Shoma A. Chatterji pays a centenary tribute and takes a look at the phenomenon called Mrinal Sen who shunned the beaten path and did not hesitate to disturb his audience and stir them into investigation, questioning and debate. Legends like him are born but only once.
Mrinal Sen represented an era that survives and reflects itself through him – the lone ranger in a track now filled with other people, other cinemas. His alacrity and his nervous energy were amazing. He spiked his answers with the right dose of barbed smiles and caustic one-liners and filled them with wonderful anecdotes. He recalled how, when he went to Bangladesh to prepare for Amar Bhubon, he visited his home town and the place where one of his little sisters, who died, was buried. “It was a trip back to nostalgia. The tragedy had happened a long time ago. But when I reached the place, I broke down,” he recounted.
Few Indian filmmakers can boast of several books written on them in several languages. Mrinal Sen is one of them while the other two are Satyajit Ray and Ritwik Ghatak. They laid the foundations of scholastic work on Indian films and filmmakers. Mrinal Sen made his presence strongly felt at every serious seminar or festival of films, never mind whether the festival included his films or not. What appeared to sustain him was his ever-youthful approach to life and people. He was a very good conversationalist, holding forth for hours on end on every topic under the sun, peppering them with his bubbly sense of intelligent humour. With the making of Ek Din Pratidin in 1979, Sen marked a turning point in his career as a film-maker. “I have been trying consistently to pull my characters by the hair and then make them confront reality. This is a ruthless experience. But once you survive this confrontation, you come out of it a stronger person. This helps you to sustain a life of decency and dignity” he said.
Through each film of the 28 and a few documentaries he made over four-and-odd decades, Sen managed to disturb his audience and stir them into investigation, questioning and debate. He experimented with the non-narrative form in Chorus and Calcutta 71. But they left the audience cold. Perhaps the audience were conditioned to his angst of anger unfolded through a story, or an incident, or a character, such as Ek Din Achanak (based on a novel), Ekdin Pratidin (based on an incident) and Bhuvan Shome (based on two characters). Khandhar (based on a setting) blended to produce a different, cohesive whole, as seen in Antareen. These are based on original literary works by noted writers. Sen is one of the first filmmakers in India to have made films in languages he does not know, like Oriya and Hindi. He did not believe in confining his creativity to an exclusive linguistic identity.
Just when cinebuffs had begun to wonder whether Mrinal Sen had called it a day, he surprised them with Amaar Bhubon. It was internationally premiered at the Locarno International Film Festival. Based on a 1993 Bengali novel, Dhanjyotsna, penned by Afsar Amed in 1992, the film had a charity premiere at Nandan drawing full house, the proceeds ear-marked for the victims of the Gujarat genocide.
When the British Council held a grand launch of British Film Institute’s thick volume in celebration of 50 years of Pather Panchali with Nemai Ghosh’s photographs along with texts, the only Indian (Bengali) director who was present was Mrinal Sen. When I asked him what had made him come where one director’s work was being felicitated and no director from Bengali cinema was present, he was surprised. He said, “How can you ask me such a question? Pather Panchali is a film that changed the image of Indian cinema on the world map. And Manik Babu (Satyajit Ray) has directed the film. How can I not be there?”
Mrinal Sen’s Khandhar (1984) was screened at Cannes in May 2010. It was earlier screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival. On his 91st birthday, Mrinal-da said, “Every day is my birthday. I am born every day because we grow every single minute of our lives. I do not need to remember my birthday on just one day in a year. I consider my birth a disaster.” You never knew when he was serious and when he was joking. This legend of world cinema who held Bengali cinema by its hand and took it to find its place in the world map along with his two contemporaries Satyajit Ray and Ritwik Ghatak. In a manner of speaking, people like him never die because they leave behind them not only their films but also their approach to life and their memories among their audience – national and international.
Sen picked awards left, right and centre and they did not really matter to him over time. Most of his archival clippings, posters, press coverages and photographs are in France which bestowed on him the honour of Commander de L’orde des Arts des Letters and also held a retrospective of his films, a rare honour for an Indian film-maker. USSR gave him the Soviet Land Nehru Award and he has won numerous awards for his films at international film festivals like Cannes, Berlin, Moscow, Karlovy Vary, Chicago, Montreal and Carthage. The Government of India bestowed on him the Padma Bhushan in 1980 while the West Bengal Government gave him the Satyajit Ray Memorial Award in 1994. Over the years, his films won several Golden Lotuses and he himself won several Silver Lotuses as Best Director at the National Film Awards topped by the Dadsaheb Phalke Award. He represented India at the UNESCO Commission to celebrate the centenary of cinema was also the president of the International Federation of Film Societies.
Mrinal Sen’s filmography reveals a deep obsession with the basic survival needs of people, some of who adhere to their native simplicity and innocence (Bhuvan Shome, Mrigaya) through the tragedy of politics and poverty in an environment rid with every kind of inequality between and among human beings, (Calcutta’71, Ek Din Pratidin, Parasuram, Padatik). Towards the end of his life, especially after his wife Gita Sen passed away, he wearied of socio-political causes, and gravitated inwards, into the minds of people and by his own admission, into his own mind. Mrinal Sen is not just a name. He is a legend. He is a cult figure. He is forever.
Shoma A. Chatterji is a freelance journalist, film scholar and author. She has authored 17 published titles and won the National Award for Best Writing on Cinema, twice. She won the UNFPA-Laadli Media Award, 2010 for ‘commitment to addressing and analysing gender issues’ among many awards.