சுஜாதாவின் அரதப்பழசு பேட்டி ஒன்று கண்ணில் பட்டது. 1993-க்கு முந்தைய பேட்டி. உயிரே திரைப்படம் கூட வெளியாகவில்லை. எஞ்சினியர் என்று ஒரு திரைப்படத்தைப் பற்றி குறிப்பிடுகிறார், வந்ததா என்று தெரியவில்லை.
Sujatha … has worked with top directors K. Balachandar in Ninaithale Inikkum, Maniratnam in Roja, Shankar in Indian and Bharathiraja in Nadodi Thendral. He has been closely associated with Kamalahasan right from Raj Kamal International’s maiden venture Vikram. And it was he who ignited the spark in Kamal for Marudhanaayagam.’ He is now working with Maniratnam for Dil Se, starring Shah Rukh Khan and Manisha Koirala.
Are you happy with the way your stories have been filmed?
To be frank, no. Not only I, no writer has ever been happy with the way his/her stories have been converted into films. Asked to give his reaction after his novels were filmed, Hemingway put it succinctly: “Take the money and run.” Satyajit Ray‘s Pather Panchali is a great film, but the original writer was not happy with it. Hitchcock once said that he would just read the novel he wanted to film, throw away and would never get back to it again during the making of the film.
I am certainly not blaming the directors. It is just that the medium is different. Compared to those who see the film, the readers are a minuscule percentage. Probably my novels would have been read by 30-40 lakh people, but the films were seen by crores. In a medium like cinema where the stakes are high, compromises are unavoidable. They don’t affect me. People who have read my novels are unhappy with the film versions, but those who have not read them are happy with the films. That in itself explains the differencein audience tastes.
The two stories you wrote exclusively for films for two top directors, K Balachandar and Bharathiraja, flopped. What do you say?
Ninaithale Inikkum for Balachandar was the first script I wrote for a film. Before that, my stories had been filmed, but I had not played any role in writing the screenplay or dialogue. For Ninaithale Inikkum, I had written a totally different kind of screenplay. Unfortunately, owing to constraints like star dates, Balachandar did not follow my script exactly. He made several changes and looked at the film as an opera on the lines of ABBA. My original script was lively and if it had been faithfully followed,it would have been a model screenplay. Anyway, no regrets and I enjoyed working with Balachandar, his assistant Ananthu, Kamal and Rajini.
The same was the case with Bharathiraja’s Nadodi Thendral. The original story I gave was about the assassination of a collector and I had put in a lot of effort. But Bharathiraja changed it into an ordinary triangular love story set in the pre-independence backdrop.
I don’t blame the directors for these failed projects. As I told you. the target audiences are different and the directors know the medium better.
My most satisfying efforts were Maniratnam’s Roja and Shankar’s Indian, though I wrote only the dialogue for these films. Roja especially was a gratifying experience because I participated in all the discussions during its making. For Indian, the director did the thinking , gave me the sequence order and after I wrote the dialogue, Shankar would choose what he wanted.
Was it you who suggested the Marudhanayagam story to Kamal?
In a way, yes. For the last 7 or 8 years Kamal had been searching for the right story to make a historical. He even had plans of doing a historical musical on the lines of Ambikapathi and toyed with the idea of making a film which had only verses for dialogue. While he was examining so many ideas, I suggested why not we go into immediate past history instead of going to ancient period.
It was around that time I came across a folk ballad edited by Tamil scholar Vanamamalai and published by Madurai Kamaraj University. Impressed by the ballad, I showed it to Kamal to find out if it has the potential of a good film. Kamal was initially reluctant, but agreed to go through the ballad.
In the elaborate and excellent introduction was a footnote which said, “This Yousuf Khan was originally a Hindu Vellala called Marudhanayagam.” Kamal immediately jumped at it and felt that the story had all the potential of a good historical film. Kamal felt that the religious conversion could be owing to some social oppression and that would form a good subject for filming.
The story of Marudhanayagam is relatively unknown…
We chose the life of Marudhanayagam for its substantial story element and episodic content. His is not a conventional story of a king. Starting his life as a supplier to the French Army, he sneaks through enemy lines with messages effortlessly. The French train him and the British, spotting his talent, elevate him to the position of a tax collector of Madurai district, only to hang him for disobedience to the British Raj just one year after his rise to the top. It is this stunning elevation from the lowest level and again touching the nadir, this graph of Marudhanayagam’s life, that interested Kamal to make it into a film.
As for deviations, nearly 80% of the film will faithfully adapt Hills’ biography of Marudhanayagam. Only on certain aspects, where no solid or substantial information is available, have we used our imagination.
For instance, no reason is available for Marudhanayagam’s conversion to Islam. Here Kamal has worked back on the character and has imagined the reasons for his conversion beautifully.
Don’t you foresee the danger of ‘Marudha Naayagam’ being compared to Sivaji Ganesan‘s Veerapandiya Kattabomman?
Kamal can stand the comparison easily because he is not going to follow Sivaji Ganesan’s style. Knowing well about Kamal’s yen for perfection and precision, we can be sure that the level of realism in Marudhanayagam will be high. There is no question of any Indian actor playing a foreigner as Javar Sitaraman did in Veerapandiya Kattabomman and spoke his lines in broken Tamil. In Marudhanayagam wherever the British or French officers speak, Kamal, I think, is planning to use dubbing to give it an authentic touch.
Do you think Marudhanayagam, a film with a distinct native flavour, can have a national or an international audience?
Why not? Marudhanayagam may be a historical character, but he is not a larger than life character. It is a story which depicts a man with all his strengths and weaknesses. ‘The rise and fall of a man’ is the one line story of Marudhanayagam, a plot that will interest anyone in any part of the world. When films like Jurassic Park can run for its grandeur and technical brilliance, the same can be said of Marudhanayagam which will be made using state of the art techniques. Kamal is adopting the linear narrative style where through off screen narration a person tells the background of Marudhanayagam, the historical context of the story and so on.
Kamal is supposed to be following the Hollywood style in writing the screenplay of the film. Could you explain that?
I think for the first time in India, a computer has been used in screenplay writing, a method usually adopted by Hollywood film makers. Various software are available for this and Kamal is using a particular software called Movie Magic. All the information about the movie can be accessed with it.
What is you actual input in Marudhanayagam?
I created the Tamil fonts for Movie Magic. I am also overseeing the screenplay written by Kamal. In Hollywood films, you have a screenplay doctor and that is the role I’m playing.
What are your other assignments?
I am working for Maniratnam’s Dil Se. For this film, Maniratnam has given me the plot and has asked me to make it into a story. He has told me not to bother about its conversion into film which he would take care of. He just wants to see how I visualise this story. We are planning to release the book and movie simultaneously. Already one schedule is over.
Shankar’s Assistant A.R. Gandhikrishna is making a film called Engineer with Madhuri Dixit and Arvind Samy in Tamil, Telugu and Hindi. Its also an interesting film I’m working.
தொகுக்கப்பட்ட பக்கம்: சுஜாதா பக்கம், திரைப்படங்கள்
சேயர்ஸ் துப்பறியும் கதை எழுத்தாளர்களில் குறிப்பிட வேண்டியவர். எனக்குப் பிடித்த துப்பறியும் கதை எழுத்தாளர்களில் ஒருவர். Golden Age of Detective Fiction என்று அறியப்படும் காலகட்டத்தின் முக்கியப் பங்களிப்பாளர்.
Murder Must Advertise (1933) நல்ல உதாரணம். விளம்பர நிறுவனத்தில் வேலை செய்யும் விக்டர் டீன் மாடிப்படிகளில் விழுந்து இறந்து போகிறார். விபத்து என்று தீர்ப்பு வந்துவிட்டாலும் முதலாளிக்கு சின்ன உறுத்தல். விம்சி வேறு பெயரில் விளம்பரக் கம்பெனியில் வேலைக்கு சேர்கிறார். போதை மருந்து வியாபாரத்துக்கான ஒரு சரடும் சென்று கொண்டிருக்கிறது. விம்சி எல்லா முடிச்சுகளையும் அவிழ்க்கிறார்.
சிலிகான் ஷெல்ஃப் 