Went to see, after much planning, missing my lunch, straight from a class, travelling some 10 kilometres, a movie by a film maker long dead again after almost 30 years.
Jadavpur Film Society was showing a better print of Amma Ariyan by the legendary Malayalam filmmaker, John Abraham.
A rebel and a genius, John did many interesting things adding to the mythology around him. One of the stories about him is that once he said that if MGR can be a hero in a Tamizh movie, even a donkey could be a hero. And he really made a Tamizh movie with a donkey in the main role. The movie got him the best film award at the national awards in that year.:-))
John, one of the most respected alumni of FTII had a rather nomadic life. And an influence which went much beyond his four completed films.
Last time I saw Abraham's movies was in a JNU auditorium in Delhi ( somewhere in the city, not on the campus) when I was visiting. This could be 1987, sometime after the death of Abraham at a relatively young age of 50. I remember having seen three of his movies. One was definitely Agraharathil Kazhutai ( Donkey in the Elite Colony). The second one was most probably Vidyarthikale Ithile Ithile ( This way, Students). And off course, Amma Ariyan (Report to Mother). While all the three movies were interesting in their own right, Amma Ariyan had a narrative style which seemed quite phenomenological to me.
In the years since I saw it last, Amma Ariyan ( made in 1986) has grown in stature. It got selected as the only movie from South India in the top 10 movies of Indian cinema mad by the prestigious British Film Institute in 2011.
I realised after watching it that I didn't remember much of the movie except some key facts about it. So it was almost a fresh viewing.
The movie is about a person's journey to look for the identity of a suicide victim and after he finds his identity- his journey to give the victim's mother the bad news.
Through a non linear, as I said earlier, phenomenological narration, the movie tries to present many facets of the dead person. At another level, we get a road trip (and boat trip) from North Kerala to Southern Kerala, seeing many places through very special eyes. Eyes of John as a documentary maker. Documenting the history of people's struggle in the places he travels through. It is almost a visual atlas of people's struggle. The propensity for filming the reflected images made me think of what could be their significance. And invocations to mothers and mother goddess seemed like a tribute to Ghatak.
The film seems to have aged well.
Wonder if Nina Lath would be kind enough to bring out a collection of DVDs of John Abraham to make him available for the next generation of viewers.
Apart from its content and style, Amma Ariyan is also important in terms of how it was made. John and some others formed a cooperative venture called Odessa Collective ( I hope you get the Eisenstein tribute) to take movies to people. Apart from showing movies to people in villages and so on, they also collected money from people (Preceding what we now know as crowd funding by at least three decades. And typically crowd funding involves a reciprocal arrangement, here were people donating money without any expectations) in small amounts to make the movie. And it was a very frugal film making. Something which Dogme 95 movement of Lars Von trier also tried to do, in terms of its intent in 1995.
Catch it if you can.:-))
Jadavpur Film Society was showing a better print of Amma Ariyan by the legendary Malayalam filmmaker, John Abraham.
A rebel and a genius, John did many interesting things adding to the mythology around him. One of the stories about him is that once he said that if MGR can be a hero in a Tamizh movie, even a donkey could be a hero. And he really made a Tamizh movie with a donkey in the main role. The movie got him the best film award at the national awards in that year.:-))
John, one of the most respected alumni of FTII had a rather nomadic life. And an influence which went much beyond his four completed films.
Last time I saw Abraham's movies was in a JNU auditorium in Delhi ( somewhere in the city, not on the campus) when I was visiting. This could be 1987, sometime after the death of Abraham at a relatively young age of 50. I remember having seen three of his movies. One was definitely Agraharathil Kazhutai ( Donkey in the Elite Colony). The second one was most probably Vidyarthikale Ithile Ithile ( This way, Students). And off course, Amma Ariyan (Report to Mother). While all the three movies were interesting in their own right, Amma Ariyan had a narrative style which seemed quite phenomenological to me.
In the years since I saw it last, Amma Ariyan ( made in 1986) has grown in stature. It got selected as the only movie from South India in the top 10 movies of Indian cinema mad by the prestigious British Film Institute in 2011.
I realised after watching it that I didn't remember much of the movie except some key facts about it. So it was almost a fresh viewing.
The movie is about a person's journey to look for the identity of a suicide victim and after he finds his identity- his journey to give the victim's mother the bad news.
Through a non linear, as I said earlier, phenomenological narration, the movie tries to present many facets of the dead person. At another level, we get a road trip (and boat trip) from North Kerala to Southern Kerala, seeing many places through very special eyes. Eyes of John as a documentary maker. Documenting the history of people's struggle in the places he travels through. It is almost a visual atlas of people's struggle. The propensity for filming the reflected images made me think of what could be their significance. And invocations to mothers and mother goddess seemed like a tribute to Ghatak.
The film seems to have aged well.
Wonder if Nina Lath would be kind enough to bring out a collection of DVDs of John Abraham to make him available for the next generation of viewers.
Apart from its content and style, Amma Ariyan is also important in terms of how it was made. John and some others formed a cooperative venture called Odessa Collective ( I hope you get the Eisenstein tribute) to take movies to people. Apart from showing movies to people in villages and so on, they also collected money from people (Preceding what we now know as crowd funding by at least three decades. And typically crowd funding involves a reciprocal arrangement, here were people donating money without any expectations) in small amounts to make the movie. And it was a very frugal film making. Something which Dogme 95 movement of Lars Von trier also tried to do, in terms of its intent in 1995.
Catch it if you can.:-))
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