Hrishikesh Mukherjee | Cinema of Life | Statesmen

Very few people have championed the art of realistic cinema the way Hrishi Da did. When today we envision a realistic movie, we see dark movies with feel of gloom, pain and sometimes even gore. Real world is not always gloomy. Real people try to handle things in very simple ways. Hypocrisy is not so common as shown by some of the directors today. Circumstances are not always so bad. It has become quite a trend to rip off an non-hindi movie, put the protagonist in slums and add some double meaning sleaze, and pass it off as realistic cinema.

Hrishi Da interpretation of people and their sensibilities can be attributed to his humble upbringing in Calcutta (now Kolkata). He also worked as a teacher for some time. His middle class life and experiences as a teacher reflects in his work. His education of cinema got the patronage of B.N. Sircar, Subodh Mitter and Bimal Roy. Bimal Roy had a strong influence on his though process and cinematic works. He was a part of crew of Do Bigha Zameen and Devdas. Under mentorship of Roy, Hrishi Da started his career ad director with movie Musafir. It was not a success. However his second movie Anari gathered lots of acclaim and attention.

People appreciated the sensitive treatment of his stories woven around simple characters and ordinary circumstances. Be it emotional attachment of doctor and patient (Anand), relationship between Industrialist and employee friends (Namak Haraam), falling relationship between successful wife and no-longer-successful husband (Abhimaan) or a man trying hard to remain honest in a corrupt world (Satyakam), he presented each of them in a very honest way. Subtle spurts of comedy was his specialty. Those little doses were very prominent in even his serious works and were actually his USP to some extent.

Among the people born in 80s and 90s, his comedy movies were more popular than those with a serious vein. Gol Maal, Naram Garam, Bawarchi, Kisi Se Na Kehna, Chupke Chupke etc. are still loved by masses. These movie had a simple plot with a small innocent deceit as a ploy. The circumstances would lead to situations where natural reactions would evoke comedy. Noted director Basu Chatterjee also adopted this style very well.

Hrishi Da is remembered as one of the most respected movie maker of Indian cinema and his contribution will keep on bringing smiles on the face of his viewers

Written By: Sujoy Ghosh