[jyotirmoy]

Among the films I have seen at the Osian Film Festival so far Rituparno Ghosh’s “Sob Choritro KalpaniK”  stands out. Literal translation of the Bengali title is All characters are imaginary but the official English title is Afterword. The story has been penned by Rituparno himself. The biggest surprise was the stunning performance by Bipasha Basu better known for her skin & her sizzling acts setting screens ablaze !!!

The main characters in this film are young Radhika(Bipasha Basu), a upwardly mobile executive, her husband Indraneel who is an engineer by profession but a poet by choice who chucks his job to pursue writing full time, Sekhar a professional photographer who is an ardent fan of Inraneel’s poetry who in course of time would become intimate with Radhika and their old trusty maid  Nandar Ma (Nanda’s mother)

The film starts with the memorial service in honour of Indraneel who has died young. As friends and colleagues speak about Indraneel and recites his poems, Radhika seated on the stage goes through journeys that take her in to the past. Only the movement of her eyebrows and twitching of facial muscles convey the surge of emotions in her. The entire film has excellent narration of poems written by Sonkho Ghosh, one of the most prominent writers of modern Bengali poetry.

As the memorial service goes on Radhika seems to rediscover her husband. Memories stream in her mind as she could relate those everyday events, which seemed so insignificant earlier, that had found entirely new meanings in Neel’s poetries. These set her mind further back in the past as she remembers the early days of their conjugal life when conflicting events raised doubts in her mind as to Neel’s feelings towards her.
She travels in time to the moment when she had felt that she has reached the limit when Neel declared quitting his job following his reception of a prestigious award. Radhika’s dream of a secured life suffered a serious jolt by this and she felt embittered by Neel’s whims and their gradually deteriorating financial condition. She discusses divorcing her husband with Sekhar while they were on a tour together.

Another thing to haunt her was the fictitious Kajari, the protagonist in several of Neel’s works, and  then one night in her dreams she confronts Kajari only to discover that Kajari was an image of herself.
Rituparno has really woven a fabric of fiction that can also be considered a study in poetry where emotions intertwine to create an apparently complex structure that ultimately unfolds in fascinating and absolute revelations with clearer insight into each individual’s character.
Congratulations Rituparno.