Moner Manush - a saga of life and times of Lalon
Saturday, 25 June 2011
Farida Shaikh
Director Gautam Ghosh's Moner Manush, a joint venture production of Bangladesh-India, has a contemporary topic, dealing with peace and harmony, amicable relation and tolerance between all faiths, at a time when the neighbouring countries are in rift with fundamentalist pockets and conflicting groups. Setting of Moner Manush is early 19th century. It is nearly an approximate biographical account of the Baul of Bauls, Lalon Fakir born 1774-1890; in Nadia district now Kushtia of Bangladesh. Over 1,000 songs, which also inspired Rabindranath Tagore and other Bengali intellectuals, are attributed to have been composed by him, though only about half this number is traceable. Lalon rejected the division of society into communities, protesting and satirising religious fundamentalisms of all kinds. It is also an ethnographical film as it traces the anthropological and cultural history of this ethnic sect of wandering minstrels, the Bauls of Bengal who spread their progressive and secular faith through their songs and music. Quite appropriately it is a historical film as well as the story line spans a time period and a geographical terrain that has hardly been covered in Bangla films. It is also informative and educational as it sheds light on a little-known sect, on their unique ideology and lifestyle and their resurrection in modern times through cinema, theatre, and literature. The film, a joint venture of Rose Valley Productions of India and Ashirbad Films of Bangladesh, is a loose adaptation of Sunil Gangopadhyay's Moner Manush. Director Ghosh has invested it with his personal perspectives. It was acclaimed as the best film at 41st International Film Festival, Goa 2010. Bangladeshi actor Chanchal portrays as Lalon's friend Kalua and Zeeshan plays the teenaged Lalon. Others in the acting cast are Champa, Tathoi and Raisul Islam Asad from Bangladesh. It begins with Lalon as a teenager who leaves home, to when he is in his 50s, and then between the years 45-50, ending with when he is very old. Bibi Russell, the internationally renowned fashion designer from Bangladesh who has tuned the homely gamchha into a fashion statement, has done the costumes for Moner Manush along with Gautam's wife Nilanjana. "This is my first film project. I have given Prosenjit khadi kurta and dhoti that he wraps around like a lungi. I have given him a tulsi mala, a gift I received from a Baul I knew, as a lucky mascot for the film," informs Bibi. Prosenjit from India, who went into a kind of professional sanyas for five months in preparation for the role of Lalon, says: "My involvement with the character has changed my world-view and my philosophy. I have learnt that under the apparent restive spirit and wandering, under his repertoire of spiritual songs he composed; laid the basic philosophy of humanity that Lalon held above everything else. They did have female consorts but it was just like a basic biological desire like hunger for food. Lalon believed that emotional ties would take him away from his ultimate destination, finding oneness with the Almighty. It took some time for me to come back to ground level after I came back." Golam Phokir, a Nadia-based Baul who has played a cameo in the film, also doubled up as Prosenjit's trainer in this unusual role. "I taught him to play the ektara and dance like the Bauls," he says with a smile peeping out from his grey beard. The Chilapata forests in North Bengal, a four-hour drive from Jalpaiguri, covered the schedule in the Indian part of the locations. The scenes here were shot along the banks of the Bania River. Samir Chanda of India, who has won the National Award for Best Art Direction several times, created an akhra with some thatched huts and three houses. "The most challenging part of my designing for this film was getting the right props. We had a tough time finding a sarinda, a now-extinct musical instrument the Bauls played on. To recreate the architecture of Lalan's time was another challenge. There were almost no frames of reference so we had to rely on whatever little was available and rest had to be done from imagination. A project like Moner Manush does not attract me for the money or the budget constraints we have to work in compared to the budgets in Bollywood. It attracts me for the special kick I get out of working in these films." Watching the 150 minutes film Moner Manush is nostalgic for it is like a trip to the past of Bengal --- without borders. The quest is a saga of the life and times of Lalon Faqir and his liberal sects whose message was religious tolerance and sexual freedom. Born in the womb of a Hindu mother, he grew up within a Muslim environment and became a Universal Man: '.manusher to duta jaat. meya jaat aar chhele jaat.aar to kono jaat nai dharma nai.' (Farida Shaikh is a sociologist-cum-management consultant-cum-writer and can be reached at E-mail : farida_s9@optimaxbd.net)
Director Gautam Ghosh's Moner Manush, a joint venture production of Bangladesh-India, has a contemporary topic, dealing with peace and harmony, amicable relation and tolerance between all faiths, at a time when the neighbouring countries are in rift with fundamentalist pockets and conflicting groups. Setting of Moner Manush is early 19th century. It is nearly an approximate biographical account of the Baul of Bauls, Lalon Fakir born 1774-1890; in Nadia district now Kushtia of Bangladesh. Over 1,000 songs, which also inspired Rabindranath Tagore and other Bengali intellectuals, are attributed to have been composed by him, though only about half this number is traceable. Lalon rejected the division of society into communities, protesting and satirising religious fundamentalisms of all kinds. It is also an ethnographical film as it traces the anthropological and cultural history of this ethnic sect of wandering minstrels, the Bauls of Bengal who spread their progressive and secular faith through their songs and music. Quite appropriately it is a historical film as well as the story line spans a time period and a geographical terrain that has hardly been covered in Bangla films. It is also informative and educational as it sheds light on a little-known sect, on their unique ideology and lifestyle and their resurrection in modern times through cinema, theatre, and literature. The film, a joint venture of Rose Valley Productions of India and Ashirbad Films of Bangladesh, is a loose adaptation of Sunil Gangopadhyay's Moner Manush. Director Ghosh has invested it with his personal perspectives. It was acclaimed as the best film at 41st International Film Festival, Goa 2010. Bangladeshi actor Chanchal portrays as Lalon's friend Kalua and Zeeshan plays the teenaged Lalon. Others in the acting cast are Champa, Tathoi and Raisul Islam Asad from Bangladesh. It begins with Lalon as a teenager who leaves home, to when he is in his 50s, and then between the years 45-50, ending with when he is very old. Bibi Russell, the internationally renowned fashion designer from Bangladesh who has tuned the homely gamchha into a fashion statement, has done the costumes for Moner Manush along with Gautam's wife Nilanjana. "This is my first film project. I have given Prosenjit khadi kurta and dhoti that he wraps around like a lungi. I have given him a tulsi mala, a gift I received from a Baul I knew, as a lucky mascot for the film," informs Bibi. Prosenjit from India, who went into a kind of professional sanyas for five months in preparation for the role of Lalon, says: "My involvement with the character has changed my world-view and my philosophy. I have learnt that under the apparent restive spirit and wandering, under his repertoire of spiritual songs he composed; laid the basic philosophy of humanity that Lalon held above everything else. They did have female consorts but it was just like a basic biological desire like hunger for food. Lalon believed that emotional ties would take him away from his ultimate destination, finding oneness with the Almighty. It took some time for me to come back to ground level after I came back." Golam Phokir, a Nadia-based Baul who has played a cameo in the film, also doubled up as Prosenjit's trainer in this unusual role. "I taught him to play the ektara and dance like the Bauls," he says with a smile peeping out from his grey beard. The Chilapata forests in North Bengal, a four-hour drive from Jalpaiguri, covered the schedule in the Indian part of the locations. The scenes here were shot along the banks of the Bania River. Samir Chanda of India, who has won the National Award for Best Art Direction several times, created an akhra with some thatched huts and three houses. "The most challenging part of my designing for this film was getting the right props. We had a tough time finding a sarinda, a now-extinct musical instrument the Bauls played on. To recreate the architecture of Lalan's time was another challenge. There were almost no frames of reference so we had to rely on whatever little was available and rest had to be done from imagination. A project like Moner Manush does not attract me for the money or the budget constraints we have to work in compared to the budgets in Bollywood. It attracts me for the special kick I get out of working in these films." Watching the 150 minutes film Moner Manush is nostalgic for it is like a trip to the past of Bengal --- without borders. The quest is a saga of the life and times of Lalon Faqir and his liberal sects whose message was religious tolerance and sexual freedom. Born in the womb of a Hindu mother, he grew up within a Muslim environment and became a Universal Man: '.manusher to duta jaat. meya jaat aar chhele jaat.aar to kono jaat nai dharma nai.' (Farida Shaikh is a sociologist-cum-management consultant-cum-writer and can be reached at E-mail : farida_s9@optimaxbd.net)