Screening on 1st July 2007: KWAIDAN (Ghost Stories )

Since its release in 1964, KWAIDAN - an anthology film featuring four separate spooky tales - has earned a reputation in the West as one of the classic Japanese ghost movies. There had been a tradition of such films before, but with its lavish budget and production values, KWAIDAN was not just another routine genre item; it was clearly intended as high-class art.

Click here for TRAILER OF KWAIDAN

Directed by the Japanese master MASAKI KOBAYASHI and Winner of the Special Jury Prize at the 1965 Cannes Film Festival, Kwaidan represents a considerable departure from the works of its director, who made his initial fame with such socially conscious dramas as Black River (a study of corruption brought about by U.S. military bases in Japan) and The Human Condition (an expose of Japanese mistreatment of Chinese in POW camps). Shot almost entirely in enormous studio sets, with a completely post-synched and carefully controlled soundtrack, Kwaidan is about as far from moviemaking realism as it is possible to go. Yet in going to such dramatically ambitious lengths as adapting aspects of Kabuki and Bunaraku puppet theatre to filmmaking techniques, Kobayashi achieves a subtle synthesis of realism and stylization. He makes palpable a vision in which beauty and horror not only coexist but complement one another.

Click here for more on Kwaidan from IMDB

Kwaidan contains four distinct, separate stories
* In "Black Hair," a faithless samurai abandons his wife for a rich replacement. Later, filled with regret, he returns to his first wife, but he wakes up the next morning to find something else....

* "Woman in the Snow" - features two woodsmen caught in a snow storm. The older one dies at the hands of the title character, a kind of female demon, but she takes pity on the younger, letting him live in exchange for a promise never to reveal what happened.

* "Hoichi the Earless" is about a musician who is summoned to sing his songs about an ancient battle. It turns out his audience consists of the ghosts of those who perished in the battle. A priest protects Hoichi by covering his bodies with tattoos that hide him from the spirits.

* "In a Cup of Tea" - the author tells us - is an unfinished fragment of a tale of what befalls someone who drinks a cup of tea with a "soul" in it, leading to ghostly visitations. The film ends with something similar happening to the author...

"Kwaidan" is a symphony of color and sound that is truly past compare. It is also well acted in a technique of Japanese gestures by a large and orderly cast, the most conspicuous and memorable of whom is Katsuo Nakamura as the blind ballad singer. It is a film that commends itself mainly to those viewers who can appreciate rare subtlety and grace.

Masaki Kobayashi

Masaki Kobayashi is considered one of the great cinematic masters of the Japanese immediate post-war era No one of that generation of filmmakers was affected quite as strongly by the war as Kobayashi. His most acclaimed films are unflinching explorations into the dark side of Japanese culture, the side that drove men to commit gory suicide for the name of honor and commit horrific atrocities in the name of the Emperor. Kobayashi's exacting professionalism makes his films a visually and emotionally power experience.
Born in February, 1916, in Japan's northern-most island Hokkaido, Kobayashi entered prestigious Waseda University in 1933 . Kobayashi eventually left Waseda to enter Shochiku's Ofuna studios. Kobayashi worked as an assistant for a mere eight months before he was drafted and sent to the front in Manchuria. Opposed to the war, which he viewed as senseless, he refused to rise above the position of private. In 1944, he was transferred to the southern Ryukyu Islands, where he witnessed the war's final bloody tumult. There he was captured by the U.S. and held for a year in a detention camp in Okinawa. In the fall of 1946, Kobayashi returned to Shochiku and served for six years as an assistant director under Keisuke Kinoshita.

He garnered international acclaim and a prestigious San Giorgio prize at the Venice Film Festival in 1960 for his Human Condition I: No Greater Love (1958), the first installment of sweeping trilogy about the war. Kobayashi's films brought to life by the masterful performances of Nakadai in such Kobayashi classics as Harakiri (1962), Kwaidan (1964), and Rebellion (1967).With the acclaimed Kwaidan, his first color film, he pushed this emphasis on composition with his expressionistic use of color. Kobayashi died in of a heart attack in 1996.

Screening at Ashwin Hospital Auditorium, Ganapathy , Kovai.
On 01 07 2007 at 5.45 pm
Call 94430 39630 Email konangal@gmail.com

The realism of Ritwik Ghatak

Pankaja Srinivasan's write up on the Ritwik Ghatak Film Festival conducted by Konangal published in Hindu Metroplus dated 21 06 2007

Retrospective / Cinema

Never known to sugarcoat his films, Ritwik Ghatak’s in-your-face portrayal of life still wields tremendous impact, writes Pankaja Srinivasan

Idealism Vs Realism

Stills from Subarnarekha, which Ritwik Ghatak called his most philosophical film

Ritwik Ghatak was born in 1925, and came of age during the great Bengal Famine, the Second World War and, the upheaval when twice, Bengal was “physically rent apart—in 1947 by the Partition … and in 1971 by the Bangladeshi War of In dependence”.

Like millions of others, he had to leave home in Dhaka, and the uprooted, the dispossessed and the homeless became the leitmotif of most of his films, including the three — Subarnarekha, Meghey Dhaka Taara a nd Komal Gandhaar — that were screened at the Ritwik Ghatak retrospective by Konangal Film Society.

Brilliantly erratic

Inevitably, Ritwik Ghatak was compared with Satyajit Ray. But, while Ray was the toast of town and the blue-eyed boy of Indian films, Ghatak didn’t quite make the cut.

He was as in-your-face, unpredictable, and uncomfortable to be with as Ray was refined, suave and one of the boys.

Says writer-activist Jacob Levich: “Viewing Ghatak is an edgy, intimate experience, an engagement with a brilliantly erratic intelligence in an atmosphere of inquiry, experimentation, and disconcerting honesty. The feeling can be invigorating, but it’s never comfortable.”

Ghatak is “like an undesirable guest: he lacks respect, has ‘views’, makes a mess and disdains decorum”.

So in Subarnarekha, idealism always comes a poor second to realism. In a flush of enthusiastic patriotism, schoolteacher Hariprasad wants to start a new life in Calcutta for himself and his fellow refugees from East Pakistan. But, t he protagonist Ishwar wants no part of it, and he accepts a job in a foundry elsewhere, and moves with his sister Sita and a little boy Abhiram (who is separated from his mother in the chaos after partition). Hariprasad calls Ishwar a ‘deserter’.

Ishwar prides himself on being upright and principled, but is unwilling to let his sister marry Abhiram who is from a lower caste. Abhiram spurns a lucrative offer to go abroad in order to write, but abandons his idealism and becomes a bus driver for survival after he elopes with Sita to Calcutta. However, he dies in an accident.

Meanwhile, Ishwar, devastated by the hand life has dealt him, along with his erstwhile friend Hariprasad (who has since discovered lofty ideals get one no where, and that there is no distinction between being noble or cowardly), decides to live it up in Calcutta.

In search of carnal pleasures, Ishwar lands up with a woman who is soliciting a customer for the first time. And, in one horrifying sequence she takes a machete and kills herself. She is none other than his sister Sita.

There aren’t too many sunshine moments in Ghatak’s works. In Meghey Dhaka Tara, it is a bleak house all the way.

Neeta’s story

Neeta is the sole breadwinner of a family. The father does no more than quote Keats and Yeats; a brother does endless riyaaz hoping to become a renowned musician; another gets a job, but contributes nothing to the house. Neeta’ ;s younger sister only has new clothes and romance in her head. The mother sees nothing wrong in marrying off her younger daughter to the man Neeta loves. How will the family survive without Neeta’s money, asks the mother.

Komal Gandhar, often referred to as Ghatak’s favourite, portrays the rivalry and jealousy between two rival theatre groups as they struggle to put up a joint production. A Rabindranath Tagore poem is the inspiration for the t itle where a girl is compared to a musical note, which in turn, is likened to Bengal.

In the film, Anasuya mirrors the divided leadership of the People’s Theatre Movement, and ultimately, a divided Bengal.

Symbolism and metaphors abound in all three films. The debris of an aircraft, an abandoned runway, a truncated railway track, wastelands, snatches of music that are abruptly interrupted, all go towards depicting loss, helplessness and hopeless yearning.

Hope not lost

Ghatak’s films were a stinging critique of modernity. For, the euphoria that erupted after independence slowly turned into ashes for many.

Instead of an improved life, existence became even worse. Industrialisation dehumanised values, and cynicism and pessimism smothered patriotic fervour and optimism. But, Ghatak’s films did not cut off hope altogether. The filmmaker leaves the door a little ajar, for a ray of hope to enter.

Ritwik Ghatak Film Festival

We thank all cinema lovers who attended Ritwik Ghatak Film Festival at Kasthuri Sreenivasan Auditorium on 17th July.
We thank all our well wishers who are helping us with our efforts in popularising good cinema.
Our heartfelt thanks to press for all their support .
Thanks to you all .
Do mail to us about your suggestions and feedbacks to konangal@gmail.com

RITWIK GHATAK FILM FESTIVAL ON 17th JUNE 2007

(Venue : Kasthuri Srinivasan Auditorium .Please scroll down this post for full details of screening )

REINVENTING THE CINEMA

RITWIK GHATAK
1925 – 1976

In an age when film makers masquarade as reformers , it is only apt that one remembers the flag bearers of the REAL New Wave in Indian Cinema that had its inception in the early ’50s through the mid ’70s. A beacon of this New Wave was Ritwik Ghatak. The Anarchist. The Rebel. The quintessential Bengali Intellectual. The man who influenced a generation of film makers.

Ritwik Ghatak was born in Dhaka in East Bengal (now Bangladesh). He belonged to an illustrious family. Ghatak and his family formed part of the massive exodus from East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) to Kolkata owing to Partition of 1947 - the tragedy that haunted him all his life and kept coming back as a recurring theme in his films. Heavily influenced by Sergei Eisenstein and Berltolt Brecht, he had always intended his cinema to be harbinger of social change.

In 1948, Ghatak wrote his first play Kalo sayar (The Dark Lake), and participated in a revival of the landmark play Nabanna. In 1951, Ghatak joined the Indian People's Theatre Association ( IPTA ). He wrote, directed and acted in plays and translated Bertolt Brecht and Gogol into Bengali. In 1957, he wrote and directed his last play Jwala (The Burning).

Ghatak entered film industry with Nemai Ghosh's Chinnamul (1950) as actor and assistant director. Chinnamul was followed two years later by Ghatak's first completed film Nagarik (1952), both major break-throughs for the Indian cinema. Ritwik Ghatak directed eight full-length films.

He taught at FTII, Pune , and his legacy lived on through the works of his illustrious students - Mani kaul, Kumar Sahani, Ketan Mehta and John Abraham.

THE TRILOGY OF GHATAK

The 3 films chosen for our retrospective are his best-known films, Meghe Dhaka Tara (The Cloud-Capped Star) (1960), Komal Gandhar (1961), and Subarnarekha (1962), a trilogy based in Calcutta .

Meghe Dhaka Tara (1960 ) Considered Ghatak’s masterpiece, this powerful and innovative melodrama revolves around a refugee family from East Bengal, victims of the Partition, who struggle for survival on the outskirts of Calcutta. Ghatak captures the complex play of creative and destructive forces at work in the attempt of each family member to survive. At the center of this domestic tragedy is the self-sacrificing Neeta, the family’s eldest daughter and provider for all, who struggles away at her job in the city. Closer to home, an elder brother practices to become a singer, while a younger one turns to factory work. The father realizes the worthlessness of his liberal education in a modern world that has no place for Yeats or Milton and no regard for the ideals of nineteenth-century Bengali liberalism.
Runtime : 120 min / Bengali with English subtitles.

Komal Gandhar (1961) Said to be Ghatak’s favorite film, the quasi-autobiographical Komal Ghandar portrays the People’s Theater Movement of the late 1940s, agonizing over its jealousies and schisms as two rival groups seek to put on a joint production. The title comes from a Tagore poem in which a girl is compared with a particular melody and the melody, in turn, with Bengal. The script has an equally elaborate structure in which the divided mind of the film’s heroine, Anasuya, mirrors the divided leadership of the People’s Theater and, ultimately, a divided Bengal.

Runtime : 110 minBengali with English subtitles

Subarnarekha (1962)

In Subarnarekha, Ritwik Ghatak takes the stuff of melodrama and turns it into a piercing political cry. Set in Calcutta after the partition of Bengal, the film focuses on two Bengali refugees, Ishwar and his younger sister Seeta, who are reduced to living in dire poverty on the banks of the river Subarnarekha. Amidst a floating population of refugees building temporary homes, they are joined by many other uprooted Bengalis, including an abandoned boy they attempt to educate and an idealistic school teacher and his family. Ghatak’s characters are emblematic of the trail of human debris left by colonialism in an increasingly industrialized, post-independence society. Still, as with all Ghatak’s films, Subarnarekha ends on a note of optimism, however frail.

Runtime : 125 min / Bengali with English subtitles.

Venue : Kasturi Srinivasan Auditorium - near Aravind Eye Hospital , Peelamedu, Coimbatore

Time : 17 06 2007 , Sunday 9.45 am to 6.30 pm

Write to konangal@gmail.com for all your queries.

Contribution towards lunch and tea -Rs.50.

You can contribute more and support Konangal's effort to promote good cinema.
Please confirm your participation to enable us to make food arrangements. Call :9894871105 , 94430 39630

Screening on 3rd June 2007 - Andrzej Wajda's MAN OF MARBLE

Man of Marble is Andrzej Wajda's controversial attack on the brutality of the Stalinism that held Poland in its thrall during the 1950s

This film is about the attempts of a film maker, a woman with the busily self-important manner of the young fanatic, to make a documentary about a certain Mateusz Birkut, a bricklayer who, in the early days of the Communist revolution, was hailed as a national hero for his productivity feats and became as famous as any film star, only to disappear from the record books in 1952.

Agnieszka, played by Krystyna Janda in her first role, is a young filmmaker who is making her diploma film on Birkut, whose whereabouts seems to have been lost two decades later.The title refers to the propagandistic marble statues made in Birkut's image. She gets hold of outtakes and censored footage and interviews the man's friends, ex-wife, and the filmmaker who made him a hero.
MAN OF MARBLE - Colour - Polish with English Subtitles - Run Time - 168 Minutes

Wajda managed to publish the script in the Warsaw weekly 'Kultura ' on 4 August, 1963, and believed that at least one obstacle was overcome - 'censorship of the press'. Unfortunately, many "comrades", who wanted to demonstrate their Party alertness, had read the text and, as a result, the script had been banned for many years. After fourteen years, the script was passed for filming. In spite of protests from various rungs on the decision-making ladder, Man of Marble was released. The audience did the rest. The inexorable power of Wajda's indictment of the rigidity of Stalinism--and the vigor of his celebration of naturalness and authenticity--makes this arguably his best film since his classic World War II trilogy (A GENERATION, KANAL, ASHES AND DIAMONDS).

Andrzej Wajda

Andrzej Wajda (born March 6, 1926 in Suwałki) is a Polish film director. Laureate of an honorary Oscar, he is one of the most prominent members of the Polish Film School.

A major figure of world and Eastern European cinema after World War II, Wajda has made his reputation as a sensitive and uncompromising chronicler of his country's political and social evolution. The son of a Polish cavalry officer who was killed by the Soviets in 1940, Wajda fought in the Home Army against the Germans when he was still a teenager. After the war, he studied to be a painter at Kraków's Academy of Fine Arts before entering the Łódź Film School.

On the heels of his apprenticeship to director Aleksander Ford, Wajda was given the opportunity to direct his own film. With A Generation (1955), the first-time director poured out his disillusionment over jingoism, using as his alter ego a young, James Dean-style antihero played by Zbigniew Cybulski.Wajda went on to make two more increasingly accomplished films, which further developed the antiwar theme of A Generation: Kanal (1956) and Ashes and Diamonds (1958), also starring Cybulski.

Wajda was more interested in works of allegory and symbolism, and certain symbols (such as setting fire to a glass of liquor, representing the flame of youthful idealism that was extinguished by the war) recur often in his films Wajda's later devotion to Poland's burgeoning Solidarity movement was manifested in Man of Marble (1976) and Man of Iron (1981), with Solidarity leader Lech Wałęsa appearing as himself in the latter film. The director's involvement in this movement would prompt the Polish government to force Wajda's production company out of business. In 1983 he directed Danton , a film set in 1794 (Year Two) dealing with the Post-Revolutionary Terror. The film carries sharp parallels with the Post-Revolutionary period in Russia as well as with fascist Germany.

At the 2000 Academy Awards, Wajda was presented with an honorary Oscar for his numerous contributions to cinema; he subsequently donated the award to Kraków's Jagiellonian University. In February 2006, Wajda received an honorary Golden Bear for lifetime achievement at the Berlin International Film Festival. Wajda , well past his 80th year, is still making films .

Dinamalar write up on 'Character'

Dinamalar has come out recently with a write up on our earlier screening of 'CHARACTER' .
Click on the writeup image posted here to have a larger version for reading .

Screening of Ingmar Bergman's ' Wild Strawberries ' on 20th May 2007.

Wild Strawberries - Professor Borg's dream sequence.

Directed by Ingmar Bergman, Sweden , 1957,
Nominated for Oscar. Another 11 wins & 2 nominations
91 mins with English subtitles

Retired professor Isak Borg travels through the countryside on his way to receive an honorary award, accompanied by his daughter-in-law Marianne. Borg is a cold and distant man who has always had difficulties in his relationships with others. Along the way Borg passes places he remembers from his youth. This, along with a series of encounters a hitchhiker who is the exact double of a youthful love, a near-collision with a group of argumentative youths gives the Professor cause to recall incidents from his life and reflect upon his successes and failures. There are other Expressionist and certainly Freudian dream sequences in the picture, almost always with the old Professor appearing in them as his present self.

Wild Strawberries is quite simply a must-see for the serious filmgoer, offering a perfect introduction to the work of one of the world's greatest directors. For while it showcases Bergman's characteristic mastery of cinematic symbolism and his willingness to tackle subjects that most other filmmakers would balk at, Wild Strawberries also exhibits greater levels of compassion and humour than many of his other masterpieces. (Note here that wild strawberries are a symbol of rebirth in Sweden, and so function within the film as an indication that Borg ultimately reaffirms the value of his life.)

Wild Strawberries is also of note for its brilliant performances, not just from Bergman's invariably excellent stock company but also from the 78-year-old Victor Sjostrom, a noted actor-director of the silent era. Indeed we might see the Sjostrom -Bergman collaboration as something of a torch-passing from one generation to the next: It was he who made the final scene one of the most serene of all Bergman's endings. "Sjostrom's face shone", said the director. "It emanated light - a reflection of a different reality, hitherto absent. His whole appearance was soft and gentle, his glance joyful and tender. It was like a miracle".

Screening at ASHWIN HOSPITAL AUDITORIUM 4^th Floor (Lift Provided) , off Sathy Road, Ganapathy, Coimbatore -12. Call: 94430 39630

Thiruvanathapuram -Month-long film appreciation course from 10th May 2007.

The Kerala State Film Development Corporation (KSFDC) is organising a month-long course in film appreciation, which will cover among other things the growth and history of world cinema and the technical aspects of film-making.

Discussions on the history and techniques of films which became milestones in the history of cinema and on films which rewrote history will figure in the course. P.K. Nair, former Director of the Pune Film Archives and former film appreciation course director of the Pune Film Institute, is the course adviser. Eminent personalities from the film field will take classes on various aspects of cinema. The course fee is Rs.4,000.

The KSFDC will meet the cost of boarding and arrange accommodation at low cost. The course will begin on May 10. Details can be had from Lenin Rajendran, Film Officer (Telephone 944774566, 2325325) or downloaded from the website www.ksfdc.org. Application forms are available from the Kalabhavan and cinemas of the KSFDC in Thrissur, Kozhikode, Cherthala, North Paravur and Chittur on payment of Rs.100.

http://www.thehindu.com/2007/04/12/stories/2007041203540300.htm

Where is realism?

( K. Jeshi writes about the meeting organised by Konangal with Yamuna Rajendran in The Hindu - Metroplus)
Film criticism should be based on principles to bring about a societal change, says film critic Yamuna Rajendran.

Is Maniratnam's Guru a milestone in Indian cinema? Why is the sword sequence in Pudupettai compared to Akira Kurosawa's filmmaking? Why is Paruthiveeran considered a realistic movie?

Yamuna Rajendran, Tamil film critic from London, raised these questions and gave the answers too at an interaction with film lovers organised by Konangal Film Society.

"The protagonist in Paruthiveeran is chased by 60 people. He reaches a safe place; the others reach 25 minutes later. Where is realism here and why is such a movie compared to Latin-American filmmaking? And, is the free trade concept propagated in Guru the only route to success?" he asks.

This is where film criticism comes in, he states. "Globalisation encourages `aesthetic' criticism. What we require is `principles-based' criticism to tell people about world cinema, about reality and try to bring about a change," says Yamuna Rajendran, whose book, Arasiyal cinema - 16 film makers, talks about the creative world and the unique film making of Ritwik Ghatak, Oliver Stone, Akira and other master film makers.

Chaos in audience

He says restrained critiques create chaos in the minds of the audience. "But, when criticism is based on principles, it exposes the fakeness in commercial cinema and redefines societal values."

Filmmakers in the 60s started off as film critics. "Directors like Jean-Luc-Godard from Greece, American film maker Robert Redford and Italian film makers presented films based on the political developments. And, film festivals such as Cannes or the one in London served as a get-together for bringing about such change," he adds. Now, they have turned battlegrounds.

If Chinese films gained importance in the `80s with realistic portrayals of the situation in China, Iranian cinema narrated the struggles, the political situation and the poverty of the people through the eyes of children.

Knowledge of history

"The elements of historical consciousness, time of the event and the place are missing in new-age filmmaking. They exaggerate, deviate or distract the audience from serious issues. A film like Kannathil Muthamittal fails to deal with any central phenomenon, a historical issue or an ethnic issue," he adds.

This film critic rates Julie Ganapathy as a black mark in director Balu Mahendra's career. "It is a shot-by-shot copy of Steven Kings' Misery. However, his Sandhya Raagam is a masterpiece," he adds. Asked about Cheran's Autograph and Thavamai Thavamirundhu, he says: "When compared to the existing Tamil films, new concepts look better."

Activist cinema

Rajendran, who has watched over 6,000 films, says alternative cinema (documentaries and short-films) have taken on the role of activists to handle social issues.

Kanchana Srinivasan agrees. A documentary filmmaker, he has been running a film society in Tirunelveli for 16 years, and has come out with a film on the Thamirabararani issue. "Look for issues around you and convert them into films," he says.

K. JESHI

Courtesy :The Hindu Metroplus dated 23 04 2007.

Murder most foul

Like good books, murder mysteries never go out of fashion, writes PANKAJA SRINIVASAN as Alfred Hitchcock works his scary charm on Coimbatore's movie buffs.

"A good film is when the price of the dinner, the theatre admission and the babysitter were worth it". So said Alfred Hitchcock.

And, film buffs in Coimbatore had no argument with that as they sat through the master's retrospective and watched Rear Window, Vertigo and Psycho.

There is something to be said for watching films with a roomful of movie-mad people. There is a festive buzz, with posters and brochures put up on Hitchcock and the other directors whose works have already been screened by the Konangal Film Society.

Window treatment

Rear Window is great fun. For starters it has a good-looking cast. James Stewart is, well, James Stewart, and Grace Kelly, who plays his girlfriend, looks spectacular (Did you know that she was very first actress to appear on a postage stamp, in 1993).

It is about an injured photographer, confined to a wheelchair. (Hitchcock is said to have based the story on the real life romance said to be happening between Ingrid Bergman and photographer Robert Capa at that time). He is bored, so he passes time looking out of his window into his neighbours' homes.

Each window he peeps into has a story being played out. Voyeurism pays. He discovers that one of his neighbours has murdered his wife. An interesting fact is that the entire film has been shot on set (at the time, it was the largest set ever constructed).

A lively interaction follows the screening. Someone asks whether it was `ethical' for Hitchcock to make the protagonist a voyeur. Camera angles and background music are talked of; parallels are drawn between what is happening in the protagonist's life and the lives of his neighbours — the comments take interesting twists and turns.

Pure entertainment

Till, another viewer says: "It is an entertaining movie, let's just leave it at that."
Nevertheless, over an ilai saapadu (provided by the organisers at Rs. 50 per head with two tea-and-biscuit breaks as well) Hitchcock's style and substance is discussed some more.

And, then another masterpiece, Vertigo (James Stewart and Kim Novak). Martin Scorsese has said of the film, "Vertigo strikes a deep chord in me every time I see it."As, indeed, it does, with its sense of mystery, a touch of the supernatural that is eerie, beautiful and gripping all at the same time.

Satisfyingly psycho!

By now there is only one thought in everyone's head — Psycho (Anthony Perkins, Janet Leigh).
You'll never look at a shower curtain again without misgivings. The bathroom scene was all that it was promised to be, and more. And, Perkins playing Norman Bates is satisfyingly psychotic! And the background music is amazing.

(Hitchcock was so pleased with the score written by Bernard Herrmann that he doubled the composer's salary to $34,501 and said, "33 per cent of the effect of Psycho was due to the music").

It is a rare treat to watch films made by the masters. And, discussions, debates and interaction about the films and the filmmakers are a bonus. Konangal made special efforts to bring that extra something into the screening. In this case, an interview with Alfred Hitchcock where he declares poker-faced, that there is not much difference between him wanting to make Psycho to scare people and a young mother saying `boo' to her three-month-old baby!

* * *

Konangal's aim is to reach good cinema to as many people as possible. It is particularly keen to get school and college students to view good films, and is more than happy to organise shows for them. It is also planning a children's film festival during the summer vacation.

For details about subscription and events, contact Pon Chandran at 94430-39630 or email to konangal@gmail.com.

Visit their blog http://konangalfilmsociety.blogspot.com/

Courtesy The Hibdu , Metroplus 23 04 2007

Hitchcock Film Festival

We thank all cinema lovers who attended today's Hitchcock Film Festival held at PPG Nursing College Auditorium, Saravanampatti.

We thank Dr.Thangavelu for providing the auditorium for screening and also Dr.Rajendran.

We are grateful to the Press for all thier support and coverage.

We thank you all from the bottom of our hearts.

We welcome your feedbak on Hitchcock Film Festival. Please write to konangal@gmail.com

HITCHCOCK FILM FESTIVAL ON 15 th April 2007.

ALFRED HITCHCOCK
Born: August 13, 1899, Leytonstone, England Died: April 28, 1980

The acknowledged master of the thriller genre he virtually invented, Alfred Hitchcock was also a brilliant technician who deftly blended sex, suspense and humor. He began his filmmaking career in 1919 illustrating title cards for silent films at Paramount's Famous Players-Lasky studio in London. There he learned scripting, editing and art direction, and rose to assistant director in 1922. That year he directed an unfinished film, No. 13 or Mrs. Peabody . His first completed film as director was The Pleasure Garden (1925), an Anglo-German production filmed in Munich. This experience, plus a stint at Germany's UFA studios as an assistant director, help account for the Expressionistic character of his films, both in their visual schemes and thematic concerns. Hitchcock directed 66 films till 1976. He produced many evergreen classics that are being repeatedly viewed by his die-hard fans till today.

Alfred Hitchcock and his family led a quiet and unostentatious life, preferring the comforts of home to the Hollywood milieu around them. In the last year of his life, Hitchcock received the American Film Institute's lifetime achievement award and was knighted in England. He died in 1980 in Los Angeles.

Hitchcock's legacy is vast: books, tributes, film festivals, and imitators abound. Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, the monthly publication that bears his name, and other "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" anthologies, are still going strong.

THREE FILMS
OF HITCHCOCK

We will be screening PSYCHO, VERTIGO , REAR WINDOW and selected interviews with Hitchcock on 15th April .

Vertigo (1958)

Vertigo is one of Alfred Hitchcock's most powerful, deep, and stunningly beautiful films - it is a film noir that functions on multiple levels. The work is a mesmerizing romantic suspense/thriller about a macabre, doomed romance - a desperate love for an illusion. Hitchcock's intensely personal, self-revealing picture, Vertigo, is the story of a man who is possessed by the image of a lost love and becomes increasingly compulsive in his desire to re-create that image. John "Scottie" Ferguson is a retired San Francisco police detective who suffers from acrophobia and Madeleine is the lady who leads him to high places. A wealthy shipbuilder who is an acquaintance from college days approaches Scottie and asks him to follow his beautiful wife, Madeleine. He fears she is going insane, maybe even contemplating suicide, because she believes she is possessed by a dead ancestor. Scottie is skeptical, but agrees after he sees the beautiful Madeleine.

Click here for trailer of Vertigo.

Vertigo is now generally recognised as one of Hitchcock's greatest films, considered by many to be his masterpiece. It is also a masterpiece of filmmaking technique, including one of cinema's most important innovations-the dolly-out, zoom-in shot that visually represents Scottie's sensation of vertigo. Runtime : 128 minutes

Psycho ( 1960)

" Psycho has a very interesting construction and that game with the audience was fascinating. I was directing the viewers. You might say I was playing them, like an organ." - Alfred Hitchcock

Alfred Hitchcock's powerful, complex psychological thriller, Psycho (1960) is the "mother" of all modern horror suspense films - it single-handedly ushered in an era of inferior screen 'slashers' with blood-letting and graphic, shocking killings

Phoenix officeworker Marion Crane is fed up with the way life has treated her. She has to meet her lover Sam in lunch breaks and they cannot get married because Sam has to give most of his money away in alimony. One Friday Marion is trusted to bank $40,000 by her employer. Seeing the opportunity to take the money and start a new life, Marion leaves town and heads towards Sam's California store. Tired after the long drive and caught in a storm, she gets off the main highway and pulls into The Bates Motel. The motel is managed by a quiet young man called Norman who seems to be dominated by his mother. And here , in this motel , most unexpected things happen.

PSYCHO : CLICK HERE FOR THE GUIDED TOUR BY THE MASTER HIMSELF !

The nightmarish, disturbing film's themes of corruptibility, confused identities, voyeurism, human vulnerabilities and victimization, the deadly effects of money, Oedipal murder, and dark past histories are realistically revealed. Its themes were revealed through repeated uses of motifs, such as birds, eyes, hands, and mirrors. Hitchcock's murder set-pieces are so potent, they can galvanize (and frighten) even a viewer who's seen them before! Bernard Herrmann's legendary (and endlessly imitated) score adds much to the excitement. Runtime 128 minutes.

Rear Window (1954)

Rear Window is an intriguing, brilliant, macabre Hitchcockian visual study of obsessive human curiosity and voyeurism. The film is universally regarded as a classic, and a strong cadre of critics, scholars, and fans considers this to be the director's best feature. Not only does the movie generate an intensely suspenseful and fascinating situation, but it develops a compelling and memorable character: L.B. Jefferies (James Stewart), a top-flight photographer who, as the result of an accident that left him in a leg cast, is confined to his upper-story Manhattan apartment.He spends his time looking out of the rear window observing the neighbours. He begins to suspect that the man opposite may have murdered his wife. Jeff enlists the help of his society model girlfriend Lisa Freemont and his nurse Stella to investigate. This level of danger and suspense is so far elevated above the cheap thrills of the modern slasher films that "Rear Window," intended as entertainment in 1954, is now revealed as art.

Cl ick here for trailer of Rear Window.

This film masterpiece was made entirely on one confined set. built at Paramount Studios - a realistic courtyard composed of 32 apartments . Remarkably, the camera angles are largely from the protagonist's own apartment, so the film viewer (in a dark theatre) sees the inhabitants of the other apartments almost entirely from his point of view - to share in his voyeuristic surveillance. Runtime 112 minutes

Viewing age limit 18 and above.

VENUE : PPG NURSING COLLEGE AUDITORIUM , SARAVANAMPATTI.
Eight kilometers from Gandhipuram bus stand.
1.Bus routes 63 or 13 from Gandhipuram to Keeranatham - alight at Kandaswamy Nagar bus stop.
2. Route 45 from Gandhipuram,to Annur - Koilplayam, alight at Visuvasapuram stop.
Contribution towards lunch and tea -Rs.50
Please confirm your participation to enable us to make food arrangements. Call :9894871105

For more details call : 94430 39630

Next screening on 18th March 2007 Battle Of Algiers

Battle of Algiers trailer

Battle Of Algiers.

Although nearly forty years have passed since its creation, Battle of Algiers is more timely than ever – especially for Americans, given the American involvement in a contemporary colonial war in the Middle East.
The film depicts an episode in the war of independence in the then French Algeria, in the capital city of Algiers. It reconstructs the events of November 1954 to December 1960 in Algiers during the Algerian War of Independence, beginning with the organization of revolutionary cells in the Casbah. From there, it depicts the conflict between native Algerians and European settlers (pied-noirs) in which the two sides exchange acts of increasing violence, leading to the introduction of French paratroopers, under the direction of General Massu and then Colonel Bigeard, to root out the National Liberation Front (FLN). The paratroops are depicted as "winning" the battle by neutralizing the whole FLN leadership through assassination or capture. However, the film ends with a coda, depicting demonstrations and rioting by native Algerians for independence, in which it is suggested that though the French have won the Battle of Algiers, they have lost the war.

The narrative is composed mostly of illustrations of the tactics of both the FLN insurgency and the French counter insurgency, as well as the uglier incidents in the national liberation struggle. It unflinchingly shows atrocities being committed by both sides against civilians. The FLN is shown taking over the Casbah through summary execution of native Algierian criminals and others considered traitors, as well as using terrorism to harass civilian French colonials. The French colonialists are shown using lynch mobs and indiscriminate violence against natives. Paratroops are shown employing torture, intimidation and murder to combat the FLN and MNA insurgents.

Refraining from the conventions of the historical epic, Pontecorvo and Solinas chose not to have a protagonist but several characters based on figures in the conflict. The film begins and ends from the point of view of Ali la Pointe, played by Brahim Hagiag, who corresponds to the historical figure of the same name. He is a criminal radicalized while in prison and is recruited to the FLN by military commander El-hadi Jafar, a fictional version of Saadi Yacef played by himself.

Other characters include the young boy Petit Omar, a street urchin who serves as a messenger for the FLN; Larbi Ben M'hidi, one of the top leaders of the FLN, who is used in the film mainly to give the political rationale for the insurgency; Djamila, Zohra and Hassiba, a trio of female FLN militants called to carry out a revenge attack. In addition, The Battle of Algiers used thousands of Algerian extras in bit parts and crowd shots; the effect Pontecorvo intended was to create the impression of the Casbah's residents as a "chorus", communicating to the viewer through chanting, wailing and physical affect.

The Algerian revolution has been called by many the bloodiest revolution in history. Although the revolutionary forces in Algiers were defeated by the French Army, the long war throughout the country led to the French withdrawal from Algeria. As leftists, the theme of showing the inevitable demise of colonialism as an instrument of Western imperialism was central to Pontecorvo and Solinas's treatment of The Battle of Algiers.
Runtime 121 min. Language : French / English / Arabic . Subtitles : Tamil
Venue : Ashwin Hospital Auditorium ( 4th floor - lift provided), Across Sathy Road, Ganapathy, Coimbatore 12 .
(Part of this write up is from http://en.wikipedia.org )

Gillo Pontecorvo and Battle Of Algiers

The director of the Battle of Algiers, Gillo Pontecorvo was born into an Italian-Jewish family of Pisa in 1919. Like the families of not a few Italian communists, Pontecorvo’s was well-to-do: his father, a cloth manufacturer, owned three factories and employed 1500 workers.The director was introduced to communism in the late ’30s by an older brother, Bruno, who worked as an atomic physicist in Paris, and by Bruno’s circle of anti-fascist friends. During WWII, Pontecorvo worked as a courier and journalist for the Italian Communist Party. But he became disillusioned with the party in 1956 as a result of its support of the Soviet invasion of Hungary: Like many other Italian communists who left the party in disgust at the Soviet invasion of Hungary, however, Pontecorvo did not abandon his communist convictions. Which brings us to Battle of Algiers. Algerian independence was declared and recognized in 1962. In 1965, the government of Algeria gave the director "not only all the necessary permits to shoot the film in Algiers, but put at his disposal – though not completely without charge – the Algerian army for the crowd scenes."

Pontecorvo wanted to shoot his film without using professional actors. Brahim Haggiag, who played Ali La Pointe, had a splendidly dramatic face, but he was a poor illiterate farmer whom Pontecorvo had found in a city market and who hadn’t the faintest idea what cinema was. If one has not seen this film, one cannot begin to imagine Pontecorvo’s extraordinary achievement. The acting is so natural and convincing that many viewers and even some critics assumed that the movie was a documentary. Only a master director could have taken this raw acting material and gotten such performances out of it. And despite his leftist viewpoint, Pontecorvo neither ridicules or demonizes the French.

(from http://www.lewrockwell.com/ )