'India has a strong culture for cinema'

PUNE: Cinema is a movement that lets you enter the personal space of subjects without disturbing them and the art lies in then knitting a story around them, acclaimed French filmmaker Claire Denis said on Monday while addressing a news conference at the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII).
Denis, known for her films like Chocolat (Chocolate), White Material and 35 rhums (35 Shots of Rum), is in town to conduct a 10-day interactive workshop with FTII students, which began on July 5.This is the acclaimed director's first visit to India.
"There is much more to Indian cinema than Bollywood. India has a strong culture for cinema which does not exist in many other countries. And Bollywood, though being a big draw, is just a part of it. While I was surfing the television channels here, I also came across interesting shows and movies in different languages," said Denis, who remembers watching Satyajit Ray's Pather Panchali as a child. She added that she does not believe in the division between arthouse cinema and commercial cinema.
A filmmaker with over 10 feature f0s in her oeuvre, Denis' 2013 feature Bastards was screened in the Un Certain Regard section of this year's Cannes Film Festival. Denis shot to fame with her debut film Chocolat in 1988, which dealt with issues related to French colonisation in Cameroon. The movie was nominated for the prestigious Palme d'Or that year.
Denis's films are driven by intimate narratives, dramatic visual style and an editing technique often compared to jazz music for its cadence. She is known for her craftsmanship as a filmmaker and her and portrayal of the emotional intensity of characters.
"I want my viewers to read the film themselves and not provide them with explanations," she said. The characters and the story of Denis' films often reflect her personal experiences: be it Chocolat, which was inspired by the days she spent in Cameroon as a young woman, or White Material ( 2009), which tells a story of a girl who decides to stay on at her coffee plantation in Africa despite an erupting civil war.
Denis said that she wants to share her experiences with the students and speak to them about the technicalities of filmmaking that has changed over the years. "It is great to see that the younger generation in India want to study films. I want more and more people to take up filmmaking as a subject, since its reach is timeless. The workshop will not just be a learning experience for the students, but also for me," Denis said.
Denis believes that India is the only country where you can talk about spirituality along with religion. "This is a big country. And I have known India only through its films, music, literature and paintings. It will take more than one trip to understand its vastness and diversity," Denis said.