GAACH - Rare Documentary on Soumitra Chatterjee (1998) by Catherine Berge

#Gaach #SoumitraChatterjee #MerchantIvory
‘Gaach’ (‘The Tree’ 1998), Catherine Berge's documentary on Soumitra Chatterjee is one of the first documentaries on the thespian. It is MERCHANT IVORY film.

Catherine followed Chatterjee’s films, mainly his Ray ones with minutest details and that reflects on the screen.

The documentary has a mixed approach – it has Soumitra doing his voice-over himself, breaking from time to time with film excerpts, others commenting on Soumitra and/or parts of filmic experience, a patua (a person who recites a story to a group based on pictures drawn on scrolling papers called pat) played by Soumitra’s friend and actor Rabi Ghosh and most importantly snippets from few of his plays.

Catherine Berge’s efforts are intimate and her venturing out to dig into the creative cudgels of a superlative and talented persona is carried across to the audience. This is a radiantly different take on the thespian and will continue to be probably the best on him even after more than two decades of its making.

Soumitra Chatterjee had been a well-wisher of Silhouette Film Magazine. Uploading 'Gaach' for free and fair public viewing is a tribute and remembrance of the great actor.

We sincerely thank and feel immensely grateful to Mr. James Ivory and Ms Catherine Berge for EXCLUSIVELY authorizing Silhouette to upload this documentary on our official LnC-Silhouette channel.

Read 'Soumitra Became Ray’s Voice' - Interview with Catherine Berge, Director of 'Gaach' https://learningandcreativity.com/sil...

'Murmurs: Moments with Soumitra Chatterjee' by Amitava Nag is a preview collection of interactions that will come out in the form of a book, published by Blue Pencil in January 2021 to celebrate the legend’s 87th birthday.

Visit https://learningandcreativity.com/sil... for extracts from the upcoming book.

Visit: www.silhouette-magazine.com for analytical and insightful studies on films and allied arts.