INTERVIEW/ Goutam Ghose, director
Edited excerpts:
Q/ Why is Pather Panchali considered to be the first modern Indian film?
A/ Before Pather Panchali, the Kolkata audience had never seen an Indian village in cinema. The movie had such a detailed structure and it was such a perfect art form. The social circle reviews and intellectual discussions in Kolkata, which were strong back then unlike today, gave the film a new life. It was a new cinematic experience, which ultimately became timeless.
Q/ Was Satyajit Ray the first Indian director whose works were shown abroad?
A/ No. Debaki Bose was the first director whose film was shown in Venice. Ray, however, took cinema to an international level in a different way as a classical art form. Bose was a cameraman before turning director. Another cameraman who became director was Nitin Bose. Then came Pramathesh Barua. They were ignored because of Pather Panchali.
Q/ Why was it so?
A/ Ray was a class act. He followed the advice of [French director] Jean Renoir and got influenced by [Italian director Vittorio] De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves. His research on European and Hollywood films took his first film to a new level.
Q/ How was the interaction between Ray and Renoir?
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