KIFF pays tribute to screen goddess Suchitra Sen

The legendary star who passed away in January this year, has a beautiful photographic exhibition dedicated to her memory. A book on the actress was also on display for sale to her fans. A retrospective of her films is also included in the screening programme at the festival this year.

The photographic exhibition with beautiful B & W photographs of Suchitra Sen that covers stills from her feature films, intimate family photographs of Suchitra Sen with husband and little daughter Moon Moon Sen, now MP, with rare anecdotal details collected from Moon Moon Sen’s personal collection and from a veteran journalist who was close to her are presented in large fonts alongside the photographic display.

The exhibition was inaugurated on Tuesday by the late diva's daughter Moon Moon Sen, actor and festival committee chairman Ranjit Mullick, painter Shuvaprasanna, who also is the Chairman of Exhibition Committee, and Yadav Mandal, CEO, Nandan and other dignitaries from the film industry and the festival.

The seven films from her repertoire of a total of more than 50 films in Bengali and seven in Hindi chosen for the tribute are – Agnipareeksha, Uttar Phalguni, Harano Sur, Chaowa Paowa, Megh Kalo, Devdas and Aandhi.

Agnipareeksha, (1954) the first big box office hit and the second film pairing Suchitra Sen with Uttam Kumar, celebrates its 60th birth anniversary this year.

Their first pairing happened in Shaare Chuattar, a rollicking comedy set against a mess house in Kolkata. Uttam Kumar and Suchitra Sen starred in 30 films, beating the Spencer Tracy-Audrey Hepburn pair hollow.

When the young and beautiful Suchitra Sen emotes a love scene with Uttam Kumar in Chaoa-Paoa, Pathey Holo Deri, Alo Amar Alo, Shaaede Chuattar, Kamallata, the electrically charged feelings between them come across so tangibly that one can stretch one’s hand to touch them.

Aandhi, written and directed by Gulzar, has an interesting story following its release during the Emergency. The clear allusions to Indira Gandhi, then the Prime Minister of the country, led the film to being banned, without forwarding clear reasons. which, however, was lifted after some time.

Gulzar's personal convictions against career-minded women rubbed off onto the wife who brought out negative implications and the husband who evoked audience sympathy through his "martyrdom", throughout the film. But it remains one of Suchitra Sen’s outstanding performances though she refused to get her voice dubbed by anyone else and the film was screened with her bad Hindi intact.

Without the shadow of Uttam Kumar looming over her, Suchitra Sen came out with some of the finest performances too in films like Saat Pake Bandha, Uttar Phalguni, Datta, Smriti Tuku Thaak, Hospital, etc.

Even when the hero was equally strong or stronger, she held on to her own. Devdas and Aandhi are two Hindi films that sparkle like diamonds in her filmography.

As Parvati in Bimal Roy’s Devdas, Suchitra Sen looks beautiful, the pride showing up in that scene on the banks of the pond where Devdas uses his fishing line to mar her beauty. She carries the scar as a sad reminder of their doomed love story. She is courageous enough to come to Devdas asking him to take her away.

Yet, when she gets married, like the ideal Indian housewife and mother, she moulds herself into the vessel she is poured into. Motilal, in one of his last roles on screen, is the best Chunilal among the many versions of Devdas that have been made.

Harano Sur directed by Ajoy Kar, is perhaps the first ever Bengali film to tackle the subject of amnesia, never mind that the issue defied every scientific logic in favour of the touching romance between the electric pair Uttam Kumar and Suchitra Sen.

Uttam Kumar and Suchitra Sen formed one of the most formidable romantic pairs in the history of Bengali cinema. At their best, the pair made the likes of Raj Kapoor-Nargis, Spencer Tracy-Katherine Hepburn pale in comparison, such was the luminosity and chemistry between them on screen.

Together, the Uttam-Suchitra pair heralded the golden age of Bengali cinema. They brought spring, and a breath of fresh air that lasted over two decades.

Suchitra Sen-Uttam Kumar became the subject of every conversation around the dinner table at breakfast, lunch or dinner. Every member of the audience would wait with bated breath for the typical climax of a Suchitra-Uttam film with the two embracing each other.

Between them, the two wrote a new chapter in the history of Bengali cinema. They created a distinct genre of romance that acquired the label of the Uttam-Suchitra romance. It is a romance that has never known anything remotely close to this celluloid chemistry either before or after.

(Reporting by Shoma A. Chatterji, Image by Avishek Mitra)