To commemorate the 80th year of Ritwik Ghatak’s birth, Osian's-Cinefan has organised a one-day dialogue between parallel voices for a vision of New Indian Cinema, inspired by the life and work of the renowned director.
The dialogue brings together film personalities from India and Asia to discuss issues that inform a plan for future film production that is distinctive and authentic, capable of stimulating present and next generation filmmaking in Indian cinema
"In all spheres of art the true vision is subjective, the result of what he has wrested out of his experience. In other words, an artist has collectedly directed his concentrated intellect towards a particular aspect of reality and some aspect of that reality has passionately moved him. From this ferment, this impassioned wish to express art is born. The manner of expression might be according to the mood of the artist"
From "Art and Integrity", Ritwik Ghatak, 1963
"Even after an experience of over half a century and an enormous output from year to year, film making in India is still a gamble. This is quite true. Although we have produced ace directors and film technicians who can match in excellence the top ranking in caliber the world over. It is a pity that our financial roots are still unsteady."
From "What Ails Indian Film Making", Ritwik Ghatak, 1987
The conference will be centered on the question of how filmmakers can mediate between the demands of national/international markets, the creative flowering of their discipline and the realities of national financial and funding systems.
Will film exhibition currently mushrooming into multiplexes enable or threaten the expression of distinctive voices? What new opportunities and alliances are being imagined for an innovative, experimental or visionary cinema?
Whether made on a low or a high budget, a film must be permitted to freely develop its own new audience. On what scale and with what width of perspective the filmmaker pitches his work must be a spiritual choice for the filmmaker and not a ‘commercial’ fetter. Only then will we be able to reinvent the power and imagination of indigenous Indian cinema.
Mrs. Surama Ghatak will be the Guest of Honour. Participants include Sanjay Leela Bhansali, Sunil Doshi, Ritaban Ghatak, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Vimukthi Jayasundara, Rajat Kapoor, Mani Kaul, Arun Khopkar, Vishnu Mathur, Ketan Mehta, Saeed Mirza, Sudhir Mishra, Kabir Mohanty, Sriram Raghavan, Soudhamini, Kumar Shahani, Manmohan Shetty, Madan Gopal Singh
