The loving bond between a book seller and the nin-year-old boy was shown through the movie ‘Haathi Ka Anda’. The movie was screened here on Thursday at Madhya Pradesh State Tribal Museum. The movie was screened under the regular Children’s film screening Ullas.
Directed by Arun Khopkar, the film features Irrfan Khan and Parzaan Dastur in the lead roles. The movie surrounds the story of friendship between Parzaan and Irrfan. The movie was selected for 50th Indian Panaroam India 2003.
Nine year old Kintoo’s friend is an elderly bookseller-cum-restorer, Baba. One day Baba tells Kintoo about his grandfather’s library and his favourite book among them all – Arabian Nights – the book whose story never ends. Kintoo is fascinated. When he visits his uncle’s house in the village, he discovers a tattered copy of Arabian Nights, matching Baba’s description.
Kintoo now aspires to take the book to Baba. However this seems as impossible a task as an elephant trying to lay an egg. Would Kintoo be able to achieve the impossible was the rest of the story which was really enjoyed by the children.
Writer, director, producer, film scholar, teacher and actor, Arun Khopkar is an FTII alumnus. He has made many short and documentary film, a few feature films, has extensively lectured on aesthetics and cinema and written books on cinema. His films have won him many awards nationally and globally and have also travelled to festivals across the world. Many of his films are on the music, dance, painting, architecture and literary traditions of India. He is also a prolific writer on cinema and its history and teacher of cinema aesthetics.