First and foremost, it’s still debatable whether we can call our film market “an industry” or not. From one point of view, we may call it an industry because more than six million Rupees are invested in a single film and a lot of people are benefited from that. On the other side, we’re extremely poor in infrastructures and skills.
Not that I’m trying to boast about myself, but I have to say this: that for the seven months in 2009, the time when I was the chairman of the Film Development Board (FDB), the Nepali film industry constantly saw many new things happening. The Board actively participated in formulating new regulations and policies. But ever since the CPN-UML-led government came in, it wouldn’t be wrong to say that the new political appointments at the FDB have done nothing other than working like puppets of the Ministry of Information and Communication.
Whenever we talk about the Nepali film fraternity, we can’t keep it away from relating its activities with the FDB, which ironically comes under the government which keeps on changing every six months. I’ve to agree everybody plays politics in the Board. Even I did do some politics with the philosophy that with my colleagues like Yuvaraj Lama and KP Pathak, I’d bring right regulations on the track. Ironically, we failed to do so because by the time the government was about to pass our regulation, new political developments trashed all our plans. Ever since then, FDB has remained inactive, and it’ll remain so in the days to comefor the government, nothing else is important than the drafting of the Constitution. Even that’s become a joke by now.
There are bureaucrats in the Ministry of Information who play roles against the upliftment of the Nepali film industry. In their presence, 2010 will also face many struggles. The three important things that the government must consider and implement in 2010 are: it should provide career security to the artistes; it should guarantee stability and progress of the industry; and it should protect and add infrastructures for the industry.
Well, talking about production, I can see a lot of big-budget movies made in 2010. Remote places of Nepal like Jumla and Mugu will have their own cinema theaters in the localities in 2010. With more than forty cinema halls screening Nepali films in India, Nepali films will do better in internationalizing itself. Big budget productions of more than 10 million Rupees like “Katha Karnaliko” and “Goodbye Kathmandu” will be released. Digital cinema will have its own audience, but the trend of copy pasting tidbits and making digital cinema will create loopholes in the industry.
Not that we don’t have industrialists and businessmen to invest handsomely in making cinemas worth watching. But the trend of looting them and wasting their money for useless purposes by the direction team will continue, and this will become a barrier to many for exploring into wider horizons.
Script plays the most important part in any film. Sad but it’s true that we’re worst off with scripts because we’ve been following “four cheesy songs and four fight sequences blended with rich and poor chemistry” formula in writing scripts. If this is to continue, nothing much can be expected in 2010 too.
Creativity shouldn’t be barred. Scriptwriters should be free to write their original stories, rather than fulfilling the wishes of producers. Creativity isn’t a lake that confines itself to a certain limitation; it’s rather like a river, it keeps flowing to any directions.
Films produced by I/NGOs will also do nothing big for the Nepali film industry in 2010 because most of these films are made for a limited audience with special purposes. I agree that these organizations have made movies for socially aware people, but their outreach isn’t huge. Heavy investments remain advantageous to only a few people and will remain so in the days to come.
We don’t need a bunch of award ceremonies to recognize and pay respects to film artistes. One worthy and respectable award ceremony under the government will do a lot. And yes, if the influences of foreign movies aren’t monitored carefully, it’ll take no time for Nepali films to go back to zero.
Ganesh Bhandari is former chairman, Film Development Board. He is currently the General Secretary, All Nepal People’s Cultural Federation, and In-charge, All Nepal Film Association
(As told to Avash Karmacharya)
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