The minimalism and Gandhian austerity of Adoor Gopalakrishnan’s films always held filmmaker Girish Kasaravalli’s fascination. So when the offer to make a documentary on Adoor came Girish’s way from the Films Division of India, he decided to probe into this aspect of Adoor’s cinema further, rather than make a personal biopic or hagiography. And so, Images/Reflections (Bimb/Pratibimb) was born.
Girish’s film looks at Adoor’s ideology through the idiom and politics of the latter’s cinema. “In every shot, moment, and piece of music, a filmmaker exercises his own politics,” he says. Politics is not merely seen in sloganeering, it can also be apparent in the angle of the camera, for instance. So, the structures of Adoor’s films, their themes, and style all coalesce, informing us about the filmmaker’s own world view, how he dealt with Kerala’s history, and his political beliefs and humanism. But it also tells us how there was also political detachment and what this brought to his cinema. The film is about Adoor’s “cinematic journey through turmoil”— from the freedom movement to the Emergency, the Maoist movement, and more.
Documentary on Kasaravalli And while Girish was shooting Adoor, another man was shooting him training his camera on Adoor. This led to a documentary on Girish himself: A Life in Metaphors : A Portrait Of Girish Kasaravalli , which won its maker O.P. Srivastava the national award for best biographical film. And quite like his own attempt with Adoor, Girish is happy that A Life... also brought out his own cinematic idiom and politics.
The two films seem joined at the hip. But while Images/Reflections is about a filmmaker looking at his contemporary, A Life... is about a fan trying to understand his idol’s cinema and educating himself as a filmmaker in turn. “Making the film has been all about absorbing his craft,” says Srivastava.
Srivastava was an investment banker who quit his job to dive into cinema. He attended several film workshops, read, and watched films. In July 2012, in Goa, he attended a masterclass by Girish where he was “mesmerised” by Dweepa. What struck him was that Girish was unassuming, yet profound — both of which reflected in his films. “His heart is close to the roots, heritage, and culture. He is global and universal in his appeal while remaining local,” says Srivastava. That’s when the association between the two of them began. Srivastava read everything available on Girish, and saw all his films several times before gathering the courage to begin shooting the documentary on him.
Similarly, before embarking on the documentary on Adoor, Girish too spent time reviewing his films, reading interviews and articles. He saw other documentaries and films made on him, and met and discussed with Adoor the pattern he wanted to adopt for the film. Adoor left it entirely to Girish’s discretion. His only wish was that he be allowed to answer questions spontaneously. Similarly, Girish did not want too much of his own voice in Srivastava’s film. “He wanted to let others talk about him and his films,” says Srivastava.
Srivastava also shot Girish while he was shooting the U.R. Ananthamurthy documentary Not A Biography, But A Hypothesis. “By the time I made one film on him, he had already made two,” says Srivastava. He put his own money in making the film, but used the same crew as Girish’s to cut down on expenses.
For someone who has been respected for his feature films, from Ghatashraddha to Koormavatara , making a documentary on a contemporary filmmaker was challenging for Girish. “You can’t go to the shoot with any fixed notions,” he says. “You construct the film from the footage you get rather than shoot the footage with a script in hand.”
Interviews with filmmakers such as Mrinal Sen and Shyam Benegal were crucial, as they were able to bring out his own arguments through their voices.
Girish has known Adoor for long, and has followed his work closely. The common background of the Film and Television Institute of India only added to the rapport. He laughs at how all those who make parallel cinema are placed under one umbrella, though his own filmmaking differs from Adoor’s style. “He is minimal, austere, while I am into detailing and layering,” he says. His own Adoor favourite is Mukhamukham (1984) which he considers one of the finest Indian films of all time.
In the documentary, Girish tries to make his own style interact with Adoor’s. “It is Adoor’s images and my reflections on them,” he says, explaining the title, “The narrative uses Adoor’s images rearranged in my way through the compositions, the sound design, music, and so on.” He goes back to Adoor’s locations and composes shots in the same style. He also uses interesting intercuts between Adoor’s reality and his cinema — for instance, a shot of Adoor climbing the staircase of his house cuts to a similar shot from Kathapurushan (1995).
The footage has chapters. “I like to break the narrative with it,” he says. Here each of the five parts is named after Adoor’s movies. He considers Naalu Pennungal (Four Women, the title of Adoor’s 2007 film) the most important of all the segments in his film, wherein four women bring out Adoor’s persona. For instance, Adoor’s cousin speaks about how he was born of a breech delivery, and his daughter Aswati G. Dorje talks of how Aparajita is the filmmaker's favourite in the Apu Trilogy, as it paralleled his own mother’s death.
The only person who Girish could not get to talk to was Adoor’s shy late wife Sunanda. She refused to talk on camera.
namrata.joshi@thehindu.co.in
