BENGALURU: At a time in the 1950s when cinemascopes were being introduced in the industry, many filmmakers used it to create images of opulence and grandeur on the big screens. Contrary to this late director and actor, Guru Dutt used it to show the opposite - a sense of loneliness and melancholy in his characters, says National Film award director Arun Khopkar. “This was something that was not done before and soon other filmmakers followed suit,” he adds.
This was in a sense the essence of Guru Dutt or Vasanth Kumar Shivashankar Padukoneas he is also known as in Karnataka. Khopkar released a book in Kannada called, Guru Dutt: A tragedy with Three Acts at BIFFES on Monday. Originally written in Marathi by Khopkar, the book was translated into Kannada by Uma Kulakarni and Virupaksha Kulakarni. It was published by the Karnataka Chalanachitra Academy. The original Marathi version is called Guru Dutt-Teen Anki Shokantika.
“I had never taken Guru Dutt very seriously earlier as I thought his movies were too sentimental for my taste. But after reading this work, I now see him, his movies and his melodramas in a new light,” says acclaimed Kannada director Girish Kasaravalli.
Unlike the song and dance sequence of the movies then, the number of Dutt’s movies never seemed out of the blue and were an integral and essential part of the entire story, says Khopkar. “The songs were never at odds with the movie and were not there just for the sake of it or inserted anywhere or everywhere. They were built around the story in such a way that it seemed seamlessly and a part of the story’s narrative,” Khopkar says.