Enlightenment

Had the privilege of attending a lecture given by Shyam Benegal. A quick run through the important points covered and which left an impact on me:

Commercial or the mainstream Hindi cinema as we know it caters to a passive audience. They are the ones, which don’t disturb the accepted set of norms in the audiences mind. In short they don’t challenge the audiences beliefs, credos etc. Thus they don’t make the them think.

They can be quantified as a combination of 9 basic emotions in one product.

Therefore it’s more of a spectacle than a work of art.

It doesn’t allow residuals in characters.

Viewers feel a sense of déjà vu, which in turn is what is known as general entertainment.

Popular cinema doesn’t delve into the inner lives of their characters, but rather they dig into the inner lives of the audiences. Which is why the relevance to the external life is remote.

They are anti psychological. Its hailing the status quo.

Modern cinema has fewer paradoxes.

Alternatively meaningful cinema probes on a sensory, emotional and cerebral level.

They make the audiences active.

The above-mentioned points were covered in his lecture some points that came up while I was conversing with him were:

You need to know the rules thoroughly before breaking them. Picasso is considered great because he broke the rules but not before having a complete hold over them. You should know that you are breaking a rule and doing something different rather than breaking norms in a juvenile manner by being completely oblivious about them.

One needs to have a fair enough understanding of the techniques of film making before laying your hands on it.

Before I could ask him my final question- ‘tips to an aspiring film maker.’ A certain Mr.Pandey and his troupe whisked Mr. Benegal into the more elite circles and away from the lesser mortals! theek hai yeh bhi sahi….Tu darna mat mere dost tera number bhi aayega!!!