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The Sixth River - A new Milestone
in Sikh Films
At
a time when the Online Sikh Sikhi in the 21st Century-themed Sikh
Youth Film Festival has taken off online, the WSN
presents this thought provoking piece about the state of the Sikhism
related cinema, the projection of the Sikhs in this visual art form
and the way forward.
 I am a keen
admirer of Sikh artifacts, rare Kirtan CD’s and Film DVD’s and love
to have their collection. The boom started with ‘Sahibzade’, the
animation film, followed by another short animation, ‘Sunny, proud
to be a Sikh’, the heart rending ‘Widow Colony’. And then came our
first feature film ‘Kambdi Kalaai’.
I was fascinated by this
amazingly packaged film which dealt with the themes which are very
close to Sikh hearts. It needs a rare courage indeed to call a spade
a spade. How many of us can take a stand when it actually comes to
it? And here, in this film, the young director Ish Amitoj Kaur said
it loud and clear, which had been lying mute in her heart as well as
in our hearts for a long time. Since the release of the film, I had
been constantly reading articles on the film where ever they
appeared but what caught my fascination recently was the front page
of the Magazine ‘Kaurs’ which featured the said Director and its
Title, “Sikhs In Cinema”.
Cinema has a
unique language, a language that everybody can relate to. It is
difficult today to imagine the world without this entertainment
medium. ‘Feast for the eyes and food for the thought’, that is what
intelligent cine - goers look for. We all have our favorites and
always set our minds to certain standards, lesser than which we
would just reject. It’s just like, if we are a real ‘Banana
Republic’ shopper, we won’t shop ‘Old Navy’. Similarly, if our minds
are set on something like ‘Brave heart’, we will not be satisfied
with ‘Flag of Our Fathers’.
It has often
been observed that people proudly quote one or two films with Sikh
characters like ‘The English Patient’ or ‘Inside Man’. That is our
standard, and not a bad one at all indeed, after all, we get to say,
we saw a Sikh being portrayed in a Hollywood film, however, in the
process we forget about our small time filmmakers who try to do
justice by making good quality films like ‘Amu’, ‘Widow Colony’,
‘The Rise Of Khalsa’ or for that matter ‘Kambdi Kalaai’ which had an
actual Sikh Actor in the main lead for the first time. Rome
was not built in a day, folks!
Let us have a
look at the progress of Punjabi films in general. Trade reports say
that last year’s Punjabi film (with Harbhajan Maan as hero) fetched
more money than any other Hindi film in Indian theatres at that
time. But we, here in America, on the
contrary, are not giving adequate importance to Punjabi--our mother
tongue, which can have deplorable consequences. If our kids don’t
understand and respect Punjabi, how would we expect them to
understand Gurbani and have love for their Guru?
No doubt, in
Punjabi cinema there is an appreciable effort now-a - days to make
good quality films, but they, too, unfortunately lack proper
portrayal of a ‘Sikh’ or ‘Sikh way of life’—which is the crying need
of the hour. The primordial Mannus, Gangus and Rangars continue to
follows us everywhere, be it India,
USA, France or Canada. The onus lies on us and us alone to come to
lime light maintain our true stature and protect our rights.
Noor Nissan
Films pioneered in this direction last year by giving us the well
known feature film ‘Kambdi Kalaai’. The film, as claimed by the film
makers reached over 15,000 households. It must have touched 100,000
hearts. Once again, with the same dedication for the community, they
have announced their next venture, ‘Chhevan Dariya’, ‘The Sixth
River’.
As there exists
a vast vacuum of Films on the Sikh community or for the Sikh
Community, there can be multifarious stories available for films.
The most favorite amongst people is something on ‘Sikh History’.
History, to most of the people denotes the days of the past, the
bygone times of the Sikh wars or warriors. “However, there is always
history in every moment— every present moment of the day is a
chronicle for the next day and every man a hero, in his own stride
when he contributes to the making of an ethos. ‘The Sixth River’ is
going to be one such maiden effort, says Ish Amitoj Kaur, “to
project the contemporary aspects of our lives”.
Somehow, the
lack of good quality Punjabi films has led to lesser and lesser
spectators going to theatres these days and that in turn has
resulted in poor distribution of films. What one needs to do is to
revive our audience by concentrating on good quality films, which is
possible by not only giving them ‘what they want’, but as
intelligent spectators ‘what they should want’. The second Online
Sikhnet Film Festival is a good example of some thoughtful changes
being sown by our youth in the area of ‘what the spectators should
want?’ Good ‘Sikh theme’ films do have international appeal. But
from where does one get money to make good films? There are three
options: go to the Hollywood and
tell them your story, or go to the Bollywood producers and tell
them, “please, don’t portray us as buffoons” or spend Millions of
Dollars to make our own films. The third option sounds really good
to the ears but let’s be frank here, how many of us actually spent
$10 on the tickets or DVDs of the films we already have in our
Library leave alone dare an investment in a large scale film? That
is an irony!
Does it worry
Ish Amitoj Kaur, who is all set to direct her new film? “No, though
stress is part of this journey that I have taken up,” she says,
“but, more than anything else I believe that God entrusted this duty
to me and I am sure that He will help me in my venture.”
The question
here is that what should be our role as a community? Are we here
just to express our feelings for the need of the hour? Do we want
our next generation to see their community portrayed in the right
context in media so that it infuses them with ‘chardi kala’? Do we
really want these filmmakers to accomplish the community based task
whole heartedly? If our concerns are genuine or merely a lip
service? How many of us actually want from the core of our hearts to
bring about a revolution by doing small things which would bring
about a change in the larger scenario?
(Courtesy gurmeetkaur.blogspot.com )
19
September, 2007
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