Love, Lost: Revisiting Basu Bhattacharya’s Marriage Trilogy
From the ind.igenous desk The 70s and the 80s were a vibrant time for Hindi cinema, with Bollywood churning out action-and-adventure-packed blockbusters of glitz and glamour with tales of characters who were very distinctly in the black or the white, the growth of the parallel cinema movement in sync with the cinema of other Indian […]
In the Twilight of the Mind: Revisiting G. Aravindan’s Pokkuveyil
From the ind.igenous desk ‘Somewhere within your loving look I sense,Without the least intention to deceive,Without suspicion, without evidence,Somewhere within your heart the heart to leave.’ ‘Interpretation’, Vikram Seth A lot of who we are is shaped by the people around us. We become friends, care, and love – and each of these social acts […]
A Night of Memories
From the ind.igenous desk ‘Aadate bhi ajeeb hoti hai saans lena bhi kaisi aadat hai jiye jaana bhi kya rivayat hai jiye jaate hai, jiye jaate hai aadate bhi ajeeb hoti hai’ (Aadat/ Maya’s nazm – Gulzar) A tale of memories, separation, and love that becomes difficult to separate from habit. A poet went behind […]
The Mountains and the Mist
From the ind.igenous desk Every time I’m asked to name my favourite Satyajit Ray film, I do not know how to respond. Earlier, I used to stare stupidly for a while and then blurt out a name which, for no apparent reason, came first to my mind. Once you decide on a favourite, it is […]
Cinema for Change: Shyam Benegal’s Rural Trilogy
‘Through my films I can say, “Here is the world, and here are the possibilities we have,”’ – perhaps it is the existence of these possibilities that made Shyam Benegal the bearer of the winds of change in Indian cinema. There were filmmakers before him working independent of mainstream cinema, experimenting with different styles of […]
On Mothers and Daughters
Exploration of this powerful relationship through two films by Rituparno Ghosh
Absence
From the ind.igenous desk A young woman doesn’t return home for a night. A retired professor casually leaves his home one evening but never returns. The young servant boy of a middle-class Kolkata household is found dead one morning. Delay, disappearance, death – three films made over almost a decade, but connected through their central […]
The Music of Ritwik Ghatak
From the ind.igenous desk “Why do you always sing sad songs?” Ishwar asks his sister Sita in Subarnarekha. “It is almost as if there is nothing in this world beyond pain and suffering.” When art stems from lived experiences, it must be truthful. And truth is seldom under the compulsion to have a happy ending. […]
The Other Lens
An account of some of the most prominent photographer characters in Indian cinema
To Love the Ordinary
Remembering the world of Basu Chatterjee that celebrated the richness of simple living
