GB Exclusive interview with National Award winning director Sagnik Chatterjee

National award-winning director Sagnik Chatterjee reminisces the birth centenary of Satyajit Ray by recording the song of his film ‘Master Anshuman,’ made as a tribute to the Oscar winning filmmaker

On the occasion of the birth centenary of Satyajit Ray, Sagnik Chatterjee paid homage to the great Master of Film, through his new movie ‘Master Anshuman’ and completed the recording of an important song that is laced with the ‘Ray’ phenomenon. It also happens to be the only song of the film, where the stuntman Captain Krishnan, narrates his life struggle to his little fan Anshuman. Satyajit Ray himself was well-known for his numerous films made for children or with child artistes at the centre of many films. “Through the song, the Captain will tell us how he went to Mumbai with no identity and against the wishes of his parents, but ultimately became successful,” Sagnik told to GB.

None other than Rupankar Bagchi sings the song. Somnath Roy was in charge of the music, who is known as ‘Ghatam Somnath’. Speaking of the song in the film, Rupankar Bagchi told GB: “It’s not like the usual songs I generally sing. I narrated the story through the song. So, in addition to singing, I also acted with vocals and I loved to act.” No wonder such experiments were often done by Ray in many of his films, particularly the Goopy-Bagha series.

Sagnik-Chatterjee

The melody of the song is unique too. “The variations in tunes from kirtan to rap to pop to classical was very challenging. I enjoyed doing the work. It’s full of novelty. The lyrics are justified with the situation which is depicted through this song,” said Rupankar Bagchi.

Journalist and poet Agni Roy who was highly in praise of the director will be seen for the first time in the role of a lyricist through this song. “I know the meter and rhythmic structure of poetry but never lend my hand in a song. When I was asked to compose, there was no tune, but only the sequence. Tune came much later, when my job was almost done,” said Agni Roy to GB.

In the process of writing this song’s lyrics, few words were added by Sagnik but the major part was written by Agni. “It’s a narrative form of poetry, quite unique from the usual lyrical songs we get to hear. As the movie is based on Satyajit Ray’s thoughts, writing a song for such a story is a thrill in itself. The original story structure immensely helped me to write the lyrics,” added Roy.

'Master Anshuman' is definitely going to be a tribute to the icon Satyajit Ray who had inspired so many filmmakers. But on a personal note, Sagnik wishes to mark both his documentary and upcoming feature as a tribute to his son, Sandip Ray too.

The film will be released in 2022. The shooting is at Darjeeling. Captain Krishnan along with Master Anshuman will get busy solving the mystery in the land of mountains. The film has several known and some new faces of the film industry in its cast. Samantak Dyuthi Mitra plays the central character of the film. Captain Krishnan will be enacted by Som Chattopadhyay, a graduate from National School of Drama. In addition to this, NSD graduate Ravi Keemu, Rajtav Dutt, Supriya Dutt, Soumya Mukherjee, Kanwaljit Singh, Priyanka Trivedi and others will play major roles in the film. Ray’s nephew, Souradip Roy, is in charge of photography for the film. Dialogues are written by Sreeparna Mitra who is also one of the producers along with Sagnik .

The shooting of the song sequence will be in 3D graphics technology. And the singer himself said, “I am quite optimistic about the song and I believe it will be one of my most memorable songs ever recorded.”