Kolkata: One of the leading voices from Indian parallel cinema fell silent on Thursday when Buddhadeb Dasgupta breathed his last at his south Kolkata residence.
The news of Dasgupta’s demise came as a shock to veteran director Shyam Benegal.
The octogenarian director borrowed a musical term to describe Dasgupta’s films as “delicate minuets” – a slow, stately ballroom dance for two in triple time, popular especially in the 18th century.
“Buddhadeb was a poet before he became a filmmaker.
He was a thoughtful and intelligent filmmaker.
His films were not grand statements.
They were very quiet films.
They were kind of conversations about human beings with a lot of quieter moments rather than high-pitched passionate situations.
They were charming, quiet films,” he said.
Shyam Benegal Though their paths didn’t cross in recent years, Benegal had a role to play when Dasgupta adapted Tagore’s works for national television.
The ‘Ankur’ director was once part of the thinktank that had conceived the idea of introducing Indian literature to viewers of national television.
“When private television channels were coming up, there were talks about how to use national television.
One of the suggestions was to introduce our own literature via audio visual medium.
That would also encourage translations.
I was part of that thinktank that suggested the presentation of Tagore stories on national television along with works of other literary giants across India,” he said.
According to Benegal, anybody who could do justice to Tagore had to be a Bengali.
“There is a certain sensibility that is difficult for a non-Bengali or a non-resident of that deltaic area to fathom and express.
For us on the west coast, the sensibilities are very different.
Tagore had a sensibility that suited not just Bengali but also the areas slightly beyond like south Bihar and Jharkhand.
I think Buddhadeb understood that world very well.
There was something very intuitive about the way he dealt with the subjects,” he said.
He also points out that Dasgupta was one of the important makers from Bengal emerging in the 80s who took Indian cinema to the world.
“Starting with Satyajit Ray in the 50s, this process was carried on with Mrinal (Sen) and a few others.
Then Buddhadeb’s generation came.
He is from my generation, though a little younger to me.
We used to refer to our works as new-cinema.
Other terms like alternate and parallel cinema were also used for this format of making a non-mainstream film.
Popular Indian cinema used to have a definite form, style and aesthetics that hark back to late 19th century commercial theatre.
Television came and changed everything.
It became the popular medium to watch and all that distinct format moved to television in so many different guises.
But cinema itself went through a profound change.
Buddhadeb was part of that change.
He wasn’t all that old and I am so sorry to hear the news of his demise.”