Director Arun Kuckreja has come up with a film that talks about the beauty of the Ganga. He tells S Mallik that the movie has been inspired by the nobility of the Indian woman
It is not easy to capture the essence and beauty of the mighty Ganga in 17 minutes. But director Arun Kuckreja has been successful in doing so in his film Ganga. He has associated the many moods and the facets of the river with grace and elegance of the Indian woman in the film. The filmmaker has simultaneously finished two other films — Bittoo which is a semi autobiography and Mohabbati which portray a happy relationship between a director and his actress.
The idea of Ganga came to him after he read a poem by Maya Angelou, comparing a woman to a river. “The poem described how a woman must flow like a river and that she must always be herself,” said the director and added, “People talk about feminism all the time and I thought of presenting the Ganga in the form of a woman. The river is said to sustain life and I could easily relate it to the image of a woman.” Subsequently he was also inspired by the paintings of artist Raja Ravi Verma whose muse was a lady and Raj Kapoor’s depiction of Mandakini in his movie Ram Teri Ganga Maili. “Even Jawaharlal Nehru talked about Ganga. So, it was but natural for me to draw the parallel,” he said. Maulshri Shukla Rajdhan is the face of Ganga in the movie.
The movie depicts the fluctuating moods of a woman. And he does this with his poem narrated by Sam Mathews. “The poem is an allegory of a woman and her feelings,” explained the director. Although Maulshri is the face of Ganga, it is Kathak exponent Asavari Pawar who has essayed the multiple roles of Ganga and Yamuna through her dance. Running parallel to Kuckreja’s poem, there is a recorded narration of Nehru’s poem by his sister Vijaya lakshmi Pandit.
The movie opens with a visual aalap. “Just like every song has aalap, I wanted my film to begin with one, too, because I feel that the movie is very lyrical,” he said. Kuckreja has used Ravi Shankar’s music, which is based on the theme of the river and also Bismillah Khan’s shehnai rendition of raga Gunkali. As a director he is familiar with the relationship between a director and an actor. “That is why I have directed Mohabbati which depicts no sadness or lament. The movie is about a happy occasion of the union of a director and and his actress,” said Kuckreja.
Bittoo, on the other hand, is a semi autobiography where the director has added a bit of his life into the character of the protagonist Kalyan Sundaram. He said, “Kalyan is a person who has done charity work all his life. He is adopted by actor Rajinikanth and the story revolves around how his life moves on from there.”