Satyajit Ray films overcome war hurdle, reach Moscow

KOLKATA: Satyajit Ray's films might have faced various challenges while being made, but this was the first time that they were confronted with war.

The ongoing Russian-Ukraine war made it difficult for six Ray films to be transported to the 44th Moscow International Film Festival (MIFF), the same festival that had awarded an "honorable prize" to Ray, Luis Bunuel and Akira Kurosawa, along with others, in 1979. The impasse was finally resolved when the festival authorities contacted the embassy for transporting the Digital Cinema Packages (DCP)s.

Most producers rely on couriers to transfer the digital files of films for festival screenings abroad. Sometimes technical laboratories, who have associates all over the world, also assist in deliveries. But no major courier company seemed willing to take the risk of transporting the DCPs of 'Charulata', 'Mahanagar', 'Kapurush', 'Mahapurush', 'Nayak' and 'Joi Baba Felunath' to Moscow amid the war. However, no way the films' producers could back out as they were contract-bound to send the DCPs to the festival. "We had signed the contract in January. That was before the war began. The earlier dates were from April 21 to April 28," said Varsha Bansal, who helms the worldwide distribution of RDB films that produced all these six films.

The festival will begin on August 26 and end on September 2. "But no courier company or technical lab was willing to transport the DCPs. We were in a fix. When everyone refused to deliver, we communicated it to the festival. They instantly understood the situation and were thankful that we were agreeable to honour the contract if they could take care of the delivery from India," said Bansal.

The DCPs were finally picked up by the embassy from Bansal's Mumbai office in early August and delivered to Moscow. The official website of MIFF has also uploaded their names in the segment, titled 'Song of Indian Roads'. This title takes its name from Ray's 'Song of the Road'. "On a few occasions in the past five-six years, I had the pleasure of meeting Kirill Razlogov. He was an ardent admirer of Ray, Russian film critic, cultural anthropologist and a former program director of MIFF. He always spoke about wanting to pay tributes to Ray. He passed away in September last year. His dream is now being fulfilled," Bansal said.

Cinephiles, however, have doubts. When a country is fighting a war, will there be viewers for Ray films at a festival? A distributor of foreign films in Moscow since 1992 doesn't have high hopes. "I am sure very few people care about the festival with so many dying on the front now. The population is divided between the patriots praising the government policy and the traitors who are terrified. I don't know who these connoisseurs of world cinema are who will find the strength and time to enjoy great films now," she said.