Persistence Resistance: published after reluctance

From almost a long "inactive" phase (since May 2010 to March 2011), to suddenly hyperactive, my blog now shows an uneven graph of visitors and usage... glad that its at the peak at this moment, but the low lying areas make my heart sink... i remember posting the last post around, um, (oh, i don't exactly remember) a few weeks back... and since then, work (other than "writing") kept me occupied so much that i almost forgot that one needs to post stuff on the blog on a regular basis...

To end the drought, i am choosing an easier way out... publishing one of my drafts (which had been in pipeline for over two months)...

its a small story (yeah, a small "story", of perhaps 700 words, not a small write-up, one would say) about one of the fine days in my journalism and mass communication studies...   

I was asked to write a film critique on any one of the films screened at a film festival that we had attended once upon a time. there was a small irony, though; we were never taught to write one... "once upon a time" has relevance, which would be explained later, if i don't get another fit of short term memory loss...

Name of the film festival: Persistence Resistance 2011

Date, Venue & Timings: February 10, India International Centre, 10am-7.30pm

Films Screened/Seen: My Mother India, Fragments of History, The Other Song, Diamonds in Vegetable Market, Beware-Dogs, The Children of Pyre.

“Persistence Resistance: edge of visual narrative, as it is completely named, is a documentary film festival. In its fourth year, it came up with a new sub-title to draw attention to the independent documentary artists’ deep engagement with the narrative structure and cinema’s aesthetics, its language and form”, reads the second paragraph of preface of the hand book they gave us. Why I used such a discrete element from their two page long preface would be an obvious question. Well, these particular lines accurately define the event and its objective, so I thought, "I can’t begin in a better way".

I still  remember vividly every moment of the day. It was one such day in my journalism course that taught me more than last eighteen months classroom studies. Of course, my teachers would hate me for saying so, but with all due respect to each one of my “gurus”, I would like to justify my statement, by taking you straight to the day.

It was 9.30 in the morning when I, with two other friends, reached the IIC, at Lodhi Road. At the registration desk, we found two ladies, clad in traditional Indian Sarees, but (ironically) speaking fluent English. I was sure that we were going to witness something really special, particularly when one of them lit up a cigarette, and continued her conversation with the other lady. Without much adieu and after gaining all my courage and some good English words that my mind thought sounded stylish enough to be spoken to them, and with the most warm smile I ever gave anyone, I started enquiring about the festival, and the registration procedure. Soon I got a bolt from the blue. They required us to register online first, get a confirmation email, and then feel registered. All we knew was that some guy of our class has started up the “film-festival” conversation very casually and the rest forty of us had just joined in the long discussion that followed, to pass the remaining twenty five minutes of our class.

But we had to attend the festival. With passing time, people started coming, and unlike us, they were all registered. In fact, they didn’t need any registration as they were eminent and elite bunch of men and women, who were Directors, Writers, Photographers, Media personnel, or other intelligentsia. We started to feel out of place, but soon got comforted by seeing a hand full of students arrive. Two of them were from our college, and one of them was this guy, “hero” of yesterday’s class discussion but who seemed no less than a villain at this moment. But contrary to his appearance to us, he actually did some heroic, secret deal with some organisers, and we were allowed in.

Our hearts sank again as we entered the auditorium, the first film had already started. I asked a foreigner who was sitting behind me, about the duration of film we had missed, and she was kind enough to inform me that it had just begun. So, here began my actual expedition as I focused myself, and in my peculiar but unique gesture asked my friends not to disturb me. 

The movie was "My Mother India", by Safina Uberoi... A fantastic film set in the backdrop of modern Indian history, based on multicultural family, and how an event makes their lives a "survival task"...

My next post will give its review, so do visit again... 

(part II: http://writertj.blogspot.com/2011/04/persistence-resistance-part-ii-film.html)