AWESOME TWOSOME IN FEARLESS FILMMAKING

PARNA Sen’s 36 Chowringhee Lane (1981) was a landmark in my formative years as a film buff. I am not sure where I watched it. But what has stayed with me till date are Jennifer Kendal’s eloquent presence as the quiet and secluded Anglo-Indian teacher Violet Stoneham, and Ashok Mehta’s camera that captures the many shades of loss and solitude that imbue the film, and the textures of a fading world it is set in. It was about underscoring the tenuousness of a community as well as the vulnerability of an individual.

- NAMRATA JOSHI

The film was my initiation into fearless female filmmaking. In an ageist film industry and society, Sen was radical in pivoting her debut on the taboo theme of ageing, that too with a senior woman as the protagonist. There was empathy in capturing the routinised habits of Stoneham. There was grace in portraying her stagnancy. There was also the artistic astuteness in crafting the narrative arc from Twelfth Night to King Lear.

Since that introduction to Sen, there has been much to admire about her, personally and professionally. The multi-hyphenate renaissance woman has been both influential and awe-inspiring with her immense talent, intelligence, commitment, and drive—as actor-writer-director-magazine editor-activist—that have shown no signs of waning as she turned 80 on October 25.

Legend has it that Shyam Benegal had initially offered his directorial debut Ankur (1974) to Sen. It was when she declined that Shabana Azmi stepped in and another icon was born, as inspiring and formidable as Sen in being a vital, nuanced personality, and becoming many such characters on screen. Azmi celebrated her 75th birthday on September 18.