Mrinal Sen’s birth centenary: How his film Bhuvan Shome pioneered New Wave movement in Indian cinema

Filmmaker Mrinal Sen would have turned 100 today. On this day, we recall one of his pioneering films -- Bhuvan Shome. The 1969 film, director Mrinal Sen’s first Hindi movie, won three National Awards and is regarded as a pioneer of the New Wave Cinema movement in Hindi films.“If you had a suggestion and he liked it, he'd incorporate it. And the suggestion could come from anybody. I mean, I remember even the chaiwala told Mrinal Da, ‘Why don't you do it like this? Because in the village, this is not how it is done. It is done like this.’ And he said, ‘Oh, is that right? Okay. So we won't do it’.”And he told everybody: “Bhaiya chaiwala bolta hai ke aise nhi hota hai aise aise hota hai so the camera won't be here and you'll have to do this as opposed to that. You know, which I think is absolutely spectacular. A, for the director to listen to a chaiwala. B, for the chaiwala to actually pick up enough courage and be treated with enough respect that he thought if he gave a suggestion, it would actually be treated seriously and then for the unit to act on it.”That fabulous anecdote was narrated by documentary filmmaker and actress Suhasini Mulay. She was talking about director Mrinal Sen and the democratic and egalitarian spirit on the sets of Bhuvan Shome.In Yesterday Once More, our series on Hindi film classics, we will discuss the film and listen to more of Suhasini Mulay’s memories of the iconic film.Bhuvan Shome arrived quietly in the theatres with an ageing male in the lead. It had no dances and no fights. What it had was a long, tortuous bullock-cart ride and a hero who’s scared of a buffalo. And it was narrated by a struggling actor whose surname was left out of the opening credit. He was Amitabh without Bachchan.Authored by the famous Bengali writer Bonophool, Bhuvan Shome was Mrinal Sen’s first Hindi film as a director. But the film, made for a mere Rs 2 lakh, also became an unlikely critical and commercial success.In its review, The Times of India wrote back in May 1970: Mrinal Sen’s Bhuvan Shome opens a new chapter for Hindi cinema. It’s off-beat, aesthetically pleasing, realistic to the core and a splendid study in depth of a character undergoing a transformation.The film was also praised for its stunning black-and-white photography. Watching the film, one often wonders how cinematographer KK Mahajan took those breathtaking shots of birds with such limited technology.The Times of India review had said: “To some of the shots showing the vast expanse of the sand and the flamingos, he has imparted a painting-like quality. Bhuvan Shome is as much a triumph for Mrinal Sen as for KK Mahajan. “ A Day In The LifeBhuvan Shome is about an unusual day in the life of a senior railways officer. He is a grouchy widower who never let his wife live in peace, a loner by temperament, a Bengali with a huge colonial hangover. He smokes cigars even as he exercises. He is also a stickler for discipline. He even dismissed his own son from his job for dereliction of duty. His subordinates pretend to like and respect him but they abuse him behind his back.One fine day, Bhuvan Shome decides to take a break. He takes a train journey to a small railway station and then rides a bullock cart to a village hoping to hunt birds. The journey is the beginning of Shome’s education. He seems unaware of rural India as the cart trudges through hinterland Saurashtra on a dusty road full of potholes.His interaction with Gauri, a free-spirited village girl, becomes the story’s centre-point spine and the film’s heart. The role of Shome was played by Utpal Dutt, his first Hindi film. Gauri was played by Suhasini, a schoolgoing teenager then. It is quite fascinating how she landed the role.“Mrinal Da was looking for a girl to play Gauri and he had already been to FTII and had not particularly, I think, found what he was looking for and this is while you know, Alique Pasamsee, Uma Da Cunha and all were still working at Lintas,” she remembers. “And my mother happens to be a friend of Uma Da Cunha who at that time was not married. They were friends because of the film society movement. So when Mrinal Da came back to Bombay, He met Uma and said, ‘I have looked at a few girls. I haven't found what I was looking for.’ By which time I had shot an ad film for soap. And they had run a whole campaign with me. I think I was 15 or 16 at that time, on Pear soap. And so she says, oh, here is Mrs Mulay’s daughter, have a look at her. We have done a film with her and you see what you want. And he looked at the ad film and I think must have liked it.”The film was shot a few months before her board examinations. But she was extremely excited about going to Bhavnagar, the film’s outdoor location.“So I showed up and I remember going to Bhawnagar and for me, the most exciting was, I took a train to Bombay, but from Bombay to Bhavnagar I took a flight,” she says. “And to me that was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to me. Cause I'd never sat in an aeroplane in my life. And my mother went with me from Bombay to Bhavnagar.”But on reaching Bhavnagar, Suhasini found out something that worried her.“Actually, I really started getting very worried when I reached Bhavnagar,” she remembers. “The person I was introduced to was Utpal Dutt. Because I had been in Kolkata – my mother was a film censor officer there for two years. And while I was in Kolkata, one had seen Utpal Dutt’s plays. And for the first time when I met him and I realised that this is the guy I'm supposed to act against, that is when I actually started getting worried.” Bhavnagar was a small town those days and Sen had a small unit working on a loan provided by the Film Finance Corporation. Among other things, Suhasini recalls going out shopping for local jewellery with Mrinal Sen and Utpal Dutt“When we went to the market in Bhavnagar, Utpal Da had come along because there's nothing to do there,” she remembers. “It's a very, very, very, very small town. At that time, we were talking about 1968. And so I went shopping around and then we got clothes that fit me. And once I tried one or two clothes and then I bought a ghaghra. Then Utpal Da said that’s enough. I said, no, no, I need at least one more ghaghra and at least two more blouses because I'll be sweating in my blouses and they won't be washed every day. So that is what was done. And then we went around buying jewellery for Gauri, and he did all the choosing of all that.“While we were going to Bhavnagar, Utpal Da saw me reading Perry Mason,” Suahisini says. “And he said, ‘Do you read this junk?’ I said, ‘Yes.’ He said, ‘Do you find it interesting?’ So I said, ‘Yes.’ So, by which time they're getting a little tired of him being so overbearing. I said, ‘Yes. I like it and I will buy more and I will read it.’ So then he said, ‘Oh, then let me buy you something worth reading.’ And he bought me the complete works of Shakespeare hardbound and said, ‘Read this.’ So I said, ‘This is school stuff. This is a textbook. I'm not going to read a textbook.’ He said, ‘Fine. Then don't take this. He went and then got me the complete works of Oscar Wilde, whom I had not read at all. And I still have that book in my library with a dedication from Utpal Da to me.”Both Dutt and Sen didn’t know much about the Hindi language. And it occasionally caused hilarious situations.“So I actually spent the first few days tutoring Utpal Da Hindi,” Suhasini remembers. “And of course, Mrinal Sen’s Hindi was even funnier because I remember he was taking a shot of Utpal Da shooting with the rifle. We were actually just shooting it against the sky in the place where we were staying. And that happened to be the Maharaj of Bhavnagar, he had a sort of a hunting lodge or guesthouse. I'm not sure what it was. And so we were shooting it right in the verandah where Utpal Da was standing on a table taking the shot. Mrinal Da tells KK Mahajan, who was the camera man, ‘Hey, Mahajan, isska ped kaato.’ And we all cracked up laughing. What he meant was, you know, frame it above his waist so that you don't see his legs and of course you don't commit the background.”In the film, Gauri is everything Shome is not. She is warm, beguiling, loquacious, caring and has an innate understanding of nature and ecology like many in rural India. Their interaction is a meeting of opposites. Both are different personalities shaped by their surroundings. But Gauri has a certain vim and vitality that transforms Shome. Their conversations about duck shooting, bribes, and life in general acts as emotional therapy for the middle-aged bureaucrat. He had become a mummified and machinised version of himself in the soulless world of bureaucracy. The interaction proves a catharsis for him. He feels liberated and rehumanised.When he returns, Shome lets off a corrupt ticket collector, actually Gauri’s husband, with a warning. But Mrinal Sen doesn’t end the film as a feelgood fable, as the last lines in the film show. The husband writes to Gauri that he has been transferred to a bigger junction, which means more “income”. Bhuvan Shome is more than a character study of a cranky bureaucrat. The film underlines the value of lived-in experience and the importance of looking at the world from another person’s point of view. The film can be read as a plea for diversity. Bhuvan Shome won National Awards for best film, best director for Mrinal Sen and best actor for Utpal Dutt. And Suhasini’s performance earned plenty of accolades.Bhuvan Shome’s journeyDespite showing superlative work, Mahajan did not win the national award for best cinematography. He received it for another New Wave film released the same year, Saara Akash, which was Basu Chatterjee’s debut film.It’s been more than five decades since Bhuvan Shome was released. Both Mrinal Sen and Utpal Dutt are gone. Suhasini Mulay made a name for herself as an actor as well as a documentary filmmaker. Her shorts on Bhagalpur blindings and Bhopal genocide won her National Awards just like her acting in Hu Tu Tu Tu. This is how she remembers her first film:“It's a small, sweet little charming film. And I think that, of course Ray had made other films earlier, but this was a film, which was a feel-good film. You know what I mean? And everybody likes feel-good films. Otherwise, why would you love Jackie Chan, which I do? It was a feel-good film. It was also a film that, you know, at the end of the film, the husband doesn't get reformed and stop taking bribes. Just because he's had a bad experience, which is very true. Otherwise in Indian cinema, you know, one man gives one big speech and suddenly people get converted. It doesn't happen like that. If people had given speeches and people had stopped believing in the caste system, we'd have got rid of the caste system with Mahatma Gandhi and Ambedkar.“So it doesn't happen like that,” she adds. “So I think that that was the other thing. That it still left people with a smile because the husband just says, ‘Oh, I got posted to a bigger place. And guess what? I make even more money now’.”Audio production: Basant Singhal