New Cinema and new media: Hopes for resurrection

ABSTRACT

This article conducts empirical research on the use of new media by the National Film Development Corporation (NFDC). It critically engages with its DVD campaign launched under the Cinemas of India (COI) label in 2012. This is done with a larger view to assess the after-life of New Cinema and map the creation of an alternative archive. The digitally restored NFDC films constitute valuable empirical tools for film studies; the DVDs have made the text ‘attainable’ in the hands of a film scholar. However, the article does not seek to textually analyse the content of the films restored, nor is it a technical study of DVDs, instead the DVDs are assessed on their archival potential to study New Cinema – i.e., (Hindi) films that were made and supported by the Corporation during the 1970s to early 1990s. In the end, the article tries to hint towards the challenges of doing film history in a digital age.

KEYWORDS:

• Archive
• Cinemas of India
• New Cinema
• new media
• NFDC

Acknowledgments

An earlier version of this article was presented at the South Asian Popular Culture (SAPC) Conference, held at the Birmingham City University on 27 June 2017. I am grateful to the Organizers Professors Rajinder Dudrah and Gita Rajan for providing me this opportunity to share my ideas with a wonderful batch of scholars at the Conference. I feel indebted to the Fox International Fellowship at Yale University for funding my visit at the Conference. I am thankful to Lawrence Liang (then the Rice Visiting Fellow at Yale University), who helped while I was writing the abstract for the Conference. The readings and resources that he suggested, and the ideas he threw on the abstract, shaped many of my arguments. A major part of the research to write this article was done at Yale University, while I was there on the Fox International Fellowship (2016-17). The Yale libraries were very useful.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. For a very interesting debate in the early 19^th century France, on establishing film as an archive, read Amad, Paula. ‘No More Written Archives, Only Films’. Counter-Archive: The Film, The Everyday and Albert Kahn’s Archive De La Planete. Paula Amad. New York: Columbia University Press, 2010. 133–163. Print. This chapter traces ‘the common desire to wed film to an archival context across a range of discourses and actual projects in France that negotiated figuratively and literally the positivist and counter-positivist archival properties of film, especially as they related to the idea and discipline of history’ (162).

2. For more on Arvind Desai, and Party, see Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 435 & 467. Sinha’s Ek Doctor Ki Maut is based on a tragic real life story of Dr. Subhash Mukhopadhyay from West Bengal, and a short story written by Ramapada Choudhury.

3. Lakh is a hundred thousand in international numbering/unit.

4. Shemaroo Entertainment Ltd. was founded in October 1962 in Bombay as a book circulating library. Today they are an established media content house in India with activities across acquisition and distribution.

5. The list of feature films released as home videos under COI, their summary, and trailer can be accessed on https://www.nfdcindia.com/cinemasofindia/home-video-01.htm.

6. While discussing Madhava Prasad, a friend pointed out how Prasad, when talking about Shyam Benegal’s Ankur (1974), has committed a factual error on Surya’s college exam result (he gets a Pass class, and does not fail as claimed by Prasad 197). My friend was quick enough to give him the benefit of doubt; Prasad was perhaps writing about it (in the early 1990s) based on his memory of the film. It illustrated to me the importance of home videos in film studies.

7. When I clicked on the icon ‘Games’ on Disc 2, it opened a new window saying ‘Open the DVD on your computer, Find the folder Games’; I did not access/find any such folder.

8. Kundan Shah passed away on 7 October 2017 in Mumbai. I would regret it forever that I could not interview him.

9. See Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 467.

10. See Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 419.

11. See, e.g., https://moviemahal.net/, and https://www.arthousecinema.in/.

12. ZEE Classic screened these films during July–October 2016. The channel also brought the cast and crew of these films in the studio, who shared their memories and experiences of those feature films. The interview videos are available on the Zee Classic website and YouTube. The paratext that this series has added to the archive is immensely useful. A renewed interest owing to the availability of films, helps resurrect, revive, and redefine the New Cinema for the digital generation. Also, see Scroll.

13. Bhuvan Shome was the first most successful, both critically and commercially, feature film financed by the Corporation. It is credited to have started the Indian New Wave or the New Indian Cinema. See Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 399.

14. See Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 401.

15. Maya Darpan, in spite of receiving international recognition, was soon forgotten in Indian film circles, only to be rediscovered in the late 1980s by some art lovers. Writing in 2010, a blogger lamented the neglect many new wave directors and their work face in India, ‘Unfortunately, neither are there home video releases for most of their works nor are there widespread public screenings or film fest retrospectives within the country to generate interest. Heck, they don’t even make their way into the world of file sharing and peer to peer networks. We are now at a point where even the original negatives of the films face the risk of extinction’ (The Seventh Art). In desperation, the blogger, whose name is not specified, sought the World Cinema Foundation’s intervention to help such neglected work. Also, see Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 413–4.

16. See Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 443–4.

17. Financed by the Corporation, and having an ensemble of leading New Cinema actors like Shabana Azmi, Smita Patil, and Naseeruddin Shah, the film’s exclusion in the collection is puzzling. Also see, Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 444.

18. Over a personal interview in early May 2015 in New Delhi, Shahani told me that he himself does not have any copy of the film. I could get one decent print from Ashish Rajadhyaksha. Also see Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 468.

19. Mahayatra is the Hindi dubbed version of the original Bengali feature film Antarjali Yatra, directed by Ghose himself and produced by the Corporation. While a DVD of Antarjali has been restored and released under COI collection, Mahayatra is not available. See Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 479.

20. See Rajadhyaksha and Willemen 498.

21. As is shown by spurt of blog writings on new cinema, see note 12.

22. Singh (October 2012) writes on his blog, ‘Naseeruddin Shah once told me that his only print of Albert Pinto ko Gussa Kyon Aata Hai was a battered video-cassette: “Come to my place if you want to see it, I’m not lending it to anyone.” The actor Pawan Malhotra interrupted an interview to plaintively ask if I had seen a disc of Salim Langde Pe Mat Ro, which featured his best starring role.’ Similarly, this article has already mentioned about Tarang and several other classic films missing from the list of restored films.

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Sudha Tiwari

Sudha Tiwari is a PhD student at Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She works on the State and New Cinema movement in India as part of her doctoral research. She is also a recipient of the Indian Council of Historical Research’s Junior Research Fellowship.