there were money in the Mumbai industry and directors knew nothing but to spend it on sets and mindless scenes. Coming from Adoor it was a heavy attack on the merits of those so-called wonders of Hindi films, of whom various media are writing, showing and trumpeting as Avatars in Cinedome. Adoor is a man of plain speaks and when he speaks he knows what exactly he is talking about. Only yesterday I saw a promo of a Bachchan enacted big-budget special effect drama in television news. Amitabh is a warrior of a sect that do not condone war, but when they do a sway of Bachchan’s sword produces a bird of fire and it flies over the head of the assembled army. I was thinking how poor can be the scape of imagination that even can not surplus B-grade technoes of Hollywood? How many times we had seen this kind of jugglery in such movies where dragon to bird to a demon (pterodactyl sort of) appears in the screen to install fear among its viewers?
Anyway, it also had reminded me of an era of Bengali stage in pre-independence period, when the lack in playmaking (in content and form) was supplemented by placing elephants, even camels on stage to create wonders for the directors and producers. But that had soon gone overboard and all these petty magic had dried up to restore sanity and ofcourse the ‘Art’. But there is no stopping in Hindi film industry. They are hell-bent on doing what they can, that is, spending money on bad ventures. I had also seen that most of the so-called big bullies like ‘Ajooba’ had fallen flat on its face. Why? The answer is very simple. Though it is said that people go to cinema hall to get only entertainment, yet more often than not it is a half truth. They do not stick to a film that is poor on story and that also can be seen in the earlier demise of great Bachchan when he acted in films like ‘Indrajeet’, ‘Lalbadsha’ etc. etc. He came back with KBC series and then in films those had some stories in it. So any sort of mindless entertainment can not keep viewers in hall. But one can argue that these stories are definitely not the once like Adoor’s. It is true indeed. But then again there are certain points to be taken note of here.
In all literatures there are writers like Sidney Sheldon who are more popular than James Joyce. But definitely no one in right mind can claim that Sheldon is much greater than Joyce. There will be some all the time that will enjoy Sheldon than Joyce and vise-versa also. But at the base these are all creditable narrators functioning in different manners. When it comes to non-narratives it becomes a bit more difficult and Anurag Kashyap is facing that with his ‘No Smoking’. I have heard that his film is getting good reception in Rome festival, but here in India he was anguished by the critics. He has to realize that Mani Kaul had also faced serious lack of interest in general viewers, even Adoor himself is not that much watched here. So if you are taking a few steps more to experimentation you are open to critic for wounds, but obviously not always for wrong reasons. Even ‘Pather Panchali’ by Ray, that was a simple narration, was denounced by certain critics before it was applauded abroad and then after media here came out in throngs to call it a masterpiece. For now I must stop here in discussing non-narratives, because I will have to get back to entertainment itself.
If there is a narration well woven in movies it certainly will attract viewers and it surely not only depends upon stars in actuality. Time and again it had been proven by films like ‘Satya’ and directors like Ramgopal Verma. Just remember Mani Ratnam’s ‘Roja’ in which he had cast an actor like Madhu who is not that a celebrity in Hindi atleast and Arvind whom Bollywood barely knows at that period. But he dealt his piece of narration with good technique and it was an instant success. In that film he had spend certain money, but cleverly and knowingly and he had his fruit. I am not saying that I expect someone like David Dhawan to make a film like ‘Arth’ even, but then he atleast can follow earlier comedies like ‘Golmaal’ that had certain story to tell and he will not need to stoop to low standards and eluding viewers. Entertainment also needs a process of understanding and it has its logic too. I rarely have seen any film woven with logic to fail and I had seen thousands to topple with spending spree and nonsense.
When Adoor had commented he knew that thousand of producers and distributors are behind these sort of nonsense who actually controls film industries everywhere and they do not want to promote good cinemas as that will make them helpless in return. These are the people who want to dictate terms in the industry and for that reason they operate behind curtains or ‘Star System’ and again when any of the so-called Star gets too big to fit in their given shoes they try to cast him or her off. Actors who turns into star know this well but then money speaks a volume in human civilization. Then one may argue that directors are hapless lots and that is certainly not the case. In the period of good movies directors and actors and technicians in general will be much benefited than to-day. How exactly? It is easy to calculate. Directors and technicians and actors (not stars) are lesser paid beings in all industry. Producers, distributors and so-called stars bag the booty and above mentioned workers do suffer. If that money is distributed properly (means on the basis of work contribution atleast) all may prosper. But there is no indication as such in horizon. Why?
Some directors like Sanjay Lila Bansali or Ram Gopal Verma have their own company and they can even break distributor’s strangleholds too. They do often do it as I remember that after each and every Yash Chopra production a scuffle goes on with multiplexes in all around India for share of sells and all that. So they can negotiate and get free of this strangle. But at the one hand they are now turned into producers who like all other businessman only want to get more profits for themselves only. In fact some may argue that they are out there only to make money and name, then why must they bother about film-fraternity. That is a valid argument. They do not bother for the rest of the industry and its workers.
But they can atleast make some films of worth. Can’t they? Why they do not make films that of which they are capable of? In the facet of world cinema we have directors like Spielberg or Tarantino whom we can consider good atleast. Each and every director can not be turned into a ‘Maestro’ overnight but they can be sensible at least. In India we are lacking in such sensible directors and producers too, who does understand entertainment properly. One may think that I am just forwarding my views without the basis of facts. I am not. Let’s take reference of ‘Black’ to discuss my point of views.
Black is much touted here and when it missed Oscar there were a general holler that it is a deprivation. But sorry, I do not think so. Here I must say that I do not feel personally that Oscar is a great honor for films, because I had seen so-many films to get Oscar that is quite under a good film benchmark. That is another topic and I must not discuss this here. Let’s come back to Black. The film had good and gorgeous set-setting, color and costumes and more often than not it looked like a European town to me. I went to Simla, to Darjeeling and know well that Britishers had modeled them after their own culture. Yet there is certain typicality that is pretty local in nature. Any culture that is foreign to a region can not contain purity for long. In Black I had found no local presence other than Indian characters only. Some of my friends even had stated that it was Bansali’s calculation that took a European shape to impress Oscar jurors. Visuals were definitely good in Indian standard, but then again not so in the standards of international cinema and we had seen this kind of framing, composition and lights several times. This we may call craftiness, rather than artiness. There was no local or even personal touch of Bansali in the scenes and shots on those aspects. If you still do not understand then please see ‘Kanchanjangha’ by Satyajit Ray and I hope you will understand what a personal touch can do to a much less budget film. Now the narrative itself and enactment of it can be discussed. I remember Anjan Dutta’s review in Anandabazar, Bengali news daily, in which he called Amitabh’s acting a bit hyper and he was absolutely right. ‘Lights’ can be pronounced in the way he pronounced, but that dramatic only took him to a role of Othello who is hell-bent to kill Desdemona in Shakespeare’s play. That dramatics grew on and on. Viewers, who had not seen Amitabh in such a role for a long time, had taken to a ride. The angry old man had tricked them. Yes the word is trick, because I remember another Amitabh Bachchan in ‘Mili’ under a director who knew how to handle his actor. That time he had given a thoughtful and restrained performance, not dramatics on being image conscious. It may be that he was cast in opposition of a much powerful actor like Jaya Bhaduri/Bachchan and here he was against Rani Mukharjee who is still learning nuances of good acting. She had tried hard but had failed as her methods were not that good and the director was in the mind of dramatics only. Like Amitabh and Rani all others had done the same and obviously under directors instruction only. I had seen alzimer patient in my home and worked with blinds, deaf and dumb as well as other physically challenged in theatre and was astonished with the way actors are delivering in Bansali’s film. I think one ‘Sparsh’ and one Nasiruddin Shah can make them understand the utilization of proper training and methods of acting. We have two earlier films like ‘Mili’ and ‘Sparsh’ in comparison to ‘Black’ in all aspects and the grave hollering of Oscar injustice fall flat in home only. Let us keep ‘A Beautiful Mind’ out of this discussion. Black had much better budget, technology, big names (this Amitabh is much bigger than ‘Mili’ actor), yet a lack of sensibility had it all washed away. Sanjay Lila Bansali, again and again is proving that he needs to be more sensible to handle topics like Black or Devdaas, otherwise it will be great circus of money and not an entertaining, yet engulfing film. Same goes for the others around. It is easy to iconize Sayeed Mirza or Sudhir, but it is difficult to be one. Because they are the product of their time only and at that period a word called ‘political knowledge’ was not missing. That knowledge makes you a man apart and you can start seeing reality instead of projecting a laughable positivism in your films. Bansali had not had that and therefore an alzimer patient can converse in a fit of sanity and that is insane itself. If you start to see the bigger scheme of things you will consider your surroundings and there will not be profits only, but a lot of human beings in the shape of actors, technicians, directors who are part of you and on whom even your success depend.
Producers or producer-directors are living in their world apart and there they conceive their narration or whatever it is, and then they come to sell those in the market. They in their aloofness has lost the pulse of time and more often than not they can not touch a single nerve in their viewers. All the high life is only for a mere percentage of India, that is Bharat once and that Bharat is missing in their narratives. So halls are being deserted and they now make films for foreign markets and NRI-s. That is pathetic. These industry men were the people who once used to shout that good makers are doing films for foreign only and not for ‘Desi’ public and now what are they doing? Big budgets, big premiers have failed to save Hollywood itself and one can not wonder in Indian film industrial failure. If and when they realize that any entertainment has its root in people only and if and when they come out of seclusion of money dream they will know what had made Mumbai the great industry once. I said once because south India is taking them slowly. An animation with Rajnikant there is billing 300 crore and some more will come soon. NRI market can give them a short respite only as it will be challenged soon by powerful southern regional industry. So it is high time to look back and understand what had gone wrong since nineteen seventies.
In the period of Bimal Roy Mumbai had started to produce fine narratives and from then on it took great shapes in the hands of directors like Hrishikesh Mukharjee, Bijay Anand etc. But now even with people like Bansali, Verma, and Vidhu Vinod Chopra around can we hope for a better take than Deshai or Dhawan style idiosyncrasies? Then it may come out one day that Adoor had seen a Hindi mainstream movie to its full length and house full notices can be seen on theatres too. Yes, even in this period of television and DVD-s also. That is quite possible I think.
Suddha Satya Ghosh
25 Responses to “Critical Adoor….”
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Why only blame producers and distributors…….large section of people in India do not want to watch such films……..which is the basic reason films like these do not run……but like always no one wants to blame the people.
It’s the same thing over and over again ,it’s like blaming the politicians for inciting communalism when the main culprit is the aam janta……
“Visuals were definitely good in Indian standard, but then again not so in the standards of international cinema and we had seen this kind of framing, composition and lights several times.”
What are International standards author ?
Name any 10 Hindi films having this kind of framing, composition and lights several times ? You can also name regional films but i asked Hindi coz you here criticizing Hindi cinema.
I think SLB was sensible enough to handle Black and Devdas with such level of aesthetical and technical achievement.
What do you mean by Circus of Money ?
And how does it matters that Adoor Gopalakrishnan does not watch such films. You know even Bhansali never see much of Hindi cinema. So what Man? Yes Adoor is a excellent filmmaker but he is not So any Father Of Indian Cinema that we would go upon his choice or reservations.
Economic considerations play a defining role in both determining art and cinema of a generation ,but in spite of this universal truth the intellectuals in cinema world largely ignore this fact like ostriches ,true ….cinema should not be driven by short term economic considerations but the mentality of a generation should be given ample room……we are the children of liberalization and globalization……the world has gone through many upheavals since Do-Beegha-Zameen and being rich or trying to be rich is no longer considered a taboo…….capitalism has infiltrated the society which was for so long kept under the shackles of Nehruvian socialism……
A movie made on a farm boy like Tingya may be ranked highly in terms of art value but it does not represent hope rather it represents despair…….this is not a desirable situation but an unavoidable one….Even the ending in Taare Zameen Par which disturbed many purists represented that…..HOPE is hallmark of our times……which is why more movies are based on the rich as compared to the poor…..
I am not a cinema connoisseur and have no knowledge of the nuances of film making ,what I do however enjoy is good entertaining movies of the past like those by Hrishikesh Mukherjee and all….and I lament the fact that such films are no longer there….once in a while we do get such films in the form of DCH and Khosla ka Ghosla…..but that’s more of an oddity than a regularity….
What I lament even more is the fact the young film-maker
brigade of today is more cynical than ever…….and they produce extremely complex cinema instead of keeping stuff simple…and when their product gets neglected they cringe and cry blaming the current philmi establishment for their woes…….while the fact is that they have been unable to dish out good entertaining and educative films in sync with today’s generation….
@ Shashank - Great words! Good points!
I always have a hard time reading articles that bring Sanjay Leela Bhansali into the argument and start putting him down, for whatever reasons. He is a true artist and his films are masterpieces, in the same sphere as Italy’s own Luchino Visconti’s “Ludwig” or - of course drawn from the same story as “Saawariya” - “White Nights”. He’s true blue entertainment - no pun intended - and it’s about time people wake up, see that and stop trying to read so much into it…
Mr ghosh….
the greatness in any art form in my POV is relative
for a person A sidney sheldon would be as good or better than joyce and for a person B vice versa….
how do u decide whose choice is greater?
and i dont think one should expect from david dhawan what one has got from hrishikesh mukherjee…
both are different people and have different sensibilities..
david dhawan cant make a golmaal for the simple reason that he is not hrishi da…but ofcourse he can make a coolie no. or a raja babu….
i mean no disrespect but just like adoor cannot last any bollywood movie for more than 10 minutes , u ll find many who cannot sit through his movies irrespective of their greatness.
maybe he didnt check out a black friday or a johnny gaddar or a dil chahta hai or a taarein zameen par…
@Vineet
We,who are doing audio-visual newses(for it is one of my professions)sometime claim that people do not want to know this and do want to know that.But that is exactly on being dishonest and to hide a fact that we go by the policy of our owner(including political interest).In film distributors say that people do want and don’t.Who told them?Give good cinema a chance to run in theatres at par with so-called commercials and offcourse do not forget that seeing film is also a learning process,by which we had learned to tollerate absurdum in mainstream Bollywood and you will find out what is a popular choice.The people of India who has a brilliant,intellectual and such fine folk culture will understand good cinema easily as they can the rest stuff now.Then any sort of dialogue of popular choice can take place.Now,in this stranglehold of semi feudal-semi capital production and distribution structure popular choice do not make any sense.
And for simplicity lets take a que from arithmetic and alzebra.2+2=4 in arithmatic, but in higher mathematics9that is philosophy also) is not that simple case.Now it depends on knowledge of the receiver only.
And for hope Vineet, we had and still have some great hopes here in INDIA itself than market economy products.Not all are ready to accept capitalism(compradur here) as their only fate.In many villages still they do not function in terms of money and they do not know a country named India.They do know only their village names and name of their Sadar Town.Yes they have cinemas there(in the shape of video hall).So what ‘we’ suggest here?
@Shasank
PLEASE SEE TARKOVSKY,BRESSON AND LUI BUNUEL to KNOW WHAT I mean…If you have already seen them then it is strange that you do not understand this standard in international Cinema.
In the era of mega serials I had seen viewers to follow set-settings and costumes to buy them for their homes.Makers are also conscious about it.That is circus of money.A palace, a king size life had not contributed in narrative of Black and it was a designer stuff only.
@ashwin
I did not put forward my arguments to show disrespect to anyone(here Bansali) as Nina had suggested earlier.I was discussing sensibility and for that I preferred data only.But popularism once had killed a Socratice and it often does that.Majority to me atleast means nothing.I do think and wrote that in Mumbai some capable directors are not working upto their merits and if they then Adoor even will see them.
@all
Harsh words written,spoken and forgotten in love of cinema and I loved all of your comments.But friends(Shasank) Adoor is a master till date.He does not speak to please or displease you.He speaks for cinema only.He is not father,mother or something like that, he is a great teacher.You have every rights to criticise me to the limit you set for yourself, but yet please consider his words.They are telling something that is really necessary even for the industries and their wonders.Thank you.
mr ghosh…
i didnt mean that popularity is be all and end of all..
what i meant was that if i like david dhawan more and u like addoor more how do u decide whose choice is better…and im not even referring to their popularity….
it is natural for me to say that my choice is better than urs and for u to say vice versa…..
yes adoor is a master no doubt about that….its a pity that the majority is yet to see his work…
@Nina
I never said SLB is a masterpiece filmmaker, i just meant that he is trying to bring new sensibilities no matter he draws inspiration from Luchino Visconti, Guru Dutt and Stayajit Ray.
@SuddhaSatya
Yes yes we all know you have seen a good amount of world cinema but if names matters so much then i can send you a whole list of filmmakers who are at par with names you wrote. TARKOVSKYs are born once in a lifetime, his visual sense was magnanimous but comparing him to SLB is just not fine. Even Spielberg or Copolla cant match up to him. As far as black is considered it has visuals matching up to every damn international standards. But yes now if I start comparing another visual artist like Wong Kar Wai or Guillermo del Toro to Godard or Kurosawa it will not make a deal. So stop this comparing stuff. Now if I compare the work of Adoor with that of Ritwik Ghatak will it be fine ?
Are these really Adoor’s words, cent percent?? Makes me wonder, why would he talk about Bhansali, Anurag, Mani Ratnam and others??
@ Shashank - NO you did you not write that SLB is a brilliant filmmaker, I did! Sorry to have caused you confusion…
@SuddhaSatya
Thanks for your reply.I can’t help but notice a certain amount of despair in your voice ,a despair against the current set of distributors and film producers…..a despair which I have no doubt is fuelled by your interactions with film janata in general.
But what is the reason behind this ? I am sure somebody somewhere down the line must have burned his pocket while trying to finance such films ,after all whether you agree or not ,producing and directing films is a business after all ,and you at least need a reasonable return on your investment if not a huge profit.
Businesses are not very sympathetic to creativity because there is no certainty of ROI(return on investment) ,perhaps people in your profession can marry both the business side and creative side of film making ,ranting about this state of affairs is not a solution……..it’s what we call in Darwinian circles as “adaption” ,and it is one of the fundamental requirements for success.
@SuddhaSatya
You also talk about India’s fine traditions in art and culture, while this sentence is true ,cinema as a medium is quite new and not really part of our tradition .
Having said so let’s take an example of our Indian tradition ,for example say “Ram Leela” ,which is quite popular in North India and has been around for centuries. The Ram Leela is based on what you would call over dramatization where each and every action is hyped and over staged…….I haven’t seen many movies but from whatever I have observed this style of theater is quite similar to what happens in bollywood where there is quite an overdose of melodrama and dramatization along with songs and sequences.
Even other forms of art such as the kuchipudi and Kalaripayattu are based on song and dance forms which are require excessive facial expressions with minimal dialogues.
On the other hand I find that the other style of film making which was perfected by western directors which is without song and dance sequences and based on dialogues and conversations without any costume and facial expressions is quite opposite to our traditions……
I believe this is an interesting topic to debate on and maybe will require some amount of study…….maybe you could shed some light here….
@Nina
I think there is a difference in a brilliant director and a masterpiece director. Well if you can understand it I can’t help. You should be sorry for your confusion.
@Shasank
First you wanted to know What is an international standard and I named a few makers who had contributed in Visualization and had curved out cine-language.Now you say that why I am comparing Bansali with them.I am not as I am in my right mind yet.I had seen Black visuals and had said that it is good in Indian standard.If you say that it is even good for Speilberg and Copola then I do propose you to see Schindler’s List again.You will be angry again I know.Sorry friend, I am not here to tell others that how much I know than you.But if someone does I am ready to take it on. Till date I hate to be dictated by others as you did in my case (stop this…) or in Nina’s case(Should be sorry) and I think I will fail to please you there with your orders. I will say what I feel and not to undermine others. If I am proven wrong I do ammend and learn the right. That is not nobility,it is the basic requirement for a living artist–such I understand. So please do not send a list. You may have known all makers even more than me, yet that just not is changing case here. Rather please understand that like all I have a paramiter for that and a film only can be compared with films.Yes Rittwik can be compared with Adoor.It was done earlier and will be done again if necessity come.You only understand a tall,short,fat,thin sort of words in comaparison only, and there are measures to do that.Do you think that within this hundred and more years all cinema people was sleeping and had forgot to make grammers for cine-language(though it also changes time to time and in a very fast manner than other fields)? Certainly that is not the case and I do not find anything wrong in comparing. If you want to you can even compare Adoor against Dhawan also.
As a great litterary work is compared with others(like Faustus by three digfferent authors) or even two ‘DON’ bY TWO DIFFERENT DIRECTORS only to judge which one is superior.Otherwise how do one know which one is better and what has to be learnt from what?
Here comes Vineet again and I am really enthused by your debate friend.Yes there are certain paramiters in all fields and those are well spelt in so many theories.One may say that to hell with theories, then again what one does will need a theory to be explained.Like grammers are written after the birth of laguages and their progress and often they are called obsolite to have another set of rules in the shape of another grammer.Vineet we need to debate more on these standards and then only we may find an way out in the midst of cine-crisis(not in India only,it is everywhere). Well I will try to put on my understandings in separate writtings.Also I will hope for one from you and love to read.
@Nina
Do not take me in a wrong way.I am not here to malaign Mr.Bansali and I do not have any personal animosity at all.I believe in his capabilities as a director and that is why I am writting this.I do not want to waste my little and precious 24 hrs a day to write on anybody and everybody.
@Manjeet
I had mentioned The Telegraph as a source and he commented on general state of Hindi films.Do I wrote in my article that he had commented on these directors specifically?@Vineet
I think there is another scope of discussing commerce and Arts, and its interrelations.For now let me depart with a fact that Tarkovsky was the best earner in the history of Russian and East-European Cinema and till date his later works are collecting huge which were produced by Western Producers and Japanise too.
@SudhaSatya
Sorry if I offended you but then I completely disagree with your thinking but i do not disrespect it. So ROCK ON.
@Shasank
Its all for cinema.We are free to agree and disagree that is why this is a great medium.My love and regards…
Adoor shouldn’t be talking after making an average film like 4 Women.
But i completely agree with what he said about hindi films. They are in general unwatchable. (to me)
@Vijay
Probably the maker is slipping from his peak/or a slaggishness is catching up…It happens and have to see if he can come out or not…
Anyone who has read this line carefully, should certainly be knowing what Adoor has really meant.
“He said that there were money in the Mumbai industry and directors knew nothing but to spend it on sets and mindless scenes.”
People who have been observing Hindi cinema from outside, (well like me ;) should certainly know the heights it has fallen. From plagiarism to “inherited” talents to admiration of mediocrity, the mainstream Hindi cinema hasn’t left any credibility for itself. I use the word “mainstream” carefully here.
It isn’t wise to blame it on business concerns or on the dicretion of the audience. If it was really so, many off-beat films with lesser known star cast wouldn’t be making money here. It isn’t doing any good in terms of Return On Investment, and nor it is really winning viewers. Both should be matters of serious concerns for people who really love Cinema.
Adoor has brought out an interesting point.
@Shudhasatya, I agree with your observations on Black. It was a loud and over-rated film.
I come from Kerala so feel compelled to comment on this article since it involves our own son of the soil - Adoor :)
Directors like Adoor, the late Aravindan and the rest of the brigade have definitely placed Malayalam films prominently in the world of art-house films. But to the movie going people of Kerala, their films represent an alien perspective and a bleak outlook of contemporary Kerala society. I have to underscore the cinema literate audience in Kerala take a keen interest in the socio-political landscape and see films mirroring the travails of the society they live in (at least the folks who grew up in the 70’s and 80’s and watched meaningful films then!)
My point here is that Mr. Gopalakrishnan has never “matured” as a contemporary director, IMO. His films have got bleaker, more alienating and while his style is very distinct, it never attempts to “connect” with an audience. Such directors appear to make films to win the approval of the intelligentsia or their peers or the art-house crowd.
On that basis I would say his comments on the grotesquely commercial Hindi film industry is not to be taken seriously! The mainstream Hindi film space was never a medium to produce serious cinema and has always relied on star power, over-the-top dramatization and will continue to do that, imo. The redeeming factor for Hindi films is that the platform has just got bigger and more filmakers are able to play in this space. So we could see some nice flicks every now and then, in the sea of duds!
@Vineet – your comments are spot on man!
SJ, I am seriously interested to know your definitions of “contemporary” and “connecting”. (I have also grown up watching malayalam films.)
Because, IMO it is the mindless mainstream cinema that can neither connect, nor stay contemporary. Just because of the simple reason it neither tries to do any of those. It is floating, it is superficial. It makes very strong assumptions that the audience wants to forget that cinema the moment they leave the halls. whereas Adoor or Aravindan or their brigade(?) do not.
I wouldn’t hesitate to say that a character in an Adoor’s film never ceases to be contemporary. It never fails to connect. It always engages a straight conversation with the viewer. OK, even I accept that the criticisms about his last two movies (naalu pennungal and nizhalkkuthu) aren’t misplaced. But, the fact is I was disappointed because, I thought those were movies he shouldn’t have made.
@SJ
Being born in 70-80’s or 90’s does not mean that you can not connect with Adoor.If that is the case you can not connect to any classical text either.If Adoor fails to communicate you(I do not know the typicality here,Hope you will write more on this) you simply can take him as a piece of time to remeber and learn.You are a son of Kerala,I am not.But yet I find his some works fasciating and great.In litterature, a saying goes like your objective condition mothers your subjectibve thoughts.Therefore,it is also possible that he is not addressing you also.There is nothing that is universal and for all.No maker can claim to make for all.But if on that basis you ask me not to take seriously then I am affraid I owe him a much greater debt in the shape of knowledge than you and in this field of cinema I will take him seriously as long he lives(and in sound mental health).What you will do is your choice friend.
AND AGAIN…
I have not answered Vineet here on producers and distribution system,because that may be too long.I will definitely answer this in a separate post sometimes.He has encouraged me to do so with his critic.
@JRV
I am also interested to listen to SJ on those issues.And directors are human beings and they do err too.Adoor had his lot also.Sometimes it angers and that I have seen in Vijay’s comment.Too much love shapes that anger.
That was aver well put article….
I always though how people can be so mindless seeing all the ridiculous movies made now, not just in hindi but everywhere even in traditional strongholds like Kerala and Bengal.
The audience is not to be blamed, for good cinema still finds audiences… if you need a bigger success , get them good screens, which of course is not possible for it is flooded with superfluous bollywood films that try to garner as much revenue in the first week.
About Sidney Sheldon and James Joyce- I did not understand a single bit of “Ulysses”, a hard read and extremely boring while I simply loved Tomorrow never comes, the deliberate obfuscation in the novel by Joyce serves no purpose… a novel is not written to show the author’s eloquence in words or to get him famous. Adoor’s movie except “mathilukal” and “elippathayam” are complete bore and only weirdos can sit all through the movie.
But see Bergman, De Sica or Tarkovsky it is entertaining., only if u care to watch it.