After Binodini... Ram Kamal is set to direct another biopic, Draupadi

National Award-winning filmmaker Ram Kamal Mukherjee is in a happy space, with his film Binodiini — Ekti Natir Upakhyan, a biopic on the first female theatre artist of Bengal, Binodini Dasi. It has seen box office success with the completion of 50 days at theatres.

- ASHOK CHATTERJEE

National Award-winning filmmaker Ram Kamal Mukherjee is in a happy space, with his film Binodiini — Ekti Natir Upakhyan, a biopic on the first female theatre artist of Bengal, Binodini Dasi. It has seen box office success with the completion of 50 days at theatres. It has been a long and arduous journey for the journalist-turned-director to bring out the film, which has been appreciated across India.

The Mumbai-based director has had to struggle for five ‘long’ years before his film saw light of the day. “It was a five-long-year journey for me and Rukmini Maitra (who plays Binodini) to make the film. Nobody wanted to put in money in a women-centric film, that too at such a high-cost budget. Without any box-office hero, it was a risk to find a producer, I was told. But I’m lucky to find Pratik Chakraborty of Pramod Films as producer and later Dev (Adhikari) too joined in. But before that I had to knock on the doors of every studio. Everyone told me it is not going to work. No producer was willing to burn his fingers,” says Ram Kamal.

The filmmaker’s conviction remained steadfast about the film’s potential and on his goal, undeterred by the impediments. He was proved right, ultimately. Not only did the film find its producers, the biopic was appreciated, from Mumbai to Tollywood to down south.