THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Satyajit Ray and Ingmar Bergman were his greatest inspirations, said Iranian filmmaker Bahman Farmanara. “Ray produced incredible films with minimum facilities. The enormous scale of Ray’s films have always been an influential factor, with realistic themes portrayed in relevant contexts,” he said at the meet-the-press session as part of the 23rd IFFK.
Swedish filmmaker Bergman and American filmmaker Oliver Stone have also influenced him, Farmanara said. “They narrated stories of people and issues related to socio-economic and cultural aspects in exciting perspectives,” he said. Farmanara’s ‘Tale of the Sea’ - a byproduct of the past four decades of artistic renaissance in Iran - is in the International Competition section of the fest.
Cinematographer of the Kyrgyzstan drama ‘Night Accident’ Kabuljan Hamidov said the film was based on three short stories. “Indian films are familiar to the audience in Kyrgyzstan. During the Soviet era, we watched Indian movies of popular heroes like Raj Kapoor,” added Hamidov.
Director of ‘Painting Life’ Bijukumar Damodaran, director of ‘Kottayam’ Binu Bhaskar, director of ‘Ave Maria’ Vipin Radhakrishnan and filmmaker Balu Kiriyath participated in the session.
Indian filmmakers should expose fascism: Buddhadeb Dasgupta
Indian filmmakers must be vocal against the fascist regime in the country and around the world through films, opined Bengali filmmaker Buddhadeb Dasgupta. He was speaking at the ‘in conversation’ session on the sidelines of the IFFK.
“The state has become omnipotent in restricting the realms of artistic expression all around the world and young artists including filmmakers, writers, poets and photographers are asked to confine their freedom of speech and expression before them,” he said.
“Young filmmakers, in places such as Bengal, are pursuing power which is absurd. They are limiting their creativity to satisfy the government as soon as they are given awards and recognition.”
Buddhadeb said Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak and Luis Bunuel were his inspirations. “Reality is boring, and predictable. Yet unreality is not another world or segment but a part of reality itself. Extend reality and one can find the magic of unreality. Deep in that world, an aesthetic filmmaker will find the derivation of reality, dreams, magic, and images with an absolute newness,” he said.
Sound in cinema is about cheating: Resul Pookutty
Sound can never be real in cinema, said Academy award-winner Resul Pookutty. “It is all about cheating and how good you are at it determines how good a technician you are. The digital medium has democratised the filmmaking process, but killed the quality of recording in the process,” he said, adding technology should only be a tool, and not overrule skill.
He also narrated the tale of how he wanted to be a physicist and dreamt of winning a Nobel Prize for his discoveries in superconductivity, but instead won the Oscar after becoming a sound engineer. Filmmakers K P Kumaran, and Sanju Surendran participated. in the session.