Apart from their celebrated reputation as ambassadors of Bengali cinema, there is one more thing that directors Rituparno Ghosh and Buddhadeb Dasgupta share— the heartbreaking ordeal of seeing their completed films lie in cans. For Dasgupta, it happened with Swapner Din and Kaalpurush, both of which were completed years before they were released. Ghosh’s Khela faced a similar fate. Dasgupta’s much acclaimed Ami, Yasin Ar Amar Madhubala, was completed two years ago and is yet to be released, his Swastika Mukherjee-Indraneil Dasgupta starrer Janala too is complete and is awaiting release. Same is the case with Ghosh’s Jaya Bachchan-Konkona Sen Sharma starrer, Sunglass. Moreover, Ghosh has two other films lined up for release, the Bipasha Basu starrer Sob Choritro Kalponik and Abohoman “It’s quite depressing you know, to see films languish like this. I have given a lot to these projects. They are like my babies. But what can one do? It’s upto the producers to release films,” says Dasgupta.

Interestingly, all the aforementioned films have been festival favourites. Dasgupta’s Ami Yasin ar Amar Madhubala has traveled to Toronto, London and Athens Film Festival while his Janala is all set to be screened at the Toronto Film Festival too. Meanwhile, Sob Choritro Kalponik was premiered at the Durban Film Festival recently before which it was screened at the marketing section of Cannes along with Abohoman earlier this year. “These films are primarily aimed at the festival audience, which is why we choose to take them to festivals around the world before commercially releasing them. Since both Ghosh and Dasgupta are such well-respected directors we seem them as cultural ambassadors,” claims Mahesh Ranganathan of Big Pictures which has produced Sob Choritro..., Abohoman and Janala.

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