"Every mainstream film that you see in India has some or the other references from the Mahabharata or Shakespeare", said Naseeruddin Shah.
Veteran actor Naseeruddin Shah is one of the most forward-thinking artistes of Indian cinema. So when he talks about something, the world sits down to take notice. The senior actor, who has donned the hat of a director for the second time with his recently released short film Man Woman, Man Woman, feels that the mainstream cinema of India hasn’t fully stuck to its responsibilities as a medium of art.
Talking to IANS, he said, "Our mainstream cinema has ruined the taste of the audience forever. Filmmaker Satyajit Ray mentioned about this thing in his book titled 'Our films, their films' which he wrote 50 years ago. He wasn't running down Indian films but he was merely comparing the Indian filmmakers with international filmmakers."
The actor shared that Ray wished for our audience to be more “discerning”, and stressed upon the importance of the audience that questions a filmmaker. "Satyajit Ray said that we need audiences which get angry, we need audiences which are curious. It’s not correct to always pander to the softest sensibilities of the audience," he added.
The actor is awaiting a positive change in the mainstream cinema as he further mentioned, "It’s been over 100 years for our cinema, and our mainstream cinema keeps making the same kind of films, many stories that you find in the mainstream films can be found in the Indian epics like Mahabharata which is one of the greatest epics written. Every mainstream film that you see in India has some or the other references from the Mahabharata’. Either that or Shakespeare. Every cliche in Hindi mainstream cinemas has been heavily borrowed from Shakespeare."
After making his directorial debut with the 2006 film Yun Hota Toh Kya Hota, Naseeruddin Shah has once again gone behind the camera after 17 years for the short film Man Woman, Man Woman. The film, featuring Naseer's wife Ratna Pathak Shah and his son Vivaah Shah in the lead roles, is availabe on the YouTube channel of Royal Stag Barrel Select Large Short Films. (With inputs from IANS)
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 "Naseeruddin Shah/File photo")
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