: The film industry in Nepal resembles its counterpart in Malayalam on two counts. Just about a couple of the 125 films made in Nepal in a year can be termed as ‘meaningful’ cinema.
Paradoxically, a fairly large percentage of the commercial Nepali cinema falls flat at the box office, where Bollywood’s writ runs.
Replace Bollywood with ‘other language cinema’ and the scenario applies to Kerala.
“But there’s a mushrooming of first-time producers in Nepal who are lured into financing such formula flicks that invariably fail,” says Chandra K. Jha—a native of Bihar who partnered with a Nepali film-lover to set up Mountain River Films, a production-cum-marketing house headquartered at Kathmandu for ‘creative, meaningful’ cinema some five years ago.
Arguably one among the few companies in the entire South Asia in the business of marketing films overseas, it has so far sold about 30 films including the acclaimed Indian movie, Chittagong , informs Mr. Jha, its chief executive, who is in the city in connection with the world premiere of Nepali film Taandaro at the ongoing All Lights India International Film Festival. “Filmmakers often fail to understand that the biggest market lies abroad, in the diaspora,” he says.
While they chip in to sell films that have earned rave reviews, Mr. Jha and his team of ‘packaging professionals’ prefer to collaborate with filmmakers from the conceptual stage itself, in order to churn out movies that are ‘different’ in form and content. “We make creative, constructive suggestions, but it is up to the filmmaker to take the final call.” Nepal’s official entry to the Oscars for the past two years were films born from such collaboration, he says.
Taandro , which was screened in the city on Monday, is based on a true story from the life of a Maoist culture wing leader, Ganga Bahadur Lama.
It captures the dilemma and internal turbulence of a young Maoist co-traveller who survives a military ambush. However, he is blamed by the villagers of being responsible for the killing of a village girl in the military strike. “Samtek Bhutia, from Gangtok, has directed the film, which focuses on the human struggle.”
Mr. Jha’s company is now opening an office in Mumbai, as there’s a surge in enquiries from Hindi. Their forthcoming production, titled ‘ Mother Without Breasts’ is an Indo-Japanese endeavour and a psychological drama. Sensing the advent of a young crop of promising directors in Malayalam, Mr. Jha is keen to collaborate with emerging Malayalam filmmakers as well.
