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Umesh Kulkarni, the honest filmmaker

Deool taught Umesh Kulkarni that honest, simple stories bridge the gap between commercial and meaningful cinema, the filmmaker tells DNA.

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In a central Mumbai hotel, Umesh Kulkarni welcomes guests for the music launch of Masala — a film he is producing in partnership with his writer-actor friend Girish Kulkarni. The duo seems to have a knack of making films that are critically acclaimed as well as commercially successful. These include Deool, which won the National Award earlier this month, and Valu (2008), where a bull plays the lead role. Only Vihir (2010) failed to get a commercial release despite getting rave reviews in the festival circuit.

Umesh’s collaboration with Girish goes back to more than fifteen years ago when he acted and Girish directed plays for their theater group Antarik in Pune. “The roles have reversed now, but our friendship began in those days. Later, when I joined FTII, though Girish wasn’t a part of the course, he remained involved in my projects,” Umesh says.

Once he completed the course at FTII, Kulkarni decided to make his directorial debut with Valu. “We (Umesh and Girish) thought of a story that interested both of us. We didn’t pick the subject after calculating where we wanted our careers to go. We just picked a story and poured ourselves into it,” says Umesh. Given the unusual plot, getting financial backing wasn’t easy, but being sticklers for creative freedom, the duo self-financed the film. Risky as it was, Valu clicked, and Umesh Kulkarni became one of the names to watch out for in the new wave that was hitting Marathi cinema.  

Incidentally, Deool saw a cow play a pivotal role, as did a bird in Vihir. Asked why this love for birds and animals, Kulkarni replies, “The people we see every day are linked to the environment and nature around us. The Sahyadris are an essential reason why a Maharashtrian is the way he is. Animals form a large part of the environment and are a metaphor that interacts with all the elements that make a story.”

The drive to tell a story, for Umesh, comes from an urge to create something without compromises. “Or outside influence that could possibly force something into a film. Creative freedom is necessary to create something from the bottom of your heart,” he says. While the producer of traditional Marathi films might argue that creative freedom doesn’t exactly yield commercial success, Umesh has broken that norm. “Deool’s 100-day run at the box-office along with the great reception at film festivals and at the National Awards, can be attributed to several factors. We had a team for whom the film was much more than a commercial assignment. We didn’t want to make a film that was going to cater to the audience mindset. We wanted to make a film that we would like to see while keeping the medium of the message simple. We conveyed our story without a high-handed approach, which made it essential for us to steer clear of sounding preachy,” he says.

Though Umesh wants to convey a message with each of his films, he is conscious of the manner in which it is conveyed. “We try to create an experience through a film. When people think of the film, they should walk away with the message that they have perceived. How can we dictate what the audience should take away from a film? That’s why we never use any dialogue to give out our message, the experience of watching the film should do the job,” says Kulkarni.

Once Valu became successful, there was pressure on Umesh to deliver something similar. “Everyone wanted us to make another Valu. That’s why we made Vihir, which was a personal subject. For me, filmmaking is not playing to the gallery. It is more about exploring and expressing myself,” says the director who firmly believes that honest thoughts and a simple rendition can bridge the gap between commercial and meaningful cinema.

Umesh values the National Award because he feels that the acknowledgement to regional cinema on a national level encourages the new energy in the Marathi film industry. For this reason, the three-film-old director is taking a step back to produce films directed by his friends. “It is time to let my friends direct their first films. There are so many stories to tell and obviously, I can’t direct them all. So, we are producing Sandesh’s (Kulkarni) first film Masala. It is an opportunity to understand the production side of things and try to be the kind of a producer that I, as a director, have always longed to work with,” says Umesh.

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