Chapter 8: chapter 8

4I used to wander around Public Garden, Birla Mandir, Tank Bund and Ravindra Bharathi on Sunday evenings. During one such sojourn, I came across the Film Club. In the evenings, there were continuous programmes in Ravindra Bharathi. In all States, there were auditoriums under the name ‘Ravindra Bharathi’ except in Tamil Nadu. The fund allotted for it had been diverted to something else, it appears and we have lost a public auditorium.One evening I saw a small crowd in the mini auditorium on the first floor of Ravindra Bharathi. I tried to enter it but I was not allowed. The man who was standing at the entrance said that entry was restricted to the members of the Film Club only.Vaikunthan who was a painter and who was standing there asked me, “Why don’t you join the Film Club?” I had met him in Secunderabad at Narasing Rao’s office. I had also met him in his painting exhibitions conducted in various places. In his paintings of Andhra’s village women, one could discern some uniqueness! Large breasts, revolting physique, big navels and short figures drawn in dark colours - oh, they were unique really! Vaikunthan introduced me to Mr. Prakash Reddy, who was the secretary of the Film Club. (Later Mr. Reddy announced Tirupur V.T. Subramanian as an important member of the governing council in the general body meeting of the South Indian Film Association. Mr. Subramanian did remarkable work in the Art, Literary and Film associations.The film that was screened on that day was Sinbad. I anxiously looked for Laila who was made popular by the Tamil Newspaper Thina Thanthi in its cartoon series. There were too many Lailas in the film. Sinbad was dating all of them. He enjoyed many Lailahs in the film. That film aroused erotic feelings!There were two more Film Clubs like the Hyderabad Film Club. But they had only a few members. Later Hyderabad Film Club alone withstood the tides of time. The programmes were conducted at Sri Sarathi Studio, situated in the suburbs. The studio was within a short distance from the Ameerpet bus stop. But my office and house were far away from the studio. Yet, when I heard that a film was going to be screened at the studio, my joy knew no bounds-; distance could not deter me! There was always some film being shot there! There would always be a large crowd of fans there. People would be jostling and pushing each other. However I could gain entrance into the studio easily saying that I was a member of the film club and mentioning the programme of the day. The programme would always commence late; it would wait till sufficient number of people gathered. Till then shooting of Hindi films would be going on. On rare occasions, there would be Tamil or Kannada films on the floor, when I could meet and talk with film artistes. On some occasions, the talks turned into interviews!The twin cities had a Tamil population of more than one lakh. But only four or five people were members of the Film Club. One of them was Amirthan, who held an important post in M/S Rasi Cements. He was much interested in the erotic scenes of World Cinema. Films without such scenes were boring to him. He would try to understand the story of the films and if they gave importance to erotic content, he would sit through and watch such films. As soon as such scenes were over, he would leave. There were many people like him. On hearing over telephone that an erotic scene had appeared in the film after he had left, then Amirthan would be heart- broken. He was not at all satisfied with the films screened in the club. He was of the strong opinion that only films that did not run well in their native soil were screened here. Whenever somebody spoke about good directors and good films, he would listen but would evince no interest at all. But he never missed a screening in the Film Club.Mani would come rarely. He was working as a sound engineer in the studio owned by Rama Naidu. Whenever he had no work, he would attend the programmes conducted by the film society. We were good friends because he too, like me, was interested in modern literature. He was also much interested in seeing good films. We were like twins. He was with me whenever I attended the art, literary and cultural programmes conducted in Secunderabad as well as in places away from Secunderabad. He was also with me when I went to Delhi and Rishikesh. He was also with me when I was in Goa for a week that was sponsored by Sahitya Akademi.Earlier, I had Kathirvelan as my bosom friend... After he had left for Chennai, Mani took that place.Once there was a programme arranged in the auditorium of Ramakrishna Studios in Golconda Street. The auditorium was quite big. As no other place was available, it was chosen.I met Arokya Raj in Ramakrishna Studios. As we were talking in Tamil, he came to us and started talking to us in Tamil with a strong accent of Telangana Telugu. He was also with me on another occasion when five films were screened in the Australian Film Festival. As he was working in Australia, I took a special in him.In the Australian films there were quite a lot of nude scenes and bed- room scenes. Amirthan was not present then; he had earlier left for Tamil Nadu on some important work. When he came to know about the ‘juicy’ scenes in those Australian films, he was much disappointed and depressed. He was bemoaning to everyone about his bad luck. He was a bit consoled when Prakash Reddy promised him that he would inform him in advance whenever such films were screened. But later Amirthan lost all his interest in the film society because of Prakash Reddy.Once Arokya Raj introduced me to an acquaintance of his. He told me that the latter had an important part of the ‘editing table’. The words ‘editing table’ troubled me. That gentle man looked lifeless and withered. His puny figure also pained me!I met Na. Kathirvelan, who had settled in Chennai, when he was working as an assistant to Mr. B. Lenin, a renowned film editor. When he had left Hyderabad, he had only wanted to settle down in some job either at Karaikudi or Kunrakudi. But his interest in Cinema had made him join Mr. Lenin. Even though there was a direct train from Hyderabad to Tirupur, I used to get down at Chennai to meet my friends. Once there was a small meeting arranged by Naveena Virutcham in a dirty building in Mylapore in Chennai. I spent half-an-hour in the meeting and then left it to meet Kathirvelan. It was always an interesting experience to talk and eat with him. When his work was over that day, it was already past 9 p.m. The editing table had already made him tired. That day there was no interesting topic to discuss and there was no tasty food too. He derived some comfort from the books and the paintings of painters like K.M. Adimoolam that filled his room. Mani’s brother Sounder was staying upstairs. Moreover, friends like poet Pazhani Bharathi were staying near him and that gave him some consolation. I thought it would be better if somebody kidnapped Kathirvelan from the editing table. He made the decision to leave the editing table only after seven or eight years and joined Pavai Chandran who was working in the magazine Puthiya Parvai. Alas! There also he could get only the editing table!A few years later I met Arokya Raj in Max Muller Bhavan during the screening of a film by Fassbinder. To some extent Amirthan liked Fassbinder. He was interested in the activities of the prostitute-heroines and the sexual activities exhibited by the downtrodden people in his films. However, he was not fully satisfied with Fassbinder. Arokya Raj once mentioned about the films by Pasolini. I had already heard about Federico Fellini. He told me that the lack of hope in sex and the disenchantment with the Establishment expressed in Pasolini’s films were quite shocking!When I met Arokya Raj in the Sarathi Studio after a long time he was pronouncedly ill. His health was as bad as that of the editing gentleman whom he had introduced me earlier. The disease that had struck Arokya Raj was debilitating. The chemical that was used in the studio laboratories to develop the film- negatives would eat up one’s health. That chemical had devoured Arokya Raj. His physical health was almost wrecked. The ‘meaning’ of the editing table became quite frightening to me! The picture of the editing table had stuck in my heart as painful images.