Finest film on the making of a film

Pather Panchali 1955mdashmuch like Citizen Kane 1941mdashI suspect is a film that everyone knows is essential film history But everybody assumes somebody else mustrsquove seen itThe thought of sitting through it puts the young to sleep which is their loss really As was the case wersquore told with some audiences walking out of its maiden screening at CannesFor all its aesthetic and technical achievements in line with Italian neorealism of the times Pather Panchali first of Apu trilogy Satyajit Rayrsquos directorial debut set the ball rolling towards the most prolific filmmaking career by an Indian in world cinema everIt picked up an award at Cannes As with quality art this western interest mustrsquove instantly elevated the directorrsquos national stature For decades Ray or Manik Da continued to do his own thing making features documentariesmdashcommandeering a filmmaking process from designing posters including fonts music script storyboard direction to securing releaseAparjito a fictionalised feature film on the making of Pather Panchali PicTwitterThe only Indian director alive and as inexhaustible as Ray that I can think of is Shyam Benegal 87 Benegal himself extensively interviewed Ray for a 1982 documentary which is probably the most unpretentious indepth conversation to do with Indian cinema I remember Ray being probed much on choice of lenses etc and he stops ldquoYou know Irsquom just more interested in communicatingrdquoBenegal told me once about the role the director of New Yorkrsquos MoMA gathering top tastemakers at the museum had played in first pushing for Pather Panchali in the West You watch this Mr Wheeler in the film Aparajito which uses for its narrative device a long interview of Ray being held for All India RadioAparajito 2022 is an inherently humorous experimental evocative entertaining filmmdashon the making of Pather Panchali Firstly the brilliant actor Jeetu Kamal in his gravitas and appearance is pretty much Ray himselfmdashand I donrsquot mean this in a way that directors Anurag Basu and Q look a lot like RayThis Manik Da tribute is joyously directed by Anik DaDutta from Calcuttamdashbest known in Bengal for a cult horrorcomedy Bhooter Bhabishyat 2012 which I hear was quite badly remade in Bollywood as well Anik Da has been an ad filmmaker for decades having also worked as an exec on the iconic Tata Steel campaign lsquoWe also make steelrsquo that was originally commissioned as an ad campaign to go with Benegalrsquos series Bharat Ek Khoj that Tata Steel had sponsored in the late rsquo80s Hersquos worked on over 300 ads for a biscuit brand Bisk Farm that everyone in Bengal looks forward to One of which features a spoof of Rayrsquos CharulataFull disclosure The warm funny Anik Da and I have been friends ever since on the same National Film Awards jury in 2016mdashthat involved 10hour backtoback screenings over 10 days By the ninth day I heard Anik Da yell ldquoAssault assaultrdquo from the backrow It was a bad year for Bong films in particularmdashall the substandard stuff either had a mention of Robi Thakur Tagore or Ray in itRay continues to be God in Bengal and much of India as wellmdashsurely with his own brigade of bhakts looking to take offence over a biopic Irsquod love to hear public reaction to Aparajito which opens in theatres nationwide on May 13mdashto coincide with the Renaissance Manrsquos belated postpandemic centenaryTo be extra safe all names of actual people have been cleverly changed in Duttarsquos film The allusions are obvious You miss nothing from the plot Aporajito is Satyajit Ray himselfmdashnot a reference to the lead Apu of the trilogy of course If you recall the college rollcall scene in Rayrsquos Aparajito 1956 sequel to Pather Panchali yoursquod know Apursquos full name is Apurva Kumar RoyItrsquos the anecdotes beautifully woven around the lsquoOrient Longmanrsquo Ray that draws you to the film on Pather Panchali firstmdashsome of it surely stuff of repeated legends That its legendary cinematographer Subrata Mitra had never held a moving camera before his debutmdashhe broke the basic 180degree filmmaking rule which was but deemed a masterstroke of sorts That Ray himself had never read Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyayrsquos popular novel until commissioned to design the cover for its childrenrsquos edition which inspired the film Its English title meant the Bengal CM could divert PWDrsquos lsquoSiliguri highway fundrsquo for a film named lsquoSong of the RoadrsquoAt the centre of delicious lsquokissasrsquo that follow is of course the filmmaking journey itselfmdashwhich anyway is a mix of war luck and heist The decision to go blackandwhite allows Aparajito to lyrically reprise characters and scenes from Pather Panchali including the iconic kash fields in the village where Apu and Durga danced through with the train in the backgroundThis bit of the BampW concept is kinda similar to David Fincherrsquos Mank 2021mdasha film on the making of Citizen Kane that walked away with more Oscars two wins 10 noms than Kane itselfOnly that was the story of the eponymous screenwriter Herman Mankiewicz oscillating between what he saw and wrotemdashtherersquos hardly much of director Orson Welles in it This is Manklike love for Manik Da if you maymdashmoviebuffs mustnrsquot ask for moreMayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass culture He tweets mayankw14Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper