Over the five years he frequented Thulissery, a small islet near Ezhimala in Kannur, shooting for his documentary Mother Bird, which poignantly captures an ageing Thulissery Narayani’s love for the birds part of the vibrant wetland ecosystem there, Babu Kambrath witnessed two things.
First, he saw the frail woman who tended to the winged creatures with warmth and affection walk into memory in February 2015. The very next month, he went to the islet again to see the sudden deterioration of the wetlands. Where once waterbirds swam in gay abandon, teenagers were rolling the pitch for a game of cricket. The parched land was all cracked up and the thick foliage of trees lining the far end was gone.
“It was a chance finding, but it pained me endless to see the sudden transformation of the region, which did not seem to bother the youth,” he said at the SiGNS short film and documentary fest which drew to a close here on Saturday. The film was screened at the fete on Friday.
Mr. Kambrath, an administrative officer in the LIC, has taken four films, including Mother Bird, in which he has used natural sounds, and the scenes after the demise of Narayani are silent.
Equally appealing at the fete was Uranjadunna Desangal , N.E. Harikumar’s biopic on writer U.A. Khader, born to a Malayali father and Burmese mother, who went on to learn to appreciate and try his hand in Malayalam literature at the instance of the former Chief Minister C.H. Mohammed Koya with a fair degree of critical acclaim.
“While working with him, I had shot for a feature with him at the Aghora Shivam [one of Khader’s works is titled thus] temple in Panthalayani, near Koyilandy, some 10 years ago. But this time around, when we went there for the documentary, we were not allowed to shoot on the precincts. As a young boy, Khader was enamoured of the temple festivals, but would be frequently told he being a ‘mappila’ [Muslim] wouldn’t understand things like how a calm-looking ordinary man suddenly turned into a fiery Velichappadu [oracle],” said Mr. Harikumar.
Gouri Amma , a biopic shot by the late K.R. Mohanan, was another film that was screened before a packed house on Friday. Reatraced primarily through the perspective of the legendary communist leader K.R. Gouri, the film sheds some light on her early childhood (when seeing the sunset over Andhakaranazhi how badly she wanted to be a poet!), her initiation and integration in the progressive communist movement and the twists and turns in her political career.
Mohanan, who died three months ago, was remembered by P.T. Kunju Muhammed. It was under Mohanan-Muhammed productions that all the three feature films of Mohanan were produced. “That’s my sole refuge to say now that I’m secular,” said Mr. Muhammed, who recalled Mohanan as filmmaker a la Adoor Gopalakrishnan who remained uncompromising in his approach to filmmaking.
