AMITABH BACHCHAN, LA STAR INDIANA CHE HA CONQUISTATO IL MONDO

In occasione della sua partecipazione, in collegamento video, all'imminente River to River Florence Indian Film Festival 2021 (clicca qui), ieri La Repubblica ha pubblicato un'intervista concessa da Amitabh Bachchan e raccolta da Andrea Giordano. Di seguito un estratto:

'Iniziamo da una leggenda che da anni gira sul web, sul fatto che anni fa François Truffaut la definì un one man industry. Cosa c'è di vero?

Purtroppo non è stato lui a dirmelo, ma un gentiluomo francese, in visita in India, che aveva un nome molto simile. Parlammo di cinema, delle esperienze che avevo fatto fino a quel momento e allora fece questa osservazione riguardo al mio lavoro, che fu ripresa dai media. Da lì è innescato tutto. Non ho mai incontrato Truffaut e certo non mi merito quel titolo.

Eppure lei ha sperimentato tutto, quindi c’è una grande verità.

Mi intimorisce, e allo stesso tempo mi rende orgoglioso il fatto che si parli di me come di un’icona, una leggenda vivente, ma non me ne voglio convincere pienamente. Nel 2022 compirò 80 anni (...), sono nell’industria cinematografica da 50: una vita, certo sono grato per ciò che continuo a realizzare ma a fare la differenza è l’amore della gente nei miei confronti, l’aspetto più tenero del mio viaggio, che invece è partito da umili origini.

Cosa le hanno insegnato quelle radici?

A rimanere focalizzato sugli obiettivi, a non sentirmi di fatto mai arrivato. All'inizio ero solo un giovane attore in difficoltà, inadeguato, cercavo di trovare la mia strada e rendere fieri i miei genitori, visto i sacrifici che avevano fatto per darmi un’istruzione. Ho dovuto affrontare tante difficoltà, anche dei fallimenti, per poi ritrovarmi a raggiungere la popolarità: non parlo del successo, ma di una certa consapevolezza e responsabilità, a cui ho sempre dato valore.

Bollywood è una realtà tra le più prolifiche. Secondo lei come si è evoluta?

Con il tempo il cambiamento avviene in molte sfere culturali, artistiche, private, e il cinema non è diverso. Nel corso degli anni il modo in cui i film sono stati realizzati tecnicamente, e dal punto di vista dei contenuti, hanno subito importanti trasformazioni, non solo invenzioni a livello tecnico e digitali, ma anche a livello sociale e morale. Sono fortunato ad aver avuto la possibilità di osservare come l’India si sia aperta in questo senso nel raccontare personaggi, volti, storie, tradizioni, ideali, mostrando al mondo e alle nuove generazioni una forma di mutazione narrativa, e quanto ci sia dietro in termini di lavoro, artigianalità, maestranze e produzioni, e sul fatto che si seguano i regolamenti e la legge del Paese, come è obbligatorio in qualsiasi società civile.

Ha avuto anche un breve passaggio in politica, poi abbandonata. Oggi per il suo paese in che modo si impegna?

Proseguo in diverse attività, sostengo varie campagne legate alla prevenzione, alla salute, a migliorare le condizioni sanitarie, così riguardo i grandi temi come l'ambiente, lo faccio sia per le Nazioni Unite, che per il mio governo.

Riferimenti e modelli: se ne ha avuti, quali sono?

Se parliamo di arte, il cinema italiano: i classici, da Fellini a Visconti, hanno rappresentato qualcosa di unico, lo dico come spettatore e attore. Sa, le ispirazioni sono motivi validi per cercare di scegliere ciò che ti colpisce come persona creativa, su cui poi lavori, dandogli però la tua di sensibilità.

Chehre segna un ulteriore step di una carriera memorabile: ci avrebbe mai pensato?

Il ragazzo timido di un tempo forse no. Ogni giorno, però, assorbo nuovi input che influenzano allo stesso tempo la mia mente e il pensiero. Questa è la bellezza della vita, nel fare un mestiere in cui sei tante cose, riesci a divertirti, come in questo caso, a esplorare, a calarti nei panni di altri, a riflettere pure sul percorso intrapreso. Per questo sono felice quando ci sono occasioni come il River to River in grado di celebrare un’intera industria, formata da così numerosi e meravigliosi ingranaggi.'

Vedi anche River to River Florence Indian Film Festival 2012: Bachchan era l'ospite d'onore dell'evento.

LA DENUNCIA DELLA DISCRIMINAZIONE CASTALE NEL NUOVO CINEMA POPOLARE TAMIL

Asuran

Vi propongo integralmente l'articolo Bollywood has miles to go before it can produce Kaala, Asuran, Karnan or even a Jai Bhim, di Dilip Mandal, pubblicato oggi da The Print:

'Tamil film industry used to be like any other Indian film Industry about a decade ago. But then it delved into anti-caste movies that even Hindi and Bengali new wave films didn't.

The Tamil film industry is making international headlines. The BBC, Yahoo News, Khaleej Times and The Independent reported that Suriya-starrer Jai Bhim is leading the global rating chart on IMDb. As far as the site’s popularity matrix is concerned, Jai Bhim is currently the most popular movie, overpassing the long-time favourite The Shawshank Redemption and The Godfather.

Jai Bhim is the latest crowning jewel of the Tamil cinema, which has produced a new genre of film in the last decade. This school of cinema comes from the French La Nouvelle Vague. These movies have caught the imagination of the audience not only in Tamil Nadu but around the country and even abroad. These movies have depicted the harsh realities of Indian social life and haven’t shied from showing the truth, especially those pertaining to the horrors of caste system and the resistance to it by the Dalit, Bahujan and Adivasi communities.

Films such as Attakathi (2012), Madras (2014), Kabali (2016), Kaala (2018), Sarpatta Parambarai (2021) – all directed by Pa. Ranjith; Asuran (2019) by Vetri Maaran; Pariyerum Perumal (2018) and Karnan (2021) by Mari Selvaraj; and now Jai Bhim have given birth to a new genre, which is different from Hindi or Bangla new wave. The main differentiators are:

1. All filmmakers in Hindi and Bengali new wave cinema were from dominant caste background, whereas Tamil new wave movies are made by Dalit and OBC (Other Backward Class) directors. Tamil new wave movies have a different standpoint and the section or aspect of society under the lens here is also poles apart.

2. Hindi and Bengali new wave films like Aakrosh (1980) by Govind Nihalani, Sadgati (1981) by Satyajit Ray, Paar (1984) by Goutam Ghose, Damul (1985) by Prakash Jha had Dalit and subaltern characters but almost all of them were poor, wretched and uneducated. Even Satyajit Ray, who is regarded as one of the greatest filmmakers, mostly had lead protagonists from dominant castes or they were. Even in Sadgati, the Dalit character Dukhi remained voiceless. Tamil new wave cinema has produced powerful Dalit and subaltern characters in films like Kaala, Asuran, Pariyerum Perumal and Karnan.

3. Hindi and Bengali new wave cinema had a ‘saviour syndrome’, in the sense that the characters who saved those oppressed almost always belonged to the elite social groups. We saw this in Sujata (1959) in which the dominant caste hero becomes the saviour of an untouchable girl, and recently in Article 15. In Tamil new wave movies, barring Jai Bhim, lead characters are from subaltern groups. Even in Jai Bhim, tribal protagonists were not mute and meek. The character of Senggeni, the pregnant Irula woman, was especially.

4. Hindi and Bengali new wave films had Gandhian socialism and Marxist ideological framework. Tamil new wave movies have very strong Ambedkarite, Periyarism and Buddhist iconography. Especially in movies of Pa. Ranjith and Mari Selvaraj, these images are quite clear. The name of the film Jai Bhim itself is an Ambedkarite slogan. The movie uses pictures, quotes and idols of Ambedkar and Buddha. Pa. Ranjith’s movie Sarpatta Parambarai even reflected the Dravidian movement of the 1970s.

Kaala

A decade of cinematic growth

There is a popular rhetoric that cinema mirrors contemporary society and politics, and impacts that society at the same time. Hindi cinema cannot claim that title – of mirroring Indian socio-political reality.

Hindi cinema failed to capture some of the watershed moments of contemporary history like JP movement (1974-77), implementation of the Mandal Commission report and related upheaval (early 1990s), and the emergence of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and OBC politics in north India among others. Someone not aware of Indian history would learn nothing about the epoch events that shaped the country if they watched all major movies of the last 50 years.

So, it is hardly a surprise that Hindi cinema completely missed or overlooked the phenomenon of newly emerged Dalit middle class and its aspirations. Tamil cinema, on the other hand, with films like Kaala and Pariyerum Perumal, show how it captured that phenomenon well.

In Tamil cinema, all this change happened in a span of a decade. The industry used to be like any other Indian film Industry and followed almost similar trajectories. As Dr. Harish Wankhede, professor at the Centre for Political Studies, JNU (Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi), puts it, “The Indian movie industries began their journey by making mythological movies and later worked in a broad Nehruvian framework. These films followed the journey of the Indian nation. It was a trans temporal journey from hope to disenchantment to ultra-nationalism.”

This grand narrative, through its normative ideas and also because it valued sectional interests, skipped many uncomfortable issues and topics, most prominently, caste. Tribal issues were also very conveniently sidestepped as if they didn’t exist, and when tribals were shown, they were extras who danced in the background.

It’s not that all movies fit in this meta narrative. There were notable exceptions like Giddha (1984) and Marathi movie Umbartha (1982) but they were few and never became mainstream. The Indian ‘new wave’ or ‘parallel’ or ‘art’ cinema movement tried to break the mould, but it could never reach the masses. This movement had its footprints mainly on West Bengal from the 1940s to mid-1960s and on Mumbai during the 1970s. It waned thereafter.

Parallel cinema in Mumbai got some of its inspiration and plots from the Naxalite movement and depicted the horrors of caste from Marxist standpoints. But because parallel cinema itself always remained in the periphery, it occupied almost negligible space and remained a sideshow because mass audiences never watched these films. Made by the rich for the rich, elite class who saw the poor on big screens, these films just won national and international awards, rarely a mass audience.

New wave Hindi cinema was just a blip in the entire Indian movie history. It came and went without making any lasting impact on film-making. When these movies were winning awards, audiences in theatres were cheering ‘angry young man’ Amitabh Bachchan. This angry man was mostly poor but didn’t have a caste. Castelessness of the poor hero is a phenomenon that Hindi movies always carried with them and still do faithfully. Thus, Raj Kapoor became Awaara and Shree 420 without any caste. This Nehruvian socialist framework has remained the Masonic stone of Hindi movies even today.

So, the pertinent question is, how did Tamil directors manage to break this mould and what is stopping other Indian film industries from replicating it?

Sarpatta Parambarai

An evolved industry and audience

A cursory glance provides some clues and entry points in this discussion. This list should not be considered complete or exhaustive, but is more in the form of a hypothesis.

1. Tamil Nadu has a strong tradition of anti-caste movements and that is the mainstream there. So, it’s easy for Tamil filmmakers to tread into that territory. Even before the advent of overtly anti-caste movies, Tamil cinema produced films with protagonists from non-Brahmin social groups.

2. It was the Madras presidency where social justice and affirmative action policies were first ushered in. Because of these policies, there is a large OBC and Dalit middle-class population in Tamil Nadu. This socio-economic class is able to sustain anti-caste movies. This is not so in north India.

3. This OBC and Dalit middle-class is the arena from where filmmakers like Pa. Ranjith, Mari Selvaraj and movie stars like Dhanush, Suriya and even Rajinikanth have emerged. No north Indian state is producing such big names from OBC/SC (Scheduled Castes) communities.

4. The Tamil film industry is based on a star-system model, in which the superstars have their own audience and choose the directors and not vice-versa. Anti-caste movie directors like Pa. Ranjith, Mari Selvaraj and Vetri Maaran are lucky in a sense that superstars like Rajinikanth, Dhanush and Jamshad Cethirakath aka Arya chose to work with them. Though, such collaborations have benefitted these superstars as well. Commercial success of Kabali was a landmark moment because this proved two points. One, Pa. Ranjith can make blockbusters. And two, if Rajinikanth can do an anti-caste movie, then other stars can also do so. No Amitabh or Shah Rukh or Aamir has ventured into similar territories. Because of this, anti-caste films are yet to acquire a critical mass, especially in Hindi movie space.

Tamil film critic Baradwaj Rangan had written about an interesting incident in his blog: “I co-wrote a screenplay some years ago, and we named the hero Rahul. We hadn’t thought about Rahul’s caste. The only thing he was, in our minds, was young – and Rahul sounded like a young name. We sent an early draft of the script around, and the first bit of advice we got was to change the protagonist’s name because it was “too Brahminical”.”

He cites another instance: “A distributor asked a filmmaker to remove scenes of the heroine (a classical singer) with a tanpura because the audience would think the film was about a privileged girl – not necessarily Brahmin, but someone belonging to an educated, upper-class background.”

Such instances show how Tamil movies and its audience have evolved. So, Pa. Ranjith found no difficulty in showing Buddhist marriage of his lead actors in Sarpatta Parambarai or Mari Selvaraj effortlessly showed the image of martyred Dalit icon Immanuvel Sekaran and headless Buddha in Karnan and still made a popular movie.

Bollywood has miles to go before it produces Kaala, Asuran, Karnan or even a Jai Bhim'.

Jai Bhim

Aggiornamento del 21 novembre 2021: sullo stesso argomento, vi segnalo l'articolo Bollywood’s unceasing fall from grace, di Namrata Joshi, pubblicato oggi dal National Herald. Di seguito un estratto:

'For Diwali, if Kollywood and Suriya (with Jai Bhim) looked at caste discrimination, exploitation of tribals and custodial violence by cops, Bollywood, with Sooryavanshi, celebrated the police force as a noble, cute, cuddly and friendly community that also doubles up as conscience keeper of the nation. (...)

Tamil cinema has seen many such searing, powerful narratives, about the systemic oppression of the marginalised at the hands of the brutally empowered, including Vetri Maaran’s brilliant socio-political thriller Visaranai. (...) But the point of Jai Bhim is precisely its massiness. It’s the ability to reach out and speak to a wider set of audiences directly, mobilise awareness and make them question and talk about all that needs to be debated out in the open. It does so without any sugar-coating at that. It is able to deploy the charisma of its star with the sense of urgency that the subject deserves. Moreover, he doesn’t hog the show. The film is not about him so much as what he is fighting for and Senggeni does retain her own agency while having him as an ally.

On the other hand, the Rohit Shetty “entertainer” is just centred on one man and his faux bravado complete with several slo-mo walks towards the camera with macho swagger in full display. Not to talk of the lame sense of humour involving his forgetfulness. (...) More than that, unlike a Jai Bhim that takes on the institutional problems head-on, Sooryavanshi unspools like a filmi toolkit of the State, one that falls in line with the larger narrative currently playing on in the country. So, you have the earlier generation being blamed for the Partition, Muslims being equated with Pakistan and terrorism. There’s the familiar play on the good Muslim-bad Muslim (Kasab-Kalaam) binary and lessons are doled out on Hindu-Muslim unity with zero humility but a smug Hindu upper hand. A signifier of what the country has become over the years, as much as the industry has been, and continues to be, an enabler in helping create the narrative with its populist, sarkar-sanctioned cinema. (...)

More than a week after the two films hit the screens, people are still talking about Jai Bhim - reams are being written in its favour and also critiquing it. Something a good film always does - generate a debate. Meanwhile, Sooryavanshi and Bollywood are gloating over the crores it has amassed in one weekend. The puffed-up Bollywood is happy that the audience has not abandoned the theatres and money is pouring in, despite the unprecedented economic downturn in the country and the health hazard of Covid. (...) I wonder between Bollywood and Kollywood who really copped out and lost this Diwali?'

Vedi anche:

- Welcome to Bollywood: Caste e Genere NRI, 26 giugno 2022

- Madurai Formula Films, 25 gennaio 2024

CINEMA. FESTA INTERNAZIONALE DI ROMA 2007

[Archivio]

Curiosando nel sito della Festa del Cinema di Roma, sono incappata nel catalogo dell'edizione del 2007, quando la manifestazione si chiamava Cinema. Festa Internazionale di Roma. Ne scrivo perché vale la pena conservarne traccia nel blog, prima che il sito riduca ulteriormente o addirittura cancelli parte dello storico. Nel 2007, il Paese ospite era l'India. A partire da pagina 301 del catalogo, si legge:

'Focus

Il Focus di quest’anno porta a Roma l’India con una programmazione di arte, letteratura, musica e naturalmente cinema, trasversale a tutte le sezioni. Sono frammenti di questo grande paese denso di cultura millenaria, la cui straordinaria vitalità e contemporaneità rimane sempre motivo di infinita meraviglia. Il Focus India apre con un Indian Day. Una serie di importanti eventi si alternano in onore del paese ospite e di una rappresentativa delegazione di autorevoli personaggi del mondo del cinema, dell’economia e delle istituzioni. Al centro dell’India-Italy: Business Forum un interessante e aperto confronto sull’obiettivo comune di costruire alleanze nei nuovi mercati globali. Le nuove produzioni cinematografiche del subcontinente attraversano i luoghi della Festa. Alla Casa del Cinema due film raccontano l’epica che ha accompagnato i sessant’anni dell’indipendenza: Gandhi, My Father di Feroz Abbas Khan e Guru di Mani Ratnam, mentre il nuovo cinema indipendente è rappresentato dai film di Sudhir Mishra con Khoya Khoya Chand e No Smoking (pagina 98 del catalogo) di Anurag Kashyap, quest’ultimo fuori concorso. Infine The Last Lear (pagina 164 del catalogo) di Rituparno Ghosh, presentato nella sezione Extra, fonde il cinema d’autore con lo star system bollywoodiano. Nella mostra PROSPECTS. Contemporary Art from India, il sorprendente panorama dell’arte contemporanea indiana, collettiva di dieci tra gli artisti indiani più emblematici e conosciuti a livello internazionale. L’artista Luigi Ontani presenta una raccolta di fotografie di viaggio En route vers l’Inde. Alcuni tra i più interessanti scrittori e filmmakers indiani si confrontano con attori, registi e autori italiani sulle culture dei due paesi all’Auditorium dell’Ara Pacis. Alla Casa del Jazz cinque concerti con i protagonisti della musica classica indiana e del jazz italiano testimoniano la molteplicità delle forme espressive del mondo musicale del subcontinente.

Anurag Kashyap - Roma, 2007

Indian Day

Indian Day: una giornata in omaggio all’India. Un’autorevole delegazione di personalità del cinema, dell’economia e delle istituzioni attraversano la Festa e sono i protagonisti di una serie di eventi e di film che raccontano l’India contemporanea e il rapporto che lega il subcontinente al nostro paese. Un forum accoglie temi dell’industria del cinema e non solo. Negli ultimi anni i rapporti economici tra India e Italia sono diventati sempre più stretti. Obiettivo comune ai due Paesi: costruire alleanze per competere nei nuovi mercati globali. India-Italy Business Forum intende fare il punto sul percorso fatto finora, sui progetti già avviati e sui possibili scenari della futura collaborazione. La diversità del cinema indiano, dove la musica assume una funzione narrativa, si confronta sempre più velocemente, con la realtà della cinematografia e dell’entertainment globale. Insieme ai blockbuster commerciali e alla nuova Bollywood rinasce un forte movimento di cinema indipendente. Ma le frontiere di questo variegato scenario cambiano di continuo, si fondono, imponendo una ridefinizione costante di questo cinema in movimento. Registi, attori, critici e produttori discutono, a partire dai rispettivi ruoli, la natura caleidoscopica del cinema contemporaneo del loro paese.

Narrazione d’India tra letteratura e cinema

La Casa delle Letterature propone al pubblico della Festa del Cinema di Roma una riflessione sulle ragioni e sulle modalità dell’incontro tra letteratura e cinema, tra immagine e parola. Narrazioni d’India: dal meraviglioso racconto che ne ha fatto Roberto Rossellini ai recenti romanzi di alcuni autori contemporanei, dai testi di grandi scrittrici indiane e i film che ne sono stati tratti, al lavoro di filmmakers sul turismo vandalo. Cinque incontri dedicati alla cultura indiana e al rapporto che ha con la cultura del nostro paese. Ne saranno protagonisti scrittori, sceneggiatori, registi, critici, indiani e non, che incrociano generi e tecniche della scrittura letteraria e di quella cinematografica nella loro esperienza creativa. (...) Nella sede della Casa delle Letterature, spazio del Comune di Roma in piazza dell'Orologio, vengono allestite una mostra documentaria sulla letteratura contemporanea indiana e una esposizione di dipinti dedicati a temi della spiritualità indiana.

Giovedì 18 ottobre (...) Mumbai - Calcutta. Città laboratorio del contemporaneo. Con lo scrittore Suketu Mehta, autore di Maximum City, e il regista Goutam Ghose. Proiezioni di estratti dai film di Goutam Ghose su Calcutta. (...)

Venerdì 19 ottobre (...) L’India nel romanzo d’oggi. Con gli scrittori Gregory David Roberts, autore di Shantaram, Francesca Marciano e Folco Terzani. Proiezioni del documentario Le strade di Shantaram di Italo Spinelli e Ian Michelini. (...)

Martedì 23 ottobre (...) I grandi reportage: India, Matri Bhumi di Roberto Rossellini. Introducono Adriano Aprà, Renzo Rossellini e il biografo indiano di Roberto Rossellini Dileep Padgaonkar. Proiezione del film India, Matri Bhumi di Roberto Rossellini.

Mercoledì 24 ottobre (...) Scritture di donne tra tradizione e innovazione. Con le scrittrici Anuradha Majumdar, autrice di Lontano dal paradiso, Elisabetta Rasy e Carola Susani. (...)

Il jazz e la musica indiana

Il rapporto tra jazz e musica indiana si può far risalire ai primissimi anni ‘60, epoca in cui anche il mondo della musica rock fu attratto dalla spiritualità e dalla suggestione di quella tradizione musicale. In quegli stessi anni il sassofonista John Coltrane iniziava ad ascoltare le registrazioni del virtuoso di sitar, Ravi Shankar; affascinato, cercò di inglobare elementi di quella musica nella sua ricerca con risultati che produssero alcune delle pagine più innovative del jazz di quel periodo. In seguito il suo esempio fu seguito da molti altri: Miles Davis, ad esempio, o il chitarrista John McLaughlin, che arrivarono ad utilizzare strumenti come il sitar o le tablas nelle proprie composizioni. Da allora le collaborazioni tra musicisti indiani e jazzisti sono diventate pratica comune, e solisti come Zakir Hussain e Trilok Gurtu ne sono validissima testimonianza. Nella settimana della Festa Internazionale del Cinema di Roma 2007, la Casa del Jazz presenta un programma di concerti in cui si esibiranno in maniera alternata e mescolata esponenti del mondo classico indiano, dall’icona del canto khyal Mangala Tiwari al virtuoso di sitar Gopal Krishna, e grandi personalità del jazz italiano. (...)

PROSPECTS. Contemporary Art from India

L’arte contemporanea indiana è da tempo parte integrante della cultura visiva del subcontinente ed il cinema, le diverse sfaccettature della società indiana, le molte attrazioni ed innumerevoli contraddizioni sono motivo d’ispirazione continua per gli artisti che al cinema rendono numerosi omaggi. Anche in forma di parodia. Alcuni significativi frammenti di questa realtà creativa sono raccolti nella mostra PROSPECTS. Contemporary Art from India. Soltanto recentemente la scena dell’arte contemporanea indiana, con il favore di una nuova generazione di artisti, sembra essere emersa ed avere acquisito visibilità internazionale. Le opere di una parte rappresentativa di questa generazione sono, per la prima volta, esposte alla Festa del Cinema di Roma'.

Anurag Kashyap racconta la sua partecipazione al festival nell'intervista esclusiva che ha concesso al nostro blog: 'I miei ricordi di Roma per la proiezione sono gli unici bei ricordi riguardo a No smoking. Ero con mia figlia, e mi sono divertito moltissimo. Fu una settimana memorabile, e non dimenticherò mai la grande accoglienza del pubblico'. Anche John Abraham aveva presenziato all'evento.

Anurag Kashyap e John Abraham - Roma, 2007

RASSEGNA STAMPA/VIDEO

- Italia-India, il business, La Stampa, 22 ottobre 2007: 'Riccardo Tozzi, capo dell’Anica, esce soddisfatto dall’incontro con i rappresentanti dell’industria cinematografica indiana. Italia e India, a suo dire, hanno un primo problema in comune: producono film che non vanno all’estero. È vero che l’India ha un potenziale pubblico di 700 milioni e l’Italia di 50, ma entrambe le cinematografie se vogliono sopravvivere devono imparare ad esportare. «Per di più - dice Tozzi - noi sappiamo costruire un racconto, loro no, ma loro producono moltissimo noi assai meno. Se unissimo le forze, forse ce la potremmo fare». Ma al parere da industriale del cinema Tozzi ne aggiunge un altro da osservatore di costume. Tanto noi quanto l’India, spiega, siamo paesi che mescolano punte avanzate e zone di arretratezza. Affari, politica e mafia sono presenti tanto qua come là, e tutti e tre i settori sono filtrati dalla famiglia, il grande collante'. 

- L'India sbarca all'Auditorium, Franco Montini, La Repubblica, 23 ottobre 2007: 'Il confronto è stato utile e serrato: nella sua veste di presidente di Confindustria Luca di Montezemolo ha incontrato Yash Chopra e Amit Mitra, rispettivamente presidente e segretario dell'analoga associazione indiana. Insomma l'ambizione è che il Focus India possa favorire la nascita di accordi di collaborazione in vari settori industriali. Per ciò che riguarda il cinema, un settore trainante, perché l'India con i suoi 700 milioni di spettatori l'anno rappresenta il secondo mercato mondiale in assoluto, qualcosa si è già concretizzato: Chase, un action movie indiano da 5 milioni di dollari, diretto dallo specialista Anubhav Sinha, sarà girato proprio a Roma e dintorni (*). L'avvio delle riprese è previsto nel giro di un paio di settimane. Il cast sarà indiano, con qualche nostro attore, la troupe interamente italiana'. 

(*) Non ho trovato traccia di questo film, a parte una dichiarazione di Sinha raccolta da Hindustan Times in un articolo del 26 settembre 2007. Però, nel video Rai 3 del TGR Lazio del 30 maggio 2007, si accenna a Cash, pellicola di Sinha distribuita nell'agosto 2007, la cui storia termina all'aeroporto di Roma. Cash venne stroncato da pubblico e critica, e l'eventuale sequel (forse Chase?) non fu mai girato.

- India Inc. eyes business on Roman holiday, Binoy Prabhakar, The Economic Times, 23 ottobre 2007

La Festa del Cinema di Roma, nel corso degli anni, ha regalato parecchie soddisfazioni agli appassionati di cinema indiano. Le più clamorose:

- edizione 2010: Shah Rukh Khan incontra il pubblico, in occasione della proiezione de Il mio nome è Khan (clicca qui);

- edizione 2014: Haider si aggiudica il premio del pubblico; Shahid Kapoor e Vishal Bhardwaj partecipano al festival (clicca qui);

- edizione 2015: Angry Indian Goddesses si aggiudica il premio del pubblico (clicca qui);

- edizione 2018: prima mondiale di Mere Pyare Prime Minister, a cui presenzia il regista Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra (clicca qui).

(Eternamente grata agli organizzatori e ai selezionatori della Festa del Cinema di Roma)

APARNA SEN IS ASKING TOUGH QUESTION WITH THE RAPIST AND WINNING AWARDS

Ieri The Hindu ha pubblicato una lunga intervista concessa da Aparna Sen a Prathyush Parasuraman. Vi propongo di seguito il testo integrale:

'The filmmaker’s 16th film just picked up the top honour at the Busan International Film Festival. She discusses how she meticulously researched the subject and then trusted her instincts.

‘Why does a man become a rapist?’ The question has been fermenting in filmmaker Aparna Sen’s mind for close to a decade. “The idea came to me first as a germ [she can’t remember if it was before or after Nirbhaya, the 2012 Delhi gang rape and murder case]. Then it gradually got fleshed out into a story with characters and setting,” she says. Now, with The Rapist, Sen has posed the question to the world.

A very matter-of-fact film - or as Variety magazine calls it, a “richly-layered discussion starter” - it takes no sides. It follows Naina, played by Konkona Sen Sharma, a criminology professor in Delhi who survives a brutal rape and assault, while putting forward various points of view and also questioning the validity of the carceral state and the death sentence.

In early October, The Rapist premiered at the Busan International Film Festival, and won the prestigious Kim Jiseok Award and numerous accolades. The actor-auteur’s 16th film, it was shot in 27 days in Delhi, in the slim window between the first and the lethal second Covid-19 wave. They finished shooting on April 6; the lockdown was announced on the 8th. “Actually, it was supposed to be a couple of days longer. We finished ahead of schedule thanks to our DOP [director of photography] Ayanaka Bose, who was extremely fast,” she says, recalling how they all stayed at The Leela Palace in Chanakyapuri. “We used to go down to breakfast along with the other guests staying at the hotel. So, it was not as though we were living in a bubble. We also shot in a real slum for four or five days. We were extremely lucky that [through the entire shoot] no one got sick.”

At 76, Sen is still raring to go, with more ideas, including a memoir, germinating. In an email interview, she looks back at her 40-year career as a director, and what prompted her to take on the subject of The Rapist.

Edited excerpts:

The title is a forceful one.

Yes, it is. We didn’t want to hide behind a more innocuous-sounding title. However, the theme is not about whether rapists should be given the death penalty, though that question is likely to come to mind when one watches the film. The theme is about what happens to three people whose lives are changed overnight after a horrific incident. Yes, it is also an exploration of what turns a person into a rapist because nobody is born as one. Is it genetics? Is it his environment? Or both? What is it about our society that turns such a large number of men into rapists? Social inequality? Ingrained patriarchy? Envy of the new, successful woman, and the desire to put her in her place? Or is it a combination of all these factors? It is an extremely complex issue that is addressed in the film, though not in an obvious or underlined way.

Whom did you consult while writing the script?

I talked to lawyers and activists, but not to rape survivors. I had a gut feeling that they would not wish to relive the experience by talking about it. Two of my feminist friends, who head organisations to help abused women, gave me important insights. Anuradha Kapoor, who runs Swayam - of which I, too, am a member - gave me a lot of material to read about rape survivors and details about the procedures immediately after a rape is reported. Shamita Dasgupta, who heads an organisation called Manavi in the US, told me about a new approach to crime called Restorative Justice where the victim and the perpetrator meet and talk about the reasons that made the latter act in the way he/she did. Restorative Justice isn’t mentioned in my film, but the knowledge was useful when I was writing certain scenes. For the most part though, I relied on my intuition and observations, which have served me well in the past.

This is the sixth film you have worked on with your daughter, Konkona - from Picnic (1989), when she was around 10, to The Rapist. How has your artistic collaboration evolved?

There is implicit trust on both sides. We have the same mindset and value systems. This makes it easier for her to understand what I am saying, right from the script stage. And, on my part, I know that Konkona has a very fine sense of balance, that she knows where to draw the line and will never go over the top. She has had tremendous screen presence from a very early age. It is difficult to delineate exactly how our relationship has evolved - I think she used to be very obedient earlier and listened to me much more than she does now! But then, she is much more mature as a person now and also far more proficient as an actor. I hardly ever have to direct her now. The only problem I had with her earlier was that she was rather uncomfortable doing intimate scenes. This time, I told her right at the beginning that she will have to get rid of those qualms. She looked at me with a wicked glint in her eye and said, ‘Okay, you just watch me!’ And I have to say, she delivered perfectly.

Tell us about the unusual casting of Arjun Rampal as Naina’s husband.

Why unusual? You know, the problem is that everyone just gapes at Arjun’s good looks and is unable to see beyond that! I had seen him in only two films before this, Rock On!! and Raajneeti, and I liked him very much in both. But for this film, I chose him because his appearance, or maybe his persona, exudes a certain nobility. This was necessary for the character. Also, I had noticed that he tends to underact. That was perfect for the role of Aftab. Despite all this, I was not entirely certain that he would be able to deliver and hold his own alongside Konkona. But I have to say I was in for a very pleasant surprise. Arjun is an extremely sensitive, finely-tuned actor underneath that gorgeous exterior. He and Konkona exuded the most wonderful chemistry together. He was quite a revelation as the understated, intellectual, highly-principled but emotionally-torn Aftab Malik.

In Mr. and Mrs. Iyer, you’d said that the characters were not supposed to be Muslim and Hindu - it was an organic development. Was it the same with The Rapist? Or was the love angle a reaction to the current climate?

No, it was not. At least, not consciously so. I had reasoned that having a couple who were Hindu and Muslim, where neither had the slightest desire to convert the other, would be the most economical way of imparting the information that they were truly liberal and secular. Aftab’s one line to the officer in charge immediately after the rape sequence, ‘Meri biwi Hindu hain. Koi problem hai aapko?’ [My wife is Hindu. Do you have a problem with that?] says it all!

Delhi looks dingy and grey in the film, almost like all the colour has been sucked out.

Yes. [DOP] Bose and I decided to go for a desaturated look. As if the colour is being drained away from the lives of the characters. It starts brightly enough when Naina and Aftab are leading a happy, normal life. But after the rape incident, as the mood of the film gets darker, we gradually remove the colour. In fact, both Bose and I would have been very happy if we could have shot the film in black and white, but other considerations prevailed.

How would you describe your artistic vision? How has it evolved from the ’80s to the digital and OTT space we are living in now?

I make neither experimental cinema nor so-called formula films. I make films about human beings - tell their stories, bring their joys and sorrows, desires and frustrations to the fore. Even in films like The Rapist or Mr. and Mrs. Iyer, which deal with issues of national importance, it is the individuals who matter and who the audience identifies with. Digitisation, or the OTT space, has never really bothered me too much. It is true that initially I resisted the transition from celluloid to digi-tapes. They seemed to have a more brittle quality and lacked the softness of colour and detail that we could get in celluloid. But science does not sit still. The quality of the digital medium has been improving so fast and giving such brilliant results, that one does not miss celluloid any more except for nostalgic reasons. As far as the OTT platform is concerned, it is something we have had to accept with a shrug, particularly after the onset of the pandemic. But there are merits too. We get to see the best of international cinema on OTT platforms. I saw films like Roma, The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, Capernaum sitting right in front of my TV. Of course, nothing compares to the experience of sitting in a darkened auditorium and watching a film with a room full of people with no doorbell, no telephones, no sudden guests to disturb you! As far as my films are concerned, most of them have been intimate stories about individuals, not elaborate spectacles. So the OTT platforms are not unsuited for viewing them.

A career spanning over 40 years, and yet you’ve noted that when you look back at your old films you only see mistakes. Is there one you’ve wished more people would have seen and talked about?

It is true that glaring mistakes are all I see when I review my films. But this is mostly with the recent ones. When I watch an old film like 36 Chowringhee Lane or Paromitar Ek Din, I often find myself thinking, ‘Well, that’s not too bad after all!’ I wish more people could have seen Yugant, which was somehow neglected outside Bengal. I wish I could have made it now with all the computer graphics available to us today, because there is an apocalyptic scene at the end with the sea breaking into flames. Yugant should really have been my swan song. The other film that I feel didn’t get its due is The Japanese Wife. It should be on one of the OTT platforms at least, so that more people can watch it. But it was marketed very badly at the time and few people outside of Bengal got to see it.'