FTII is a golden jubilee hit

The Film and TV Institute of India at Pune, which will soon enter its 50th year, has nurtured hundreds of artistes, writes Rajendra Rajan after a visit to India’s premier film institute

BUT for his desire to attain excellence in sound mixing, Resul Pookutty would not have enrolled in the Sound Engineering Course at the Film and TV Institute of India some years back. He failed in the first attempt, kept on reading books on sound engineering and passed in the next attempt. Today, Pookutty is an Oscar winner. He picked up the Academy Award for sound mixing in Slumdog Millionaire. The Film and TV Institute at Pune has nurtured the creative talents of hundreds of artistes, who have successfully carved a niche for themselves in different areas of filmmaking.

The Film and T.V. Institute of India at Pune will soon enter its 50th year. Being one of the premier film institutes in the world, the alumni of the FTII have made an outstanding contribution to the Indian cinema over the past five decades.

Set up in 1960, the institute stands at the place that witnessed the rolling out of some of the masterpieces of Indian cinema from the famous Prabhat Studio. Sant Tuka Ram, Dunia Na Mane, Manoos and Shehjari are a few examples of the masterworks created in Hindi and Marathi during the early 1930s. In 1974, the television training centre in operation at Delhi was merged with the institute. The institute is running a number of training courses in various disciplines. Some of these comprise acting, art direction, production design, animation, computer graphics, screenplay writing, cinematography, editing etc. The acting course, which was discontinued in 1976, was restarted a couple of years back.

Over the past 50 years, the FTII has produced several luminaries in the field of direction, acting etc. The feature films produced by Kumari Shami, Mani Kaul, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Sanjay Leela Bhansali have brought laurels at many international film festivals.

A recent visit to the FTII provided an opportunity to peep into the institute bustling with life. Reeta Ghosh, a student of Art Direction Course from Assam, was busy stitching gunny bags of a parcel. Nearby, workers were busy giving shape to a makeshift railway platform. The spacious Prabhat Studio reverberated with the sound of hammers emanating from old tin sheets being laid to cover the roof of the platform. The wooden planks tied with jute ropes at the ceiling are hanging over the floor. These were used to hang lights. The studio has kept its conventional structure intact since 1933.

When asked, "What is your real attainment?" Reeta Ghosh quipped, "keen observation. I feel every object has a meaning. Art direction is an adventure in itself. Everyday it gives you an opportunity to explore something novel and innovative. A cameraman cannot put anything in the frame without realising the fact that the object he or she is going to shoot will convey the meaning of its existence."

Armin from Mumbai, a TV cinematographer trainee, was making reflectors from the glossy sheets of the paper."I think women cinematographers have to undergo stiff competition with the male counterpart", said Armin.

I watched a footage produced by Deepu, one of the students in cinematography from Kerala. When asked why the frames of contemporary cinema didn’t remain in our minds for long, Deepu replied, "Today, people are too much exposed to the realities of life. The rhythm and pace of films is faster than the life. So the human mind does not register even good frames."

The FTII has produced noted artistes in several areas of film production. These include Kumari Shami, Mani Kaul, Naseeruddin Shah, Shabana Azmi, Jaya Bhaduri, Shatrughan Sinha, Raza Murad, Subhash Ghai, Sanjay Leela Bhansali, Raj Kumar Hirani, Vidhu Vinod Chopra, Mithun Chakrvaarti, Tom Alter, Kanwerjit Panital, Adoor Gopalkrishnan.

About a year back, Pankaj Rag took over as the Director of Institute of India. A writer and poet himself, Pankaj Rag has been instrumental in breaking the status quo in the institute. His deep sense of commitment and zeal for innovative ideas has given a new face to the institute. He re-launched a bilingual quarterly Lensight in July 2008 in Hindi and English, which touches upon a variety of facets of films and media.

According to Pankaj Rag, "We are trying to focus on the life and works of Satyajit Ray. A book on him The Apu Trilogy will be brought out soon. The book is being co-authored by Dr (Mrs.)Shyamala Vanarase and Prof. Satish Bahadur. Several other research projects, including the relationship of Tamasha with Marathi Films; Urban life in Hindi Cinema are in the pipeline.

The Acting Class Studio had been virtually in shambles. The renovation of the acting studio in October last gave a new thrust to the acting course. In order to co-relate the cinema with various forms art, literature, aesthetics, issues and problems of the society, the FTII has launched new series of Dhara and Guftagoo. A museum for preserving materials of archival value inherited from Prabhat Studios was set up in 1995. The museum, which was recently opened to the general public, houses all available artefacts, original contracts and partnership deeds of the company in addition to costumes, properties, equipment, posters and stills which are historically important. Every year more than 80 per cent of the awards at the national film festivals are swept by the luminaries of the institute.

Some of the outstanding names who have contributed in Cinematography and Film Direction are: Mani Kaul, Kumar Shahani and Froz Chinoi, K.K. Mahajan, S.K. Nag and S.M. Dubey as motion picture cameramen, B.S. Biswas and Narendra Singh in sound recording, Subhash Ghai, Rehana Sultan, Navin Nischal, Anil Dhawan and Rakesh Pandey have also distinguished themselves. In the field of documentaries and short films, Chandershekhar Nair, Yashpal Chaudhuri, Gautaman and Adoor Gopalakrishnan have left an indelible impact in the film production. The recent feather in the cap of the institute is the Oscar won by Resul Pookutty for the best sound mixing in Slumdog Millionaire He also picked up trophies from BAFTA and Cinema Audio Society (CAS) in London for Slumdog Millionaire.

The FTII has been making its presence felt at the National and International Film Festivals. Intensive training, both theoretical and practical is imparted to students of various courses. The institute is equipped with sophisticated sound recording equipments, editing machines and modern movie cameras. The institute has two studios, three projection theatres. There is also a modern film-processing lab for processing 35 mm and 16mm black and white film. The Institute library has a good collection of books on various subjects connected with filmmaking and subscribers to periodicals, both Indian and Foreign. There is also a film library containing films both Indian and foreign. The Lok Sabha Television has initiated FTII students to telecast their films on its channel. So far the Lok Sabha Television has telecast 15 diploma films under its programme "First Cut". The Film Institute of Pune is going to complete 50 years of its inception. It is time to celebrate the glory and glamour earned by the institute all these years.

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