Waiting for a new Rituparno

He is undoubtedly one of the best filmmakers today, but is he reinventing his craft? Asks Saibal Chatterjee.

One of the most amazing aspects of writer-director Rituparno Ghosh’s oeuvre is its consistency. Despite the fact that the young Kolkata filmmaker tends to churn out at least two films a year, he never lets his work slip below a minimum quality threshold. That is obviously much more than can be said about any other contemporary Indian filmmaker who makes films at a pace that remotely approximates Ghosh’s.

HT Image

But is the gifted filmmaker’s sustained prolificacy really good in the long run for the overall health of his creativity? It probably isn’t. Ghosh is an accomplished screenwriter, knows precisely how to handle his actors, and invariably manages to tell a story in an engaging manner. No wonder Bollywood stars die to work with him and filmgoers with a taste for offbeat cinematic fare look forward to his films.

From the strictly critical point of view, however, the worry is that Ghosh is falling into a bit of trap. His career is going great guns and, as a result, a certain degree of complacency seems to setting in and dogging his films. One expects great, not just good, films from him.

Rituparno  Ghosh’s career is going great guns and, as a result, a certain degree of complacency seems to setting in and dogging his films

Consider the last four films that Ghosh has made –

Chokher Bali, Raincoat, Antarmahal

and

Dosar.

Each of these films is watchable enough and neither seems to be an extension of the other three. So what are we complaining about? It’s just that we want Rituparno Ghosh to surprise us. He doesn’t that in a while.

His work is becoming a tad too predictable. You expect a certain quality in his cinema. He delivers just that without fail. But for a filmmaker of his quality to attain true greatness, growth is an absolute must. And that is something we haven’t seen much of in his films lately.

It is in that context that his next project, Sunglass, which is being pitched as his first out-and-out commercial film, must be viewed. For one, it is doubtful that Ghosh will ever craft a conventional Bollywood-style potboiler, and that adds an element of excitement to the venture. When Ghosh sets out to make a film with the avowed intention of entertaining lay viewers, the possibility of something out of the ordinary emerging cannot be ruled out.

Ghosh is a great storyteller. He could be a greater filmmaker than he already is if only he were willing to take more risks. Sunglass could turn out to be just that risk. Dosar was a risk as well: it is not often that one encounters a black and white film about marital infidelity in an era of notoriously short attention spans. So between Dosar and Sunglass, is Ghosh finally ready to leave his safe literary moorings behind and embrace a more pronounced and provocative cinematic approach?

He owes it to himself and to his countless admirers. This writer is one of them. We have followed his career with great interest, especially from the point when he sprung the National Award-winning Unishe April on us. That film did take us by surprise. Since then, films like Dahan, Asookh, Bariwali and the rest have impressed us no end with the solidity of the craftsmanship that went into them. But somewhere, we have been left feeling a little unsure of his ability to deliver a film that could redefine cinematic greatness for a new generation of filmgoers. Ghosh has it in him. We are waiting for the promise to be well and truly fulfilled.