Rishabh Shetty, Prakash Belawadi, Ashwini Iyer Tiwari on Cinema and culture – When Local is Universal
India is the land of stories. Bharatha Natyashastra explains many things about natya i.e dance and angika abhinaya.
When you narrate your local story is that international?!
Rishabh Shetty: We like ajji kathe stories from our grandmother. Whether it is Ajji from the west or from Kundapur. Stories regarding mother nature are universal and touch everybody. Nature worship is evident and it is everywhere. A mother’s love is the same throughout the world.
Prakash Belawadi: At present we have a concept of the nation-state. Local is global. Nativity helps to access the culture. Wherever you go in India cultural practices may be almost different but the cultural values are the same.
Ashwini Iyer Tiwari– India has many stories to tell. India is an aspirational nation. But most of us are aping western culture. But today we feel proud about our Indianess. We are the younger generation, we represent the younger generation of our country.
Rishabh Shetty: when it comes to Kantara I had a producer and a good budget so our Kantara clicked. The audience brought much fame to Kantara. Kantara was not just a story of a Daiva. It is the story of a backward section of society. We have bridged art and commercial aspect of the cine world.
Belawadi: what becomes global that is actually local. It only becomes global when the filmmaker has that ethnocentric identity.
Rishabh Shetty: I won’t put boundaries for my stories. It goes with the flow. There are a lot of revolutions that took place with cinema. After watching Gandhada Gudi of Dr Rajkumar, most of the people joined the forest department.
