In the first half of the film the only two signs of life in Manik Babu are his listening to the Shayma Sangeet at a tea shop, and he pottering around his ailing father, adjusting the tape-recorder on his lap and giving him the morning paper. His father, the only relationship he has with another human being, is not a vegetable - he needs to believe this. But with his falling in love with a cloud, Manikbabur Megh (The Cloud & the Man, 2021), a Bengali film with English subtitles that has been making waves in the festival circuit, and which has been released in major cities of India this month, begins to take a fabulist turn.
Manik Babu, whom the world had dismissed as a loner is, now the world realises, a man with flesh, heart, and emotions; nevertheless, he is still a figure of ridicule. The film makes us aware of how human beings behave when they encounter ‘difference’, or that which they do not understand.
Directed by Abhinandan Banerjee and produced by Bauddhayan and Monalisa Mukherji, the film has been screened in 38 film festivals and has received 14 awards and nominations. Chandan Sen, in his breakthrough role of Manik Babu, he has so far mainly played a bad guy or a petty gangster in Tollywood, is a veteran Bengali film, television and stage actor. He is a student of actors and theatre doyens Utpal Dutt and Ramaprasad Banik. Sen, a cancer survivor, won the Best Male Actor award at the IFF Pacific Meridian at Vladivostok, Russia, in 2022.
Excerpts from a conversation:
A world that is transactional, and looks for success and exceptionalism, has no time for a man like Manik Babu. How did you look for Manik Babu’s world within yourself before you set out to become him on screen?
All through my life, I have seen a few Manik Babus, people who do not have any contact with others, they can be seen on the streets, you realise they exist when they leave and return to their homes. Throughout the film, Manik Babu seems not to be able to countenance life head-on, his eyes wear a certain expression - life is too much for him, he can only bear it with side glances. The film in my mind moves around three topics - a man’s isolation, his relationship to nature and how he reacts to rejection by others. Every man at some time or the other feels this. I internalised them, then just did it my own way.
The film has a relationship with life and death. Is that why in your portrayal of Manik Babu, you seem like a dead man who is looking after a man, his father, who is about to die?
Manik Babu is not dead, he has desires, emotions. There is a scene in which he picks up a mongolghot (an auspicious pitcher-like vessel that brides hold in their hands during weddings) when he goes to a dump to dispose of his father’s belongings. He also picks up a flower from the spot, and when at home, he keeps it on his bed and sleeps. I didn’t want to overplay all this in the scene, I just caressed the flowers. The city’s billboards that catch his eye [such as the ‘ride like a beast’ bikes or the real estate ad for a high-rise], are also instances that point to his inner life.
The trees in the film have also been used in a particular way.
There is the wild foliage on the top of their terrace which he cares for. He also waters a certain dead tree in his neighbourhood. It is after caressing the trees that he moves towards the final scene on the terrace. Since the time when he falls in love with the cloud, he also wears a grass ring. The director has shown love and nature and love of nature in this way.
That Manik Babu can find love is also shown in a poignant way.
It’s when his friend Kali Babu takes him to the doctor. It is the doctor (played by actor-playwright and West Bengal Education Minister Bratya Basu) who first articulates Manik Babu’s latent desires. On hearing that a cloud has been following him, a cloud only visible to him, the doctor ribs him: ‘Megh na Meye (A cloud or a girl)’? Manik Babu begins to chase the cloud all over the city. As he lies on the grass, he looks towards the sky and addresses the cloud, offering, as it were, the best version of himself in a suit; he asks the cloud whether like everybody else, will she, too, think he is mad…
Utpal Dutt and Ramaprosad Banik have been major influences on your work.
I knew Utpal Dutt first through my father. I come from a Communist family background. My father was the political secretary of Jyoti Basu [a former West Bengal Chief Minister], my mother was an IPTA actor. Utpalda created my pragya and magoj (the way I understand things and the way I think), Ramaprosad Banik told me how to work on my body for theatre.
What are you working on next? What would you recommend fans watch to see some of your best work?
Anjan Dutt’s Madly Bangalee, my serials Ichche Nodee, Ishti Kutum…. Right now I have no work. These things happen.