As the credits roll after the Assamese film Village Rockstars , one name repeatedly appears on screen under story, script, direction, cinematography, editing and production design — that of Rima Das. Armed with her camera and a few kids from her native village Chhaygaon for company, she has pulled off a moving tale of carefree childhood, filmed on a budget that is low even by independent cinema’s standards.
For many years, Ms. Das used to live in Mumbai, in pursuit of acting opportunities. It was a trip back home a few years ago that made her rediscover her village and kindled the filmmaker in her. “When I went back to my village for a longer stay, I saw things differently. I discovered what I was missing, while living a fast, digital life. Many people here are living in poverty, but yet they are so happy and content, and live in sync with nature. During that time, I came across this group of children who were playing as a band with cut-outs of musical instruments, at a local gathering. So, I began spending time with them and started working a story around them,” she says.
Soon, she got her niece Bhanita to join the group. Bhanita plays the central character of Dhunu, a girl whose only dream is to have a guitar of her own and start a band with her friends. For six months, the filmmaker went around with them as they played in the waters and ran up the trees. The film itself is a chronicle of everyday lives of these children, their long walks to school and their conversations. Part of it is drawn from Das’s own childhood days.
“Like Dhunu, I also was the only girl in a group of boys. There were elder women in the village, who used to admonish me for climbing trees and hanging around with boys,” she says.
With no formal training in filmmaking, it was no mean task for her to handle the shooting, with only her cousin and the children being part of the ‘crew’. Most of the film is shot in natural light, over a period of more than two years, and it captures nature in all its glory, and in its fury, with the annual floods that ravage the lives of the Assamese villagers.
“It was not easy, handling everything. But the children were my source of strength,” she says.
The film has won several accolades, at the 20th International Children's Film Festival and at the Mumbai Film Festival. She took along all the children to Mumbai, for the film’s premiere at the festival, a trip which happened to be the first outside the village for many. For the audience across the world though, the film became an unforgettable first trip to their village.
