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Hindustan Times

Pradip Kurbah: 'Major OTT platforms don't even consider screening our films'

In the film, what is it that prevents the six protagonists from migrating to urban areas despite having a very tough, isolated and secluded life in their village? Before working on this script, I explored many villages in Meghalaya where I found some villagers, who, despite leading very tough lives, have decided against migrating to the cities. They are so emotionally connected to their land that they are worried about what would happen to the region if they moved out. Many of these natives have seen their neighbours moving out for better opportunities and in some cases, even their children have gone away, but still their connection to the entire space holds them back to their roots. There is an interesting motif of a choir group that appears whenever somebody is close to death. What was the idea behind the linkage? For me, the choir in the film is a very personal element. It was not actually a creative decision. It came from memories and emotions because I've experienced silence and sound in our Khasi Hills. And in the culture of Khasis, choral singing is more than just music; it's a part of our spiritual life, social life, mourning, and celebrations. It is connected to how we share sorrow, how we find comfort, how we speak when words fall short. I remember how these voices would fill the space during funerals, quiet evenings in church, or even during moments when no one knew what to say, and often these voices stayed with me, like echoes. For me, they are the connection between the living and the dead, the seen and the unseen. In the film, they embody the spirits of the past, of the land, of the people we have lost. They can be seen guiding the viewer through this emotional landscape. And as for the characters who witness them before death takes them away, they are like angels. Please take me through the film's cinematography and visual language. We shot the film with a Blackmagic Pocket Cinema camera. For indie filmmakers like us, we cannot even think of using high-end cameras or fancy equipment. We used a gimbal for hand-held shots. While writing the script, I was very sceptical and worried about the whole visual approach because I didn't want to go for cuts. I wanted very long takes to capture the feeling of isolation. I felt that if we frequently cut, we might lose the whole sense of the vast landscape. So, my team and I decided to make a short film first to explore what we had in mind. That's how we made Path, which went on to win the Second-Best Film at IDSFFK in 2022. Then it traveled to Taipei and Greece. That's how we got the confidence to extend our visual approach to Ha Lyngkha Bneng. The cinematographer Pradip Daimary and I were clear right from the beginning that we wanted to avoid close or tight shots. We wanted to stay wide to allow the characters to exist within the environment in a way that visually expresses their emotions. Are there any filmmakers who have influenced your approach when it comes to wide landscape shots and languid visuals? To tell you frankly, I was initially very much inclined towards commercial films. I could not even imagine a film without songs and all my initial works were mainstream in nature. It was not until I met fellow Meghalayan filmmaker Dominic Sangma that I was introduced to an entirely different kind of cinema. Then, I met a very promising filmmaker from Sikkim called Tribeny Rai, who has just completed her first feature now. They both asked me to watch the films of Bela Tarr, Nuri Bilge Ceylan and the works of Iranian masters. I realised that this was real cinema. And also, when I saw Dominic's first film, (2018), I was so impressed by it. Being a self-taught filmmaker, you learn only by watching other films and listening to the filmmakers talk about their work. How do you raise funding for your films, considering you're an indie film maker? How much went into making this film, and what is the process of recovering the investment? For films like these, we rely on the collective funds of the cast, crew, family members and friends. Ha Lyngkha Bneng was made for about ₹70 lakhs. It's a challenge to recover the money poured in. We just have two theatres in Shillong and getting films screened here is so difficult for us. So, I decided that rather than screening, let's travel and take our films to all the rural places and screen them. That's the best way to recover the investment. With this film, I did approach the government of Meghalaya because they have come out with their own OTT platform to support local filmmakers. They have agreed to support our film. But still, recovering our money will take a lot of time. As for the major OTT platforms, they will not even consider it. That's sad. I was assuming that with the popularity of Rima Das' Village Rockstars (2017) on Netflix, major OTT platforms might now be interested in films from the Northeast. I had made a National Award-winning film called Onaatah: Of the Earth (2016), which was picked by Netflix. They streamed it for three years. The late Satish Kaushik saw the film and bought the rights to it and remade it into Marathi. Later in 2019, after I won the Kim Jiseok Award at Busan for my film Market, I approached Netflix again, but this time they rejected the film. I approached other platforms as well and was turned down as they wanted stars or 'recognizable' actors in the film. Ha Lyngkha Bneng does not have any songs. The only music in the film is the choir songs and a few English songs sung by the characters. Did you grow up listening more to English songs, or was the native Khasi music also part of the culture? Yes, Khasi music is very much part of our culture, but we have been very much influenced by Western music. I've used some old Khasi songs previously that are not available on any platform. I sourced them from the All India Radio as those songs had been recorded there itself. Apart from Western songs, we have been heavily influenced by Bollywood songs also. What's happening with the Kelvin Cinema Festival in Meghalaya? Dominic Sangma and I put up two editions in 2022 and 2023, respectively. Then we thought of doing the third edition and suddenly the main people who were behind us backed out because there was no support from the government. We then tried to approach the government, but things are so difficult. Let's hope we can resume it again as the festival was a great way of bringing together small films from the Northeast. Unfortunately, the discourse on cinema from the Northeast is thin. I'm acquainted with the work of Jahnu Barua, Dominic Sangma, Bhaskar Hazarika, Lakshmipriya Devi, and a few others. Tell me some more good films. Manipuri filmmaker Haobam Paban Kumar's Loktak Lairembee (2016) is an amazing film. Then there's another lovely work from Manipur called Our Home (2022) by Romi Meitei. Keep an eye out for Shape of Momo by Tribeny Rai. It'll be travelling to film festivals soon. What kind of films do you want to make in the near future, and what kind of cinema culture do you wish to foster in Meghalaya? I always tell young and budding filmmakers from Meghalaya that it is very important for us to tell our own stories. Don't focus on what others are doing. We have such a unique and rich culture. As for me, I want to continue making the kind of films I have been making — human stories about our folks. I'm currently working on the script of my next project, which deals a lot about mental health as that's a major issue we are facing nowadays out here. Whenever I go to a crowded place or somewhere and I look at the faces of people, I see every individual looking so lonely. I don't know why, and this is more so, especially after COVID. People here have this fear of being left alone and that is creeping inside the people in cities, too. There was a time in Shillong when we knew our neighbours very well and would talk, discuss and also share our food. But nowadays, that kind of bonding has completely gone. And social media has only aggravated the problem. People are so lost in their mobile phones that real conversations rarely happen. The sense of feeling and isolation has increased more. In Ha Lyngkha Bneng, I've tried to show that despite being set in the future, the characters are leading a very old-school way of life without technology. As a result, they have to rely on each other, and it is because of real communication between them that they have such a strong bonding despite not being connected by blood. Arun AK is an independent journalist. Twitter: @arunusual