Film director Nilendra Deshapriya's work likened to Fedrigo Fellini:

Thanha Rathi Ranga based on historic event in May 2009

By Anuradha Kodagoda

Thanha Rathi Ranga directed by Nilendra Deshapriya received the Best Film award at the I Will Tell International Film Festival recently and also won much recognition in many international film festivals around the world.

Nilendra Deshapriya is a trendsetter in Sri Lankan television history who studied drama and theatre at school. At the age of 14 he wrote his first stage play The Horse Carriage inspired by the film Rashoman by the legendary Akira Kurosawa which became a huge success. He was an active member of the "Group 78" at the Lionel Wendt Theatre, a community where the creative elite gathered during his time and produced many theatre productions.

In a career spanning of 30 years Deshapriya embarked on his journey of film-making as an assistant director with highly reputed film directors' in both local and international productions. He joined the film industry in 1980 with the movie Regina by Thilak Lakshman Seneviratne.

Thanha Rathi Ranga is his debut feature film. The following are excerpts of an interview had with Nilendra Deshapriya.

Q: Thanha Rathi Ranga took part in many international film festivals. Let's start the conversation from there.

A: I simply just did this film for myself. Never expected such an acceptance from the international film festival arena because it's simply myself expression. As this is my debut film I tried my best to be honest with all the characters and every scene of the film. I strongly believe that if you are not true or passionate about what you are going to say through your art piece, there's no way of reaching the masses.

Talking about the recognition Thanha Rathi Ranga received in many international film festivals, I think it's because the film is deep rooted in Sri Lanka. That story cannot be created anywhere else. Because the historical incident which happened on 2009 May 18 really happened in Sri Lanka. So it's unique to its context which was embraced by the international film festival arena.

So far Thanha Rathi Ranga took part in 22 film festivals worldwide and there are more to come. It received the Best Film award at the I Will Tell International Film Festival in London recently. I was amazed to see the citation the Jury has written for the film and I never expected someone to quote Fedrigo Fellini on par with my work which still gives me goose-bumps.

Q: As this is your debut film, most of your crew are also new to the industry. Talk about the experience of working with 'freshers' in your debut film.

A: Yes, I think that's the success story of the film. Including the two script writers Sarath Kothalawala and Kumara Thirimadura, all the technicians including the cinematographer Dhanushka Gunathilake, the music directors Gayathri and Anupa Khemadasa, the associate director and producer Natasha Dream and the first assistant director Veronika Marasinghe, are newcomers to the industry. I think because of this team a lot of freshness could be added to the film and it would be a complete different story if I tried out with professionals. I had my vision and they supported me immensely within their purview. Therefore the honour and the respect received for the film should go for them and also to my country.

Q: The script of the film was written by Sarath Kothalawala and Kumara Thirimadura who are the main actors of the film. How challenging is it when directing somebody else's script?

A: This script has been written as soon after the war was over. The script writers were tried out for funding for the film and then I got the script. Soon after I read it I decided this is going to be my debut. However any director who's directing somebody else's script would rewrite the script the way he/she wants. When you put the text into visual medium the director become the author and rewrite the script as he visualise its' scenes. However I never changed the basics of the initial script and the structure which is character driven.

Q: Let's talk about the cast of the film. The leading three characters are not familiar faces in Sri Lankan cinema but all of them have made their mark in teledramas and theatre. Why did you choose this cast?

A: I did something that main-stream cinema doesn't do. I had a series of workshops with all the actors, I didn't make a commitment to anybody but I just continued the workshops on a daily basis and picked the actors with a lot of care and patience. It's quite important for me that the main three protagonists of the film know all the mechanisms and mannerisms of a three-wheeler driver. So it was a strenuous process that I think I was successful in at the end.

Q: The theme song of the film is a onetime ground-breaking film in Sri Lankan cinema - Milla Soya by Boodi Keerthisena, which I felt is not that relevant with the theme of your film. Why did you choose that song for your film?

A: It's due to a quite personal reason which led me to choose that song at the beginning of the film. It was the time that I was developing this story in my mind and while I was driving, I heard this song on the radio. I have watched this film and Boodi is my good friend too. Filmmaking is all about beat and the rhythm.

Actually this particular song became the catalyst of the film and the whole film grew according to the rhythm of that song. So as Boodi is my buddy I thought that's going to be the greatest tribute that I could ever do for the contemporary filmmaker in Sri Lanka.

Q: The music is composed by Anupa Khemadasa and Gayathri Khemadasa. Why did you want them to compose music for your film?

A: When I was planning the film, Gayathri was in USA and Anupa was in Canada. In my cinematic career I have come across very few music directors who really could read and do fine film music. Roger Manuel was one such music director and used to tell that you don't have to underline situations with music. Music tells a different story and there's no need of fall in the same lines of the story and music which they can be developed in different paths and individually.

In that context I met these two wonderful music directors who understood the very minute I explained what I want in my film. Luckily Anupa and Gayathri grew with the great maestro who started his music at 3 a.m. in daily. They didn't have any other option other than to listen to their father's piano notes. They also mastered their instruments in Czechoslovakia and they actually could inject new blood into my film.

Q: You are one of the trendsetters in the history of Sri Lankan television. What made you to twist your career into film-making?

A: Television is my bread and butter. It is something that I always can revisit. I would die in hunger for cinema because cinema is a religion for me. My passion for cinema started when I was only seven years old. My grandmother who was a social worker at that time used to tell me bedtime stories everyday and my mother used to do the same when I was a kid. I still remember the very first day that my grandmother took me to a cinema hall to watch a movie; I remember I protested the situation and cried loud. However, the magical moment I still remember is when the curtain gradually went up and there was pin-drop silence.

I had to stop my protest and really got charmed by the images which were larger than life. That was the day I fell in love with cinema. So since I was seven and up until today there's hardly a day that I spent without watching a movie.

Q: What are your future plans in cinema?

A: My next film will be They Dance Alone which will be produced by Bandula Gunawardhana. I wrote the script a long time back in 1995 and it is about Richard de Zoysa, the famous journalist and actor who was abducted and killed during the riots and the story about his mother's mission, Manorani Sarawanamutthu's. Due to lack of funds I couldn't do the film in that time and I joined television.