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Bangladeshi Cinema Observations and propositions

Tanvir Mokammel
To everyone's chagrin, cinema in Bangladesh has reached its nadir. When in 1956 as a young Minister for Industry, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib, and his inspired colleagues, with a vision to create a film-scene in East Bengal established Film Development Corporation (FDC), they hardly had any clue, that four decades later their patriotic zeal would end up in such a cul-de-sac! Cinema now is in a very dismal state in Bangladesh, and salvation of it warrants some bold and definitive measures.
First, cinema should not be under the aegis of the Ministry of Information any more. With such prioritised and politically sensitive
sectors like newspaper and television being under it, the Information Ministry is one of the busiest and most stressed out ministry for any government in Bangladesh. In this ministry, cinema, not having any urgent political priority, receives inadequate care. Performance says it all. For example, the national film awards are supposed to be an annual affair. But to
perform this simple duty, the InfMEiation
five
schedule! Even with the best of intentions by the officials concerned, the endemic
negligence to cinema is caused due to the amount of
workload that the Information Ministry is burdened with.
There should be a separate ministry for cinema. If not, cinema should be under the aegis of the Ministry of Culture. There are a couple of reasons why. Firstly, cinema is an art form, a cultural expression, not an information tool. Secondly, in the Ministry of ( ulture, with its lesser and insipid workload, a glamourised medium like cinema is sure to receive prioritised treatment
But the core problem relating to a betterment of cinema, ironically, seems to be the very organisation supposed to develop cinema in Bangladesh — The Film Development Corporation (FDC). FDC is lagging thirty years behind the state-of-the-art in filmmaking, not only in the global context, but even to our subcontinent standard. The output of FDC film lab is simply sub-
standard.
In this age of market economy, the very concept that a government owns a film studio seems anachronistic. Why should the Bangladesh government own a film studio which churns out all these run-of-the-mill, if not plagiarised and vulgar films? The governments of France, USA and India do not own any film studio. But that never impeded cinema of those countries from flourishing. Film is a business, and business should be left to business people, to the law of demand and supply of the market. Any control by the government bureaucracy only creates potholes of corruption and anybody who has the experience to work with any department of
FDC knows what I mean! Regarding modern day filmmaking, FDC has totally run out of ideas and outlived its purpose. In order to have digitally-equipped professional film labs in Bangladesh it is high time that Bangladesh government, after having its revenue guaranteed, disinvests FDC.
The condition of another film-related government body, the film division of the Department of Films and Publication (DFP), is even worse. One wonders about the raison d'etre of DFP's film department. Days are spent shooting expensive and cumbersome 35mm footages of ministers cutting tape! In this age of digital technology, BTV alone is good enough to handle that. Besides, it is alleged that
DFP's film department, in its purchase of exorbitantly price-tagged equipment has remained lucrative for ministry officials as well as ministers.
The government should rather invest resources to establish a proper film institute and a professional film archive in the country. Cinema is a high-tech art form, and to teach cinematography, sound recording and related technologies to the young, there is no alternative to a professionally run film institute. To preserve and sustain our heritage, it is imperative also to build a modern film archive with its own building, professional dehumidified vaults and trained personnel. Proper resources should also be
allotted to give the film archive a digitalised form. The government should also establish a national film centre in Dhaka similar to Nandan in Kolkata.
I am not trying to write another Aereopagitica. One Milton was enough for that! But something has to be done with the censor system in Bangladesh. The ideal situation is not to have any censor at all in the realm of art. But given the sociocultural reality of Bangladesh, if we have to concede to any censor, then the censor board should not have any right to ban or excise a piece of cinema. It should only rate films in different categories like, "U" (Universal), "PG" (Parental Guidance) or "A" (Adult), a rating system which most democratic countries
practise. Now with our national identity cards in place, there should not be any problem for cine-hall gatekeepers to know who is a minor and who is not. Regarding nomenclature, instead of Film Censor Board, the rating body should be renamed as "Film Classification Board".
Cinema is in a pathetic state now. Out of eleven hundred functioning cine-halls, more than three hundred and fifty have been closed down. More are on the way to being shut down soon. Cinema halls, to some extent, should blame themselves for their own decline. With their penchant to exhibit vulgar films or pomo cut pieces, they successfully managed to hoot out well-meaning audiences from their
premises, especially women. Cinema halls in Bangladesh became lumpenised. And now, rows of empty seats, they are facing their nemesis! With other entertainment mediums becoming available to people the large cinema halls seem no longer economically viable. I am afraid big cinema halls may have to die their natural death as the big dinosaurs once did! May be the cineplex kind of film conglomerates, with small auditoriums to cater to different kinds of audiences, will become the future. But that is for Dhaka and other cities only. To reinvigorate cine-audience in the districts and upazilas, the government can establish or renovate mini-auditoriums with digital facilities.
A clause can be imposed on the cine-halls by the government to exhibit award winning or 'Anudan' (government grant)-films for minimum ten weeks of the fifty-two week calendar. And this condition should be attached with their licensing obligations. The government can also waive the amusement tax from award winning or Anudan-films and thus by lowering the price of tickets can lure more people, especially the young, towards better cinema.
One endemic problem with Bangladesh cinema is its protectionism. Our cinema does not have to compete either with global or the sub-continental films. Protection for a child is required and recommended, but if protection is provided to a thirty-year old individual he will never grow up and will remain physically and mentally retarded. And that has exactly happened to the film industry of Bangladesh. But that does not mean that we should open the floodgates to Bollywood stuff in our country. Bangladesh cinema already produces enough garbage and we do not need to import further garbage from Mumbai! But each year hyp or ten ^elected award winning I n ^1i.an ajid international films can be imported under some exchange programme with the pre-condition that an equal number of better made Bangladeshi films are exported to that country as well. Our film-industry should be able to sustain this much of competition!
These are just a few suggestions to salvage an industry which, four decades back, was created with some lofty ideas. But due to the myopic vision and sheer inefficiency of subsequent rulers, the film industry in Bangladesh has come to its present moribund state. Whether there will be any light at the end of tunnel depends on how resolutely our new leaders can deal with the issues. To make a digital Bangladesh, cinema, the most modern of all art forms, needs to be digitised first, both in its hard and software technology, but more importantly, in mindsets.
Tanvir Mokammel is an internationally acclaimed Bangladeshi filmmaker.