Few outside West Bengal, or even inside the state, are aware that Rabindranath Tagore directed a film based on Notir Puja, a dramatized version of his long poem Pujarini, written in 1899. Notir Puja or its original long poem offer different perspectives on death in
WHunger finds a prominent place in three films by Satyajit Ray, reflecting three completely different backdrops, though hunger is a significant sub-plot in all three narratives, each one a ‘period’ piece in a manner of speaking. One is Pather Panchali, the second is Goopy Gyne
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6YYkKI4hzg Rapping (also rhyming, spitting, emceeing) is a musical form of vocal delivery that incorporates ‘rhyme, rhythmic speech, and street vernacular’, performed or chanted in a variety of ways, usually over a backing beat or musical accompaniment. The recent Bollywood film Gully Boy directed by Zoya
Farha Khatun was only 10 when she first heard of ‘triple talaq’ (the Islamic practise of instant divorce by the husband saying ‘talaq’ thrice). It was a summer morning, and one of her aunts had come visiting their home in Medinipur. “She was very disturbed
The ‘Shahenshah-e-Ghazal’ (Emperor of Ghazal), Mehdi Hassan Khan breathed heavily as he lay motionless on his hospital bed and the moments ticked away. His dulcet voice had betrayed him as had his body. A major cerebral stroke had left the great maestro paralyzed. The dull
What does the acronym OTT mean? OTT (over-the-top) is a means of providing television and film content over the internet at the request of subscribers. The term ‘over-the-top’ implies that a content provider is going over the top of existing internet services. If treated scientifically
It was in the year 1967. The Farmer Revolution of Naxalbari had created waves by then, leading to a rift among various communist parties of India. Politicians who supported the villagers and farmers of Naxalbari, gradually distanced themselves from others. A similar picture was seen
When filmmaker Srijit Mukherjee was scheduled to release his film Gumnami (2019), based on a popular theory that Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose actually survived the plane crash that supposedly killed him, many of Netaji’s descendants were voluble in their protest. In particular, his grand-nephew and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eykFh0Ot-mo A still from Los Lobos The Arthouse Asia Film Festival has been running for five years in the city of Kolkata. But thanks to a lack of publicity and marketing, and most importantly, sponsorship and funding, very few cinebuffs in the city are aware of this
Ranjan Ghosh’s debut film Hrid Majharey (2014) created waves in various quarters as one of the best adaptations of William Shakespeare’s Othello, never mind the disastrous box-office response to it in his home state. While the reaction was amazing in academic circles beyond Indian shores,