Bengali Film review: Barun Babur Bondhu (2020)

In "Barun Babur Bondhu” (Barun Babu’s Friend) - who is the friend after all? The Godot-like President? The old footballer pal Suku? Or Captain Nemo?

Director Anik Dutta had wowed the intelligent Bengali film goer with “Bhooter Bhabisyat”. While the audience rolled in belly aching laughter to the wickedly witty dialogues, it was a scathing satire of the first order, in the genre of Ray's Hirak Rajar Deshe. Known to have taken on a Government ban on one of his satirical films, Dutta is a free thinker and true to how art should hold up a mirror to prevalent sociopolitical foibles.

“Barun Babur Bondhu” has an upright octogenarian as the pivotal protagonist, who was involved in the Naxal movement during the 70s Emergency. The plot circles aspects of his extended family and friends and how everyone is tired of his uncompromising ideology of self-reliance. Especially when he can use his influences in the upper political echelons and pull a few strings here and there for his children's benefit.

The film is inspired by Ramapada Chowdhury’s “Chaad”. Of course, for those who have read it, Somnath babu reappears in the form of Barun babu in the film. One great thing about Chowdhury’s stories is that they come with almost ready-made screenplays in their detailed stage direction/description. There are recognizable facets of Chowdhury himself in the character of Somnath/Barun too. Chowdhury had settled in Calcutta in the 1940s, to study English in Presidency College. He was more of a recluse like Barun, infrequent in social spaces like the canteen, where among others, Satyajit Ray and Siddhartha Sankar Roy (who became the Chief Minister of West Bengal) would engage in endless addas over cups of infusions. India’s Partition, the riots, the famine and the refugee crisis deeply affected Chowdhury, and it reflected in most of his work. Chowdhury concentrated on the urban middle class and their inner contradictions in his fiction, often imbuing his novels with photographic qualities that led to screen adaptations. “Banpalashir Padabali”, “Kharij”, “Ekdin Achanak”, “Ek Doctor Ki Maut” were all inspired by his stories.

In “Barun babu r Bandhu”, Barun sounds oddly like Chowdhury himself. Like Chowdhury, Barun too casts a dispassionate but probing eye on human weaknesses and foibles of society. One of Barun's old friends, Sukumar in the film (or Rameshwar from the original story) is played by Paran Bandyopadhyay. The veteran Paran perhaps inimitably exhibits in his histrionics everything that Barun is not. But while the fiction had hinged on the concept of one’s roof or one’s own house, the film keeps its focus on the missing “friend”, giving the film an entirely new theme. And if I may say this, the film title really would have better suited for the short story as well.

Dutta has created magic in the characters, more so in that of the grandson, Nemo, who was hardly a visible version as Biltu in the original story. And every time Nemo came on screen with questions like: “Dadu dhymna mane ki?” the theater hall erupted with laughter. Not as comic relief, but these episodes added another dimension to human relationships where the spectrum ranged between 8 and 80 in terms of age. And like Barun held a mirror to a younger generation shrinking in its selfish outlook, Nemo holds a mirror to the adult world, an older generation, which to him is marked with conspicuous contradictions.

The film has an ensemble that needs no review. Ritwik is the ever natural, with the rest of the cast doing perfect justice to their roles. The best thing I loved about the characterization is that the retired Barun doesn't stir sympathy but commands solid respect. Barun is curiously solitary, with zero patience for useless gabble. His bedridden wife keeps him scant company, while he spends his time reading, solving crosswords and writing letters to the editor. Not for once is he portrayed as the helplessly senile doddering senior citizen waiting for someone else to help him.

Soumitra Chatterjee has essayed a wide range of fatherly/grandfatherly characters of late. But in this new film, his character outshines all others. He walks the stage with a kingly spine of stainless steel, but an absolute foil to King Lear, another father, who had raised his daughters to be his old age insurance. Barun is a citizen of a nation, rapidly changing its face, where innocence can be found only in the questions of a child, where hidden agendas surface in the guise of sudden affections in others. Barun redefines concepts like patriotism with razor sharp mind seeing through the veneer of all who surround him. But he holds no grudge. He is your father, your Dadu, your Jethu, your Mesho, your Pisho – every man you have idolized in your youth.

You should certainly watch the movie if you want to remember how these men used to be. Or maybe some still are.

An Elegy written on a Spring Day in Quarantine

The old fridge is empty now, I observe

But the syrups and drops I must preserve.

The kitchen closet overflows with ration,

A wartime emergency warrants caution.

Hands feel dry, their knuckles and fingers itch.

All the oceans of Neptune’s a cheating ditch.

Out, damned spot! Fear won’t wipe its bloody stain

Beating the clout of the imagined pain.

Keep washing your hands, 20 seconds at least,

Lest the devil on your palm hold a fiery feast.

A sanitized world stares back from a window,

Hush! Softly speak, for I must be incognito.

Neighbors turn into ghostly absence,

Noisy elevator their only cadence

Of their guilty presence. Whispering footfalls.

Other times I see roaming antiseptic overalls.

It’s been a fortnight that a name and a number

Have surfaced with a deathly halo in my chamber

A nomenclature that makes not much tragic sense

But it’s vivid, livid, a crawling covid breaking defense

In an absurd world where symptom alone speaks

To masked medics looking like astronaut freaks.

My bed is my battlefield, blood leaks as sweet sticky sweat

But I must not go out, for I myself pose a violent threat.

The power! O the power in my breath, my saliva -

To annihilate the universe in a whiff like Shiva!

I will tell you this Covid guy is only 19 years old,

Yet look how he’s gotten the whole world on hold.

Where lungs are crying out aloud for help,

Where drugs induce a stupor-enabled yelp

Of listless living until ventilators run out of life,

Of a handful of isolated humans, who will survive

This attack as a measure to heal and regrow

And maybe all that was good will again flow.

It’s a pandemic, solemn news anchors on TV say

I hear my own gurgling laughter to my utter dismay.

Hunger is an epidemic that kills millions as well

Choosing its preys from the poor man’s cell.

Covid, such a good boy, doesn’t favor the poor alone,

He comes for the rich, makes them wail and groan.

But look, the fighting has stopped outside,

And no one asks what religion is your tribe.

When violence spreads like wildfire, you call it a riot,

Why not call it a ‘pandemic’ you pious moron, you fascist bigot?

You were born of this man-made epidemic of conformity,

Othering every ‘different’ face to classified deformity.

There’s time still to take that enzyme prescribed

The potion that quells greed, the syrup prepared

To kill your claim to superiority;

To immunize against feelings of legitimate authority.

Make haste, gulp it down in one long big swig,

And quietly go to sleep, before the cemetery is dig.

–----------------------------------------------

Disclaimer: I have not tested positive for Corona but I have written this poem from the perspective of a patient.

Deities of a different order

If you have ever sat your ample butt on the front seat of an auto rickshaw in Kolkata, you would know how it feels like swinging half a cheek in the air. I was thinking of how dramatically I was hanging by a thread from life as I rode listening to Kumar Sanu singing through his nostrils “Priyotoma mone rekho”. 

The auto driver was singing along. Tiny black sound boxes were making good music too. I was impressed with the interior décor of the tiny automobile. Stickers with hearts pierced with arrows on the front glass. The ledge along the windshield had plastic floral creepers. Bright red hibiscus peeked from the artificial shrub. Red gossamer cloths laced with golden tinsel were tied to the rear view mirror handles. The roof had imprints of Mithun da and Amitabh Bachhan lined up for attention. As the auto crossed Bagha Jatin, the driver stopped and did a brisk pennam (an act of touching your hands to your forehead as a mark of respect). I looked around for temples but found none. I couldn’t contain my curiosity.

“Dada kake pronaam korlen?”
(Who did you offer your regards to?)

I am sure the genuine interest must have touched my face and hence his core, for he replied:

“Oi je Bidyasagar, tarpore Bibekananda, statue dekhlen na? Ami thakur pronam kori na, eder kori. Kora uchit kina apni bolun? Aaj abar Guru Purnima kina.”

(Oh, that Vidyasagar, then Vivekananda, didn’t you notice the statues? I don’t bow before gods, I bow before these men. You tell me, should I not? Today is Guru Purnima too.)

So if you are in the city and ever pass the stretch of Raja S C Mullick Road, you must notice the sculptures along the boulevard or whatever remains of it. They are nothing life-size or impressive, but homely busts of two men from an era we have almost forgotten. I have passed them often without so much of an attention to them. Never cared to look to see if the likeness was commendable or if the humble tribute made any sense to pedestrians nearby. With my auto-driver friend greeting the busts with such reverence, I was rather shamed by my own indifference.

But the good thing is, I followed suit and did a baby salute to these stoned men of yore.

You never stop learning, do you?

Courtesy: Internet

Rain Swag Dashed

Walking solo in the rain has a streak of the theatrical inherent in it. Or so I thought. Here I was walking, trying to save my steps from the muddy puddle traps that the dimpled road and the monotony rain had made. Come to think of it, every rain has a tone of its own - jhomjhom, tiptip, toptop. So today's tiptip rain had this tonality to make me super bored. With Ma and Babuji, there wasn't much action to be had indoors.

Courtesy: Internet

Ma had snuggled up for 30 minutes of teletrash - Ichhenodee - a lachrymose bangla soap that hinges on preposterous family politics. Babuji had his bi-focals focused ardently on Shibram Chokkoti omnibus. Gorging on deep fried chocolate momos, I had the guilt quotient rising high on the calorie scale.

So here I was all set, in a jogger's habit, a pair of squeaky clean trainers, Apple music blasting Men's health jingles into my feminine ears, to rock the world of cardio. I did well for 4 rounds, which kind of measures up to 400m*4= 1.6 kms. The tiptip rain had managed to soak my flimsy sports vest and my curls had delicate rivulets running down their strands. Then I changed tracks on Apple to listen to 30 greatest hits of Ghulam Ali and Mehdi Hassan. Minutes later I found myself sitting on a wet bench. On a grassy patch.

A mongoose peeked out of a nearby shrub and looked at me before writing me off as a pathologically boring specimen of life and quickly leaving for more interesting pursuits. I remained stationed there and imagined listening to Hassan Sahab live. I am good at visualizing the impossible, mostly comical ones, so here I was, eyes shut, nodding virulently to the sonorous baritone until I felt a light tap on my shoulder. Looking up, I saw a concerned pair of eyes looking deep into mine. The bald pate shone with the garden lights reflecting on it. For a second I thought Hassan Saab had rejected the joys of Jannat to descend upon a rain drenched Ghazal aficionado. I felt my lips stretch into a smiley curve about to break into: Arre aap?

Then the T-shirt and the pair of denims caught my attention as did the closed umbrella dripping with water. I realised it was pasher barir kaku (next-door neighbour uncle). Kaku had obviously found me swooning to the singsong rain; he did not notice the headphones of course. He thought I was having some sort of seizures and had come to rescue me.

"Thik acho toh? Bhijcho keno? Bari jao!"
(Are you alright? Why are you soaking in the rain? Go home!)

And I scooted into the rain, blushing a deep beetroot red. Like I said, life always refused to give me the little pleasures that I sought and gave me anticlimaxes like these instead.

Pasher barir kaku had robbed my rain of all drama today!

Finding College Street in the Old Man's House Gate, Amsterdam

If you are from Kolkata and looking for a bit of the old College Street in Amsterdam, you have to visit the Oudemanhuispoort or the Old Man House Gate or simply The Gate. 

While our tour guide, Jacob took a sharp turn and disappeared into the doors between the Oudezijds Achterburgwal and Kloveniersburgwal near the Staalstraat, we stood looking deep into the muddy canal water - just to see if there was any sign of the drowned bicycles Jacob was mentioning. The group of tourists that Jacob was in charge of was a diverse set of humans with only two things in common – they were all very tall (excluding me) and all spoke English as their native language (again, excluding me). The fact that they were all intrigued by Amsterdam is a given, so I do not count that shared interest. Armed (?) with long legs, they all walked ahead of us. 

Midget Bangalis, me and my friend had to run and catch up with them every time. And most of the times, we were too lost in our admiration of the sights and sounds to even realize that we had been left behind.

So we ran after them again. Only this time, the scene that greeted us inside the large heavy doors was something slightly familiar. Bookshops. In carts, in cabinets, in makeshift stalls by the road. We had come to a unique book market inside a college square! A closer look revealed that most of the books were secondhand. Two steps ahead, we approached a covered alleyway smelling of weed and old paper. We had entered the Gate!

The Gate dates from 1602 and the building inside has been remodeled several times. The place served as a hospital for poor old men and women. In 1786, the walkway was turned into a covered alley (just behind the gates we entered) with eighteen little shops for rent to gold and silver smiths. They were called ‘winkelkasten’ (‘winkel’= shop and ‘kasten’ = cabinet) because they were too small for a shop and too big for a cabinet. In 1879 when the nearby ‘Botermarkt’ (Butter market) was shut down the book merchants from that place 
restarted their book business in one of the ‘winkelkasten’ in The Gate. Since 1879 the Oudemanhuispoort is home to Amsterdam’s best known daily book market. And in 1880 the University of Amsterdam claimed it as its own.

Here, you'd rub shoulders with University of Amsterdam professors thumbing through volumes of Homer and Nietzsche. On week days you'd find students leafing through cheaper versions of revised latest editions. Some would end up buying, some just spend the day browsing. We saw a few locals buying. And the rest were tourists like us. Most books are in Dutch, though quite a few were English editions. Like we found and bought Salinger and Murakami (translated :) ). Five euros for a book. And mine was a present. 

The book sellers looked as ancient as the Gate themselves. Silver haired, wrinkles lacing their smiles and frowns, they looked like fairy god fathers waiting to weave their magic spell on you. And what magic theirs was!

There is an interesting but a sad story about one of the popular booksellers in the Gate, Barend Boekman (1869-1942). In 1939 he celebrated his seventieth birthday, along with his fiftieth anniversary as a book trader in the Gate with his fellow booksellers. But he was a Jewish Dutch at the wrong place and the wrong time. Along with 100.000 Dutch Jews, Barend Boekman and his wife were deported to the German concentration camps. Both died in the gas chambers of Auschwitz on September 14, 1942. 

Menno Hertzberger(1897-1982), another Dutch Jewish bookseller, who survived the Second World War has written Barend's story in a small book, “Barend Boekman van de Oudemanhuispoort” (Amsterdam, 1955) to remember and celebrate the life and time of Barend.

The book, I hear, is now a collector’s item. 

A dead bird. A lesson of a life time.

“Ma, will he live?”

“Let’s hope he sang his sweetest and flew high and free all his life. Something we cannot even imagine doing.”

“Why do you say it like that?”

How do you tell a hopeful child that a bird he had hoped to save had just breathed its last in the ball of your palm? How do you introduce death as a finality to a small person who is just starting out his life?

Well, you don’t. Because life is the smartest teacher of all and has a way of handling such unanswerable questions. So although mothers are supposed to know it all, sometimes silence is the best response to uncomfortable questions they cannot tackle. Like I did this morning, when I knew, our little bird was beyond help.

***************************

We were out on our morning walk today, when we spotted a bird, fluttering its feet up in the air, in a bush tucked under a tree. It appeared to be in pain and when I picked it up, a passer-by said: “Shot kheyeche, bnachbe na” (meaning, the bird had been electrocuted by a naked wire over the tree, where it was apparently sitting and will not live). Another guy, who was on a bicycle and had stopped to see what it was all about, said with a wise nod, “Ektu jol deen toh, dekhun bnache kina” (meaning, give it some water, see if it helps).

There was a tube well right next to where the bird had fallen. Ishaan pushed the handle hard and pumped out some water. Using my fingers I managed to drip drops into its tiny beak.

“Let’s take him home, ma. We have a dropper, right, which we use to give Neopeptin to Gabloo? We can use it to give him more water. Once he gets better, we will set him free.”

“OK, but we would have to break into a run then. We must be quick. Can you match my pace?”

As we ran, the bird cried out. A few times. I have never felt the tender warmth of a bird on my skin before. It was soft, fluffy, and I could still feel the life running through it. It was so tiny and so smooth, that you wanted to protect it. You wanted to shield it with all your might. As it chirped, our hopes rose. It must be getting better.

Soon afterwards, its head fell on one side and the eyelids drew into a closed yellow shutter. It was over. I knew.

I still ran. I never felt so cheated, so humiliated in my life. Helpless too. Here we were proud humans, pretending to act saviour to a dying bird. How dare he die on us, how dare he sneak past our efforts like that? How was I supposed to face my child? How would I tell him that I could not salvage the little bird’s life, he had so fondly rescued?

We reached home. I am sure death has a smell of its own, for Gabloo, who runs to me, every time I come home and begs to be picked up, stood still watching me carry the bird in.

“Didi, pakhi ta toh more geche” was Moonmoon’s verdict.

I watched my son’s eyes as they gradually welled up. Wordless tears rolled down his flushed cheeks. Despite all the ultimate conclusions being drawn around him, I saw him quietly pick up the plastic dropper. He tried to force the stiff beaks apart to dribble in some water into the dead mouth but soon realized that it was of no use any more. 

He asked me if he could take a picture of the bird to remember him by.

Then asked me if we could bury him with dignity. I nodded a yes.

Together we went downstairs, hand in hand. We buried the little singing bird. Wrapped in a fresh clean tissue roll. Somewhere, where no one will ever trample him, no one will walk over his sacred grave.

I do not know if it was co-incidence or providence, but we had gathered a few Shiuli flowers in the early hours of our walk today. Never knew the flowers would come to such great use.

To honour our little guest. His visit was short. But he had made for some unforgettable memories for a mother and her child.

Eid Mubaraq, everyone!

Let’s celebrate the gift of life – as long as we have it.

Hair colour, here she comes!

There is a beauty parlour right outside my society gate. I have seen it grow from a modest single room affair to a three-cabin luxury, if you will. I am an old patron. I land at their glass doorstep for a random hair-oil massage, a quick pedicure or that odd facial. I am habitually slipshod about skin and hair care and my most frequent beauty treatment is a shampoo at their salon. Especially during the winter months. Feels nice to lean my head back, rest my shoulders on the padded backrest, shut my eyes and feel the warm jet of water caress my head before dollops of shampoo work up the lather.

The technicians have a way with their fingers, I must say. They press the right spots on your temples, pull the right strands of hair, twist them with the right pressure. And they have one more way of therapy available for those willing – they keep you awake with their constant chatter. As I told you, it is a humble haunt for women who aren’t willing to travel too far and wide for services locally available at affordable rates. Definitely not a place for posh socialites. And unless it is a month away from Durga Puja, and every woman wants to look her best, you won’t find the place too crowded.

I am an avid and shameless nosher of human conversation, not that I intentionally eavesdrop or anything. But when there are words flying around to catch and cuddle, I don’t let the chance slip. I think the same goes for them. They draw their energy from the women they have been trying to beautify for ages now. Naturally they ask a lot of questions. Unassuming, unpretentious, and unboring, they lack the typical sophistication of the beauticians at the classy spas who talk in whispers and never look into your eyes. They will ask you how long have you been married, was it a love marriage, how many kids did you bring to the world, where do you work, what do you do. I have always fuelled their curiosity with more than the information they have asked for. Indulging them to ask more. They have readily given in, with encouraged smiles.

The little salon is a stage set for drama of all kinds. Petty jealousies have unfurled between the girls before my eyes, professional rivalries breaking out - "Why does she sit all day when I work my ass off? Why can't she bring me the wax before I ask for it? Why didn't anyone shut the fridge door properly?" Sometimes I have heard unsavoury gossip about someone they commonly know, also witnessed a genuine camaraderie between some of them, smelled the home-cooked food they had brought for lunch in steel tiffin carriers, neatly arranged at the top of the little white refrigerator that stores gels and creams. Over a period of time, I have grown a strange sense of familiarity with the gang of girls.

After all, these are the women that you let touch yourself.

Hair, nail, skin.

And possibly your deepest sense of being women and belonging together to a tribe of workers.

So when my mother complained that her hennaed hair was all lacklustre after a long hospital stay and that her well earned greys were all showing, I decided to take her to the girls for a treat. I think it is good to mention here that my mother has never been to a beauty salon before. I must also quickly run to add that she was vehemently opposed to the idea that I take her to one for services, which would not only dig an unnecessary hole into her daughter’s purse but also infuse the world with deadly carcinogens. The henna that she has been using on her hair was all natural, she insisted, plucked from her own garden, mashed in her mixer and applied with a blue flat brush. With of course, my father supervising.

Also, having lost a lot of weight, she was suddenly conscious of strangers. But I stood my ground and took her in. The girls at the parlour were forewarned of her arrival and they were ready with all possible colour catalogues for the hair. After rejecting all the shades, declaring all as uncouthly garish, Ma sat down with a frown, silently fuming at my reflection in the mirror facing her:

“I told you, this is not a place for me”.

I saw panic in the girls’ eyes. I saw one of the senior technicians pick up a mobile and run out of the parlour. Shortly thereafter, walked in the owner of the place, sweaty and obviously hassled. She was busy preparing for the Janmashtami puja at her house, when she had got this SOS call from her assistant. With the patience of Job, she catered to my mother herself, asking Aunty-ji what exactly she wanted. My mother explained in broken Hindi that she wanted her hair to look as natural as possible, but not in any shade of black. Stirring in two different colours in a plastic bowl, the good lady had finally and confidently found a hair hue miracle.

My mother sat through the 40 minutes with a grimace. I was looking at the clock and telling my racing heart to stop acting up. After all, even if she hated the colour, she could never hate me, now could she, her last born? But with the Sanyals, you never know. We are a clan of raging ancients. We belong to an era when righteous anger was considered noble and an honest annoyance never disguised in phony smiles! So I was taking a huge risk and I knew it. All I said out loud was:

“Ma, we can always re-do if you don’t like it, right?”

Which was again greeted with a stony silence. The minutes hung heavy like wet clothes on a weak line. The good lady who had mixed the colour and supervised the application, was now standing near the wash basin to see the results. She was wiping her forehead repeatedly. Two air conditioners were fanning us with all their chilly might.

Soon, the colour had all drained away and there my mother sat with a wet mop of mane, trying to get a glance into the mirror and take stock of the disaster. She got ready to exclaim and chastise my foolish decision. I did not give her that chance. I screamed:

“Ma, you look so fabulous! Who would think you have been so critically ill!”

The girls knew their cue too.

“Mashima, bhishon bhalo lagche! The hair looks all natural too!”

They chorused in perfect unison. Suddenly the salon was filled with complimentary chatter and mother was looking all confused and unsure. Two of the girls flipped out a pair of blow-dryers and positioned themselves behind my mother’s chair. They attacked her tresses with the same alacrity with which James Bond aims his guns. My mother’s reaction:

“I don’t like it at all. It is too dark for my age.”

When she was leaving, the girls asked my mother the secret to her flawless skin at this age. My mother turned and answered:

"Coconut oil. All through the year. Not the stuff you sell here."

Well, friends, here she is, with her hair braided in a homely fashion.

A woman, who has never worn any make up, never had a beauty treatment in her life. Tell me honestly, would you say she has been fighting for her life in the ITU, pipes and channels dug into her body to help her make it through?

Isn't she beautiful, my mother?