With the passing away of veteran director Mrinal Sen, India has lost a pioneer of the alternative cinema movement in the country.
The Dadasaheb Phalke award-winning film director was best known for films such as "Padatik'', "Antreen'' and "Ek Din Pratidin'' in Bengali, and "Bhuvan Shome'' and "Ek Din Achanak'' in Hindi.
Known for taking up non-conventional themes, Mrinal Sen once said that he sometimes departs from the usual beginning, middle and end approach to a narrative. With his films filled with social analysis and psychological drama, the Left-leaning director has bagged four National Film Awards as the best director and was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 1983.
Here are some rare photographs from the sets of his films, and his life.
Dhritiman Chatterjee in the Mrinal Sen-directed 1973 political drama 'Padatik'.
A still from the set of the 1980 Bengali film Akaler Sandhane, which dealt with the famine in Bengal. The movie had a huge cast of professionals, and villagers playing themselves.
Shabana Azmi And Pankaj Kapur in the 1984 Bengali film 'Khandhar'. The film, directed by Mrinal Sen, was based on a Bengali short story 'Telenapota Abishkar' (Discovering Telenapota).
Mrinal Sen in Rajasthan in 1986
Mrinal Sen with Satyajit Ray in 1991, the year before Ray's death. Sen, Ray and Ritwik Ghatak were contemporaries and friends, so much so that Ray and he were at Ghatak’s side before he passed away.
Film director Mrinal Sen waiting anxiously at the gate of the nursing home to pay respects to Satyajit Ray, in Calcutta on April 24, 1992.
Mrinal Sen accepting the Dada Saheb Phalke Award from the then President Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam in New Delhi on February 2, 2005.
According to Mr. Sen, cinema was, to a large extent, a technological performance. However, experimentation and non-conformity are critical to evolve with the medium.
"Most of my films are as much made spontaneously as they are carefully planned out. When I confront a set or location, some kind of chemistry operates and sometimes I just do not know what is going to happen," he said in an interview to The Hindu in the early 2000s.
