SOUMENDU ROY

Tollywood’s ace cinematographer

It can easily be admitted that the 67-year old Soumendu Roy is among Tollywood’s ace cinematographers. He considers Satyajit Ray’s cameraman Subroto Mitra his guru as he learnt the ropes from him

It can easily be admitted that the 67-year old Soumendu Roy is among Tollywood’s ace cinematographers. He considers Satyajit Ray’s cameraman Subroto Mitra his guru as he learnt the ropes from him. "I came into the film world by accident," confesses Soumendu, a bachelor who lives alone in his sprawling apartment at Ballygunge Circular Road.

But he is not a loner. He has his books, music, television and of course work to keep him going. Coming from a North Calcutta based joint family, anything remotely connected with cinema or celluloid world was frowned upon by his orthodox family members especially, his father. Young Soumendu spent his childhood in Dharamjaigarh (MP) where his father Kanak Kumar Roy, a lawyer was posted during the British Raj.

His father served as a mediator between the Rani of the place, who gave him quarters for accommodation, and the British Government. Soumendu stayed there till the age of ten and returned to Calcutta for further studies. When he reached class nine, Soumendu came in touch with Asit Raha who had just joined the Tirtopati Institute located close to Roy’s house at Rashbehari Avenue.

Raha’s elder brother had a studio and his family was well connected with the film industry. Without the knowledge of his family members, Soumendu who 14 years then secretly received his first exposure to the shooting of Bengali films at the New Theatres, because of the Raha family.

On completing his matric, his elder sister presented him his first Kodak camera from which increased Soumendu’s passion for photography. Through a relative, Soumendu met veteran director Hironmoy Sen and Roy’s mother informed Sen of her son’s obsession. Since cinema was considered taboo in his family, 20 year old Soumendu gave up his studies as a B.Sc. undergraduate at Ashutosh College, Bhowanipur and was obliged to join the film industry clandestinely.

Hironmoy Sen sent the youth to cameraman Ramananda Sengupta through whom he went as an apprentice to Technicians Studio in 1954. It was around that time that Satyajit Ray was shooting his maiden venture Pather Panchali. The youth was absorbed into the unit as a caretaker operating behind the Mitchell camera used those days and it was a chance of a lifetime that he got acquainted with the likes of Bansi Chandra Gupta and cinematographer Subroto Mitra.

From Pather Panchali to Apur Sansar, Roy worked as an assistant cameraman to Subroto Mitra. His first independent venture as a cinematographer was in the Ray’s documentary on Rabindranath Tagore in 1960 for Films Division commemorating Tagore’s birth centenary. This was followed by Satyajit Ray’s feature film Teen Kanya (Three Women) in 1961.

After this, there is no looking back. Out of the 28 feature films, Soumendu Roy has worked in 15 films directed by Satyajit Ray, his last film being Gharey Bairey in 1984 as cinematographer. After Ray fell ill and was advised complete rest by doctors who suggested that if he had to make film it had to be indoors, Soumendu started looking elsewhere for work. He was involved in the shooting of four Tamil films.

While working for Ray, Soumendu was also doing the camerawork for other directors as well. He cites Tarun Majumdar’s Ganadevta (People’s God) as a case in point. He has 46 years in the industry and 50 odd films as the cinematographer to his credit. He has assisted well-known directors like Tapan Sinha, Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Utpalendu Chakravorty and Aparna Sen in her tele film Picnic.

"I learnt a lot from Manickda (Satyajit Ray) right from camera management to lighting effects and other technical aspects". In his career, there are some mainstream directors with whom Soumendu was involved in films like Victor Banerjee-directed Agun, Abhijeet Sen-directed Devata, Kabi (remake of the Debaki Bose’s film) directed by the late Sunil Banerjee, Suhash Sen’s Bhalobashar Chhoa and Biresh Chatterjee’s Surya Kanya, to name a few.

Currently, two teleserials Begum Mary Biswas, written by Bimal Mitra and directed by Prahab Chowdhury and Ferar, directed by Bidesh Sarkar whose pilot has been completed for the Alpha Bangla channel may be credited with Roy’s cinematography.

About his new feature films, he says, "There are two reasons why I am not working in any feature films right now. Firstly, the kind of films that are being made now does not give me any job and creative satisfaction. The other reason is inadequate technical infrastructure and the current seedy condition of theatre halls, does not inspire me sufficiently to work in feature films."

When asked about the role of the cinematographer in the propagation of good cinema, he says, "The role of the cinematographer is to project the concept and mind-set of the director’s visualisation through the camera lens. I have had no differences of opinion with the directors I have worked with as most were open to suggestions and would accommodate ideas if viable. They were very flexible and if the suggestion of visualisation was good, it was readily accepted."

While talking about the current crop of Bengali films, he was quick to react. "The kind of films being made these days can hardly be called films but, jatra on celluloid."

Cinematographer Soumendu Roy belonged to a generation where Subroto Mitra exerted a tremendous influences on him. To him, the director is supreme but that does not mean that the contributions of other unit members are in no way insignificant. Filmmaking is a collective art instrumental in the end result of what may be termed as good cinema. Gone are those days when team spirit would serve as a pillar to any creative work on celluloid, Roy laments.

Anit Mukerjea