From Saurav Borah
GUWAHATI: Real or reel, football has a universal appeal and the ongoing World Cup is certainly living up to the spirit of the beautiful game as it heads towards the business end.
Sport as a subject for movies is not uncommon though, but when a game of football transforms minds and reforms people, it tickles minds and touches hearts of audiences.
Filmmaker, Bidyut Kotoky’s Khel Toh Hume Khelne Do – a film on how soccer transformed a group of insurgents and helped them get into the mainstream – is one such movie. As of now, it remains one of his future projects.
“It’s a movie which I wanted to complete over the years but have not been able to, as things have not fallen into place. Among my future projects, this one surely is very close to my heart. I will certainly make it the way I want to but cannot speculate when it will be ready for release,” Kotoky told The Shillong Times over phone from Mumbai on Wednesday.
“More than soccer, the movie is about the triumph of the human spirit,” the director of the 2102 socio-political thriller, Ekhon Nedekha Nodir Xhipare (As The River Flows) fame, said.
There is another project that Kotoky is working on. “I am ready with four other projects along with Khel Toh Hume Khelne Do. One of them is related to Kaziranga but will be on the born-free mode that depicts a human-animal bond. Availability of funds among other criteria will determine which project is completed first,” he said.
Reflecting upon a concern, Kotoky was candid to reveal that he could only realise one-third of the print and publicity cost for the release of Xhoixobote Dhemalite (Rainbow Fields) in Assam during mid-January this year.
“The film ran for just six days in Assam but the turnout of spectators was abysmally low unlike at Nandan, Kolkata, where many turned out during the first week (June 15 to 22) despite an afternoon slot. So I have decided that although I will make my films based on subjects in Assam and Northeast, the next movie will not be in Assamese but in Hindi. But yes, I will definitely make Assamese movies but not in the immediate future,” he said.
Xhoixobote Dhemalite had won the Best Foreign Film award at the Hollywood CineFest and is set for a commercial release in the US next month.
Kotoky said it is unfortunate that when film critics had acclaimed Xhoixobote Dhemalite, which is a depiction of childhood in a conflict-ridden land during the turbulent days of the Assam Agitation in the 1980s, the response going by the turnout in Assam was appalling.
“So I believe that as of now, I have no moral right to ask investors to put their money in promoting an Assamese movie in Assam. But yes, my films will be made in Assam and Northeast and I will definitely make Assamese films in future,” he said.
“Rainbow Fields has a universal appeal like all films based on children growing up in conflict zones across the world. Unfortunately, people in Assam are not watching Assamese movies. So the question of judging whether the film is good or bad does not arise,” the filmmaker said.