Master Class
Noted documentary filmmaker Cyrus Bharucha talks about the business of telling stories
Like almost all top-notch personalities in the movie business — apart from actors,obviously — noted documentary filmmaker Cyrus Bharucha was dressed for comfort on Sunday morning,at the documentary-making workshop hosted by the British Library,Pune. He carried himself with easy grace,his formal speech and manners contradicting his dimpled smile.
On the second day of the workshop,which was held over the weekend,Bharucha decided to showcase parts of his Emmy-nominated documentary Fireworks! with George Plimpton. The documentary,which late journalist George Plimpton hosted,looks at how 11 countries in the world treat pyrotechnics differently. One of the stark examples in the documentary was the south Indian city of Sivakasi,which started with making matchboxes and later forayed into making fireworks.
Switching off the projector,Bharucha talked about a range of subjects — from the role of the producer in films,importance of editing,issues with copyright,the length of Indian films and the importance of background score in any film. “The role of the film producer in Bollywood,and that of one in the West are very different from each other. In India,it has traditionally been limited to ‘the chap with the bundle of notes’,” said Bharucha. “But actually,it’ s the producer who conceptualises the entire project. He hires the director,camera person,crew and actors. And it is the producer,who walks up to pick up the trophy,when his project wins the best film award,” he said.
Bharucha went on to talk about Bollywood being director-driven. “This is where problems with the length of the movie and the stretched-out songs occur. I often spoke to filmmakers such as Raj Kapoor and Dev Anand about this. And their reply was,‘The Indian audience goes to the cinema to escape from their dreary lives.’ I see their point,but hope that something would change. One of course,can’t argue with success,’ added Bharucha,who was a producer for the award-winning program Mid-Week,where he covered events around the world. Over the last 40 years he has worked with PBS,CNN and BBC London among other companies. He was also the CEO of the first Indian station in the US called TV ASIA.
Bharucha concedes that things are now changing. “Producers such as Ronnie Screwvala and Aamir Khan are very good. I also saw the movie Madras Cafe. It was serious and well made. I was also pleasantly surprised by the minimum use of songs and background score,” he says.
In the workshop,Bharucha also focussed on the steps of filmmaking such as subject,plan,research,script,shooting,editing,funding,storyboard and distribution,among others. Bharucha showcased three documentaries over the weekend — Floods and Politics in Pakistan and Sinatra the Dark Star apart from Fireworks!
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