Celluloidworks's Blog

There are stars. And then there are legends. I had the chance of interviewing one of the greatest actors of our times, Liv Ullmann, in 2003 for The Hindu. I know for a fact that this interview does not capture half of the interview, simply because we did not have enough space.  And much as I hate the piece now, I still remember my excitement at being able to interview her.

Extremely warm and gentle, she was poise and perfection personaified, her beauty unblemished even in her 60s. But there was more to her than just the brilliant actress you see before the camera. Liv Ullman wanted to make a difference, not just to the art but through the art. 

Here is the link to the article.

http://www.hindu.com/lf/2003/10/19/stories/2003101901890200.htm

The Australian Centre for Moving Images has a volunteer programme that I am now a proud member of. As part of the volunteer enrolment process, ACMI asked all the applicants to prepare a two min talk on a topic of their choice. I decided to choose why I believe in the magic of cinema. Simply because I couldn’t think of a more apt one. Here is the text I wrote out. I eventually couldn’t take a print out so spoke from what I remembered. Well I am volunteering at ACMI now for over four weeks..so I guess I did not do too badly

Here we go!

Why I Believe in the magic of cinemas

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens

Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens…

Oh yes we all know I didn’t write those lines. The copyright for that one belongs to someone else.

 Good morning everyone, my name is lakshmi balakrishnan and am here to tell you why I like to add caremalised butter popcorn and cola at the movies to that list of the timeless Julie Andrews classic number.

 It’s because I believe in the magic of cinema.

When I was a child it would often amaze me that hundreds of unfamiliar people inside a dark auditorium could giggle, gasp and cry all at the time same time just staring at a visual screen. Well, almost. It would amaze me even more that we could spend sunday after sunday laughing our guts out watching a suited man with a funny hat, fail at the most simple things. He rarely

seemed to mutter a word. May be an occasional sheepish smile here and there and a poke with his walking stick.We just thought he had to be English because the subtitles were in English.

 But that I guess is the magic of cinema. It speaks a language that can blur boundaries, capture our imagination and transform us to a world we never thought existed.

 Of course, cinema is not always about escaping the reality. I think its real magic lies in the fact that it helps us understand a country or its people’s cultural and political realities through the fictional mirrors of celluloid. It enables us to connect with the issues and concerns of people we don’t really know or may never see. Now I cant imagine how good always wins over evil was ever going to be just a line in a textbook. I mean you haven’t known that till you have seen that for your self on the big screen right ?

 But more importantly, I believe in the magic of cinema because it makes me part of a bigger world in the shortest possible time and without covering any real distance. Believe me that helps when you hate flying.

 Coming as I do from a land that brings over 800 films to the screen every year, I know movies are not just about entertainment. They can trigger a nation and motivate its people. It can bring down years of animosity between neighbouring countries at war. That is the power of the medium. It pushes you to dream big.

 I know I could just keep talking about why I believe in the magic of cinemas. So I would just like to conclude by saying I believe in the magic of cinema. Because for me, it’s the only place in the world where when darkness descends, magics begins!

That’s the question I found myself asking today while mulling over some of my favourite old hindi movies. If art does imitate life then perhaps our movies would have had more meaty roles for the Ramu, pandu, shantabais’ who have come to dominate our lives. Strangely enough while they have taken over most metro homes in India, on reel they seem to have made a disappearance act.

Think about it. Do you really remember many old Hindi classics or masala flicks without that man friday. My most visible memory is that of a greying old man in starched white dhoti, a short kurta and of course the red gamcha..never leaving the shoulder of the loyal servant. As much as he never left the side of the master. I am sure each one of us has at least one memory of these silent but strong characters…somehow the old help from Milli stands out in mind..he was in many ways the sensitive side to Amitabh’s angry young character in the movie in the first half, his only humane side…

Sholay is another movie where the character has a rather small role but plays an important link in the movie.Be it in his subtle ways of playing the strong loyal man friday to thakur or the soft man with a concern when he narrates the widow’s tale to Jai.

Of course, we have also had our share of heroes taking on this role too. Be it Rajesh Khanna in Bawarchi, Govinda in Swarg or even Amitabh in Namak Halal.

But somehow now I just cant think of a recent movie where we perhaps saw such characters.

So if you remember a recent movie with just as strong character..share it !!

Eagerly waiting for some names here….ramu ka replacement milega kya?

The digital age has brought in a new wave of producing and marketing cinema. While it may mean the loss of all things that traditionally one associated with the medium – big colourful hoardings, posters  or the box office as it existed, it has brought the audience to the forefront in a way never seen before.  They now have the choice of investing in movies, even if only a meager Rs. 1000 to see the kind of movies they want to see.

And they have the choice of marketing them with nothing more than the power of word of mouth.  We are looking at the beginning of an era where community involvement will continue to drive the business of good innovative cinema.  Unlike the small screen, where the audience has become an active participant only to enjoy the popularity `in a just in time’ phenomena like their  fictional counterparts of popular soaps, the cinema audience stands to gain from a participating in the development of the medium. And so they are tweeting, blogging and marketing movies or rather are being roped in to help do that in innumerable ways..

In the following posts,  info on movies that are being driven by the community and the reasons they have chosen to be part of them.

But for now, we must perhaps, celebrate the birth of a new cinema audience, and the death of the couch potato as we knew them.

Call it the turn of the tide, the rise of the impatient viewer or the result of a marketing dominated, TG driven world, whichever way, it is perhaps time to celebrate the death of the audience . Celebrate? Thats right!

 Or perhaps, just a wee bit incomplete. Lets see now…The death of the traditional audience? That’s it.

The audience, you see, is no longer just the audience anymore. They are also the script driver ( in some cases even writer as we will see )actor, director and now even the producer, distributor and marketing expert. We have seen this happening on tv over the last decade now.

From lapping up on the first available frames of drama to becoming the king of content, the Indian viewer, may still be largely discontent over the lack of good content, but is nevertheless, driving it. When Television first beamed into our homes, it was the age of the single channel, and about watching characters that were either images that reflected the scene from the neighbourhood or recreated heroes of our larger than life epics.

And slowly along the way, they have turned out to be our real next door neighbours. So, cashing in on their 2 ms of fame on tv have been that talented kid on the block who was only the star of neighborhood parties and classroom breaks, housewives with a passion to break, teens with attitude totally fake and people who believe they have just what it takes to win a quiz. In short, the big fat Indian society is playing out the drama big time on television on things galore. And its blurring the boundaries between fictional drama and the well scripted reality tracks being dolled out day after day. While this cross over seems to be leaving television channels just as confused about how the status of their content, it seems to be leading to a coming of age for Indian cinema.

 This is not to say that tv isint following it. Clearly the audience is voting in to decide more than just who stays in a reality game. They are also deciding which way a script should flow, which characters should die and which ones come back from the dead. So much for the creative abilities of our talented writers!

Next…how the audience is wearing multiple hats when it comes to cinema..

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   It has survived. In the bustling narrow lanes of Chandni Chowk (New Delhi), where hundreds of hurriedly paced steps fight for space amongst the shoving, pushing and squeezing past the crowd. Tucked away in the now famous narrow bylanes that houses the country’s largest electrical instruments market, Bhagirath Palace, is a piece of cinema history that every now and then, an curious film lover discovers.
   Only, this world is stripped of the arclights, the magic of the silverscreen and the glamour of the men and women it has carefully preserved in its shanty rooms for decades now. The business of movie lives on here in its naked form, bared of everything but the spirit in which the movies were made.

Movie posters and memorabilia had always interest me. I had hung on to everypiece of marketing brochure and photo that came my way when I was writing on cinema. It was often a struggle when I saw my boss happily snapping away images from some of them for use in the stories. While I still have some of the stuff I collected over the 8 years I wrote on cinema, a majority was lost when I left my last media job, as the office assistant threw them away thinking it was trash ( over 300 pictures including black and white and innumerable brochures and some poster!)

So here I was, two years after I quit journalism,  back to trace my steps into the hub of film distribution. Nestled right in the heart of Bhagirath Palace, but often unknown, unseen and lost in the hustle bustle of old delhi’s madness.Of course, your first step into the alleys behind Moti cinema will rarely give you comfort. After roaming around aimlessly for a couple of hours and asking half a dozen people, in, outside and around moti cinema, it was a chance encounter with a bunch of workmen carrying film cans of the Big B starrer Aladdin that one finally managed to hit the jackpot of the location.

I was greeted by posters of semi clad women, staring at us from pan stained and paint stripped walls that seemed to have taken on the darkness that surrounded the steps leading to nothingness at first glance.  Our man of the hour was finally found, after climbing three floors of spiral staircase, all seeped in darkness. The steps were steep and bundled with bits of celluloid works, film reels, some spilling out of the cans, clearly having outlived their time on the screen and now even on these steps.

Now about the man who makes a living out of the posters.

Ashok had no love for the movies nor was he star struck about the heroes. And yet, his cinema story started at the age of 15 when he sold his first poster, or rather plastered  it. It just happened to be a job he was good at, he insisted. You wonder if that can really be true, but are forced to believe it when he reveals he hasn’t seen any of the latest flicks. He just doesn’t have a thing for the movies. And yet, he will rattle of the names when you wonder which movies were recenty released.The only time he catches a flick is on tv, and strictly if it goes back to the black and white era or if it has his favourite actor, Dilip Kumar. He happily narrates his tales between sips of chai and a mathi, noting how there seem to be more random visitors coming to buy  a one off old poster between his regulars of video parlour owners. And just when you wonder if they still exist, he notes how movies are surviving in the old world in the small towns and cities. Clearly, the multiplexes still have a lot of ground to cover (thankfully).

With technology changing the very way movies are marketed, posters clearly have lost out to the tweets and online ads in the new era. But clearly, the age old poster still carries its charm and for those who still feel a skip of the heart when they make their mind about a movie when they watch one, it will perhaps continue to hold that magic.