Chidananda Dasgupta
Chidananda Dasgupta ( Bengali : চিদানন্দ দাসগুপ্ত, Cidānanda Dāsgupta; born November 20, 1921 in Shillong , Meghalaya , India ; † May 22, 2011 in Calcutta , West Bengal , India) was an Indian film critic, film historian, author and filmmaker of Bengali descent. He is considered to be the pioneer of serious film journalism in India.
Life
Chidananda Dasgupta came from a conservative Brahmin family. He studied in Patna , but had to leave school because of participation in the "Quit India" movement in 1942 and became a postgraduate student in Kolkata . In 1944 he married Supriya Das, a niece of the poet Jibanananda Das . In the following years he worked as a lecturer at a college in Hazaribag , as personal assistant to Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis at the Indian Statistical Institute and taught English literature at City College in Kolkata.
In 1947 he founded the Calcutta Film Society with Satyajit Ray , Harisadhan Dasgupta and others, and in 1960 the Federation of Film Societies of India , of which he was secretary until 1967. He was editor of the film magazines Indian Film Review and Indian Film Culture and has published numerous essays on art and film, including for the British film magazine Sight & Sound .
Chidananda Dasgupta has directed two Bengali feature films: Bilet Pherat (1972) - a film adaptation of three of his own short stories about young Indians returning from abroad, whose idealism is disillusioned in India - with which he took up the subject of Dhiren Ganguly 's film of the same name from 1921 and the comedy Amodini (1994). Dasgupta's other films are documentaries : Portrait of a City (1961) about the city of Kolkata, The Dance of Shiva (1968) about Ananda Coomaraswamy , The Stuff of Steel (1969), Birju Maharaj (1972) about the artist of the same name and Zaroorat Ki Purti (1979). He wrote the music for Aparna Sens Film Sati (1989).
He received a National Film Award for best film critic. At the 6th Osian's Cinefan Film Festival in July 2004, he received a Lifetime Achievement Award for Best Writing on Cinema.
His daughter is the actress and director Aparna Sen , his granddaughter is the actress Konkona Sen Sharma .
Books (selection)
- The Cinema of Satyajit Ray (1980)
- Movie India: Satyajit Ray (1981)
- Talking About Films (1981)
- The Painted Face - Studies in India's Popular Cinema (1991)
Web links
- Chidananda Dasgupta in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Literature by and about Chidananda Dasgupta in the catalog of the German National Library
- Film society pioneer who took on Ray - Obituary in The Telegraph India of May 24, 2011
- biography
- Hall of Fame (with photo) in The Hindu on September 28, 2004
- Lifetime work, Lifetime award in The Hindu on July 23, 2004
Individual evidence
- ↑ Ravi Bhushan: Reference India: biographical notes on men & women of achievement of today & tomorrow , 1992, p. 186
- ^ Who's who in India, 1986 , p. 108
- ^ Film critic Chidananda Dasgupta passes away in The Hindu from May 24, 2011
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Dasgupta, Chidananda |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | দাসগুপ্ত, চিদানন্দ (Bengali); Dāsgupta, Cidānanda |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Indian film critic, film historian, writer and filmmaker |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 20, 1921 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Shillong , Meghalaya, India |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 22, 2011 |
| Place of death | Calcutta , West Bengal, India |