Mrinal Sen is back with Swadesh

kolkata: after nearly a decade of silence veteran film maker mrinal sen is back; the venture is swadesh (this, my land). "it feels great to be on the location, interacting with the cast and film crew and i feel like doing it all over again," the acclaimed director said just after completing the shooting of his film at remote taki which involves three characters in a typical milieu in rural bengal.the lead pair is played by current favourites of 'serious' film-makers nandita das and saswata, whose father subhendu chatterjee ruled the world of celluloid during his years. asked about the story line, sen said "there is hardly any story line in the conventional sense of the term." pressed further, the recipient of many a award at the cannes, moscow, karlovy vary, berlin, montreal film festivals, said "it is an intense love story told in a simple manner." "my idea is to sensitively project the most typical rural portrait where three of my pivotal characters live, love and cherish their desires having no malice against anyone." das has portrayed the role of shakhina, mother of three children, living happily with her second husband for 11 years after getting talaq from the first a year after marriage. shakhina's world, peopled by her 32-year old husband, their three children and former husband is captured with no flashbacks in the film produced by pdg productions of mumbai. on his cast sen was all praise for every actor. "her portrayal of a typical rural woman of a muslim family has been brilliant," sen says of nandita das. "sometimes her certain traits remind me of another powerful actress who is no more," he said alluding to smita patil, who acted in akaler sandhaney (rediscovering the famine), story of a film crew that descends on a small village to recreate the conditions of the 1943 famine in bengal. he prophesised there was more to see of nandita in years to come. asked why he remained reclusive for almost 10 years, the padma bhushan awardee and four-time recipient of best director honour in the national film award, said "i did not, in real sense. many times i felt like doing something but the ideas did not fire me." looking back to his films in retrospect, sen perceives his films as variously projecting middle-class predilections, the everyday life in its multilayered structure, relations, and the urban setting of kolkata. "a member of audience wanted to hear from me that nothing 'wrong' could have happened to the middle class working girl, in ek din pratidin. but i simply said: "what you feel could have occured to her. why does that bother you? is it because you are afraid to be jolted of your middle class sensibilities?" sen said referring to the film in 1979 which blazed the most creative phase of his career. the film, besides kharij (the case is shut), akaler sandhaney (1980) and khandhar reflected on the contemplative side of the film-maker. on the films he made, 80-year old sen, "still feeling quite young" with his sharp vision and inexhaustible creative energy, said "kharij was a social commentary on certain households who shabbily treat their servants, while khandhar was based on ruins." the director, one of the three stalwarts of film making in bengal (the other two being ritwik ghatak and satyajit ray) jokingly said that though his films did not have a very big audience he kept making films for his own motley group of committed viewers spread worldover. but together, they were a sizeable number goading sen, whose first film ratbhor in 1956 was "an eminently forgettable one", according to him. sen has a unique feeling about his el dorado, the city of kolkata, the socio-economic and political unrest of which prompted sen to make the trilogy interview (1970), calcutta 71 (1972) and padatik (1973). for him, the city "acts like a stimulant and provocation" as he is both jolted and touched by its vibrant nature and its tragic manifestations, chaos and human misery. it also gave him the setting, in the beginning of 90s, of two major films, antareen, portraying a lonely woman's search for true friendship and mahaprithibi depicting how one's world changes with the crumbling of soviet union and fall of berlin wall. kolkata must remain so for him and be the pride of heaven some day, sen thinks. welcoming the new lease of life to bengali cinema, with a host of creative directors taking up new venture he said "this will certainly mark a new beginning. i think the new works of aparna, rituparno, gautam, buddhadeb will make the turnaround more happening,"