Whatever anxiety one may have before meeting an intellectual giant always vanished the moment Shyam Benegal smiled at you. I had met him before and had chatted away happily for hours, sharing his Weltanschauung. A week in Perth with him was enlightening as we talked about cinema and philosophy, politics and the mind, and even got caught in a glamour-struck audience who treated him like “Stardust,” in his own words. I provoked him greedily to make him talk and learn from him.
But this day was a bit different, like being in a classroom and appearing for a test. I was about to give him a small book of my own writing on Gandhi, seeking his views. Anyways, all the butterflies in my stomach had quietened as he flipped the pages, and we started off with Anna Hazare and the fallacy or advantages of such a movement.
Let me confess, I appeared more cynical to myself than he did. He said that after 1942, no such movement had happened in India with public participation, and as people needed an idea, Janlokpal became that idea.
As I pointed out the risk of people shunning their own responsibility and blaming the politicians only for corruption, he pointed out the same thing happening with Gandhi.
We went on through the evening, and I got a perspective and lesson in optimism. Having met another intellectual who was a bit frustrated in his old age and was either in constant cribbing (for not having enough recognition, being from a small town) or self-eulogizing, I realized that never for once was Shyam Benegal rejecting in his response.
Rather, in a therapist-style disclosure, he narrated his story. How, from a small town in Andhra, he was lucky to have been in a time in history where his college had intellectuals and artists visiting, and how his thinking evolved. When he landed in Bombay, he was radical and willing to try out his own style (he had independence at home. His father was liberal and never said no but with the rider that he had to stand on his own feet with no fallback).
In spite of the disadvantage of not being from the elite or the film industry, he could stick to his rules.
On being asked how the bug of cinema really got in…
Shyam: “It transports me to a world of my creation, whether in contact with reality or not.”
He went on to explain his continuous learning, like the arm’s length rule from an actress—the rule of human interaction where people decide the distance and position from the ‘other’ depending on the level of intimacy. He added that his assistants often wonder how he could shoot without any agitation on the sets.
His grammar is perfect, and he himself gets jarred when he sees incompatible grammar in a scene. This, he says, is like not being able to write a sentence—partially due to the impact of TV, which does not have perspective and fiddles with close-ups, etc., without looking at the whole.
Continuity is rare in TV, whereas cinema requires perspective and grammar. A scene can be broken, but not without need and not due to a lack of perspective.
As in cubism, says Shyam, where Picasso created an illusion to make the mind see all aspects at one time. But in postmodernism, the attention is deficient, and images are out of perspective and context.
Quoting Derrida, he added that once something has been written or produced, it is just a template on which people build according to their thoughts and fantasy, and how intellectual property rights are a paradox.
Discovering Shakespeare in the plays, Shyam also defined classicism as whatever is done to the template, the ‘perennial’ remains.
The human constant can never be missed in the classic.
Amidst all the discussions, he shifted to his (I guess!) favourite extracurricular—food.
And I told him he was a true foodie. While relishing taste, he could teach about the culinary details.
Even his criticisms were educative.