Right from her first documentary, “Gift of Love”, which won awards at various film festivals across the globe, Meera Dewan has produced documentaries for Doordarshan and various government bodies. Her films are known for its unique humanist views, the women's movement, cultural confluences and are chroniclers of events and personalities. Her latest documentary Baba Farid: Poet of the Soul, which was screened recently at the India International Centre, has voices of Vidya Rao and Hans Raj Hans, recitations by Mehmood Farooqui along with inputs from people from different walks of life as well as the subject experts. Produced by the Films Division of the Information and Broadcasting Ministry, the film looks into the life of Sufi saint Farid al-Din Mas’ud Ganj-i-Shakar and travels to various revered Sufi places as it poses contemporary questions for communal harmony and unity. The director talks about her process, filmmaking traditions and challenges in documentary filmmaking.
Meera Dewan
Excerpts:
What intrigued you to make a documentary on Baba Farid?
Previously, I have made a film on Guru Granth Sahib on the multi-religious aspects of it. I tried to focus on Kabirji and to a small extent on Baba Faridji. I thought this is the right time to make a detailed film on Baba Farid as everyone is talking about class, caste and religious differences. He was a man who was thinking beyond this in the 12th Century and was talking about the oneness of humanity. Even till today, he is celebrated among Sufis, Sikhs and Muslims.
What was your approach ?
I had a collection of books on Baba Farid in different languages and I had subject experts on the topics and the languages including Professor Syed Akhtar Hussain who guided me throughout and he gave me some students who knew Persian and Urdu. It is so beautiful in every language and each version is based on harmony.
How important was it to go to Faridpur and shoot the city?
Faridpur is like a dream city and it is not a metaphor for it but a reality. It is a fairytale town as the harmony is present and the living tradition is still alive. One elderly gentleman at the Baba’s place, who is over 90 years of age, is putting all his effort to propagate Baba Farid’s philosophy. It is wonderful to see someone practising those things which Baba Farid did.
How long did you take to shoot the film?
It was shot in Faridpur, Bakhtiyar Kaki Dargah, Baba Farid’s guru and many places in Delhi and it took us around nine months to complete the film.
The film could have been your own experiential piece of finding Baba Farid in present time...
Because there are only certain things which you can conceptualise and visualise and for other things you need some experts. It required some underlining and knowledgeable and credible people talking about the subject. I wanted the historical aspects to come at the opening of the film. That is why it has a professor talking about the historical aspect of Sufism. And the graphic shows the movement of Sufis from West Asia to the Indo-Gangetic plains of India. It reflects how they came to live here in India and became a part of India and never considered as looters and plunderers.
The good thing is the recurring music which is overlaid with poetries. What all went into the selection of the poetries?
I tried to use the poetry from different languages connoting different metaphors which were representative of a range of themes that Baba Farid actually talked about. I did not want to make a film about the facts of his life, I wanted to put it out as it existed.
How did you place them in the film?
There were many poetries which had to be linked in such a way that it may form a narrative and I wanted to start with the simpler ones. Gradually, it comes to the more complex ones and covers his main themes. Dastangoi sequences describe the atmosphere of the khanqas. How he welcomed women in khanqas as he was the first Sufi to do that. He was the first Sufi to use the metaphor of death as a wedding night. Death is not the end but the starting point when you meet your Maker.
The Bhakti movement picked it up later. Also, all the poetries are from the female point of view. You can see that in a lot of qawwalis like mein tu gayi thi Paniya Bharan ko. Here God is the male and the longing, which is birha, is from the female side.
There was a sequence where two young boys come and hug each other...
They were doing the raqs. Baba Farid was the first one to bring in the poetry in praying as it was something not done before in Islamic way of praying.
He also propagated music as a means to reach the divine and imagining yourself in music. I use this sequence to show the stream of time and also to underline the relationship between peer and murshid. It is not a relationship which is only based on the learning but also on love.
Also, different groups came at different times playing various kinds of music...
Baba Farid is revered in gurudwaras in shabad, his praise is physically present in qawwalis and he is also present in ghazals and you can see his poetry in various musical forms. That is why we included all of them.
Why do you think the recitations and storytelling in the film form an equal aesthetic requirement as the music and poetry?
Every culture has its relevance and through these traditions, people are keeping his message alive in different parts of the world and that is where the multi-faith aspect comes in. These are different forms of communication and it was needed to show that how Persian and Urdu come alive through intonations and pronunciations.
You shot with two different cinematographers. How did you maintain a similar visual language?
I always work with Ajmal Jami and Vilayat Ali. Ajmal was head of the camera team in NDTV for more than two decades. There is more of reality in the film than setting up and we wanted to shoot the real aspects, so both did that. We set it up for the recitations, the poetries and the musical performances. Also, I know the Sikh aspect better but because of these two people, I got to know the Islamic side of it too.
Editing such a film can be a difficult task because you have to link various sequences which have nothing in common. Cutting into another scene without losing out on narrative requires a unique fluidity. How did you achieve the form?
Yes, fluidity is required to direct the audience to one thought process. We don’t usually do linear editing as you don't know where it starts and where it ends. We edit a sequence differently at different times. The arrangement of the sequence comes with time and discussion. When the arrangement is done, the sound comes into play to connect them and then the form is in place.
At one sequence, you had superimposition of three frames along with the music. Was that more of an aesthetic requirement than an editing technique?
You may take it as the confluence of cultures and it was very much there throughout the film. The film is about harmony and that has to be done in its grammar too.
Being a pioneer in documentary filmmaking tradition in India, how do you see the present documentary filmmaking?
It has changed a lot but that is good as you have to change with time. People are making documentaries in three months which is also good. We used to take a long duration as a documentary requires subject familiarity. You meet many people, read a lot and that is time-consuming.
What are the challenges?
For documentary filmmakers, it is always about money (laughs).
Now people are more exposed to world cinema because of the web platforms like Netflix or Amazon which are coming up with new kinds of documentaries. Do you think that Indian filmmakers have the competition there?
It is great to see fresher formats in these platforms but I don’t think there is a competition as everything has its place. I just love the new filmmakers from PSBT and the way they are making the films is mind-blowing.
What about female filmmakers?
It is not about male or female anymore. I was the first female to make a film for Films Division way back in 1982. That time it was big. Luckily, we have come to a position today where you may see more women than males in some sets.
I remember you saying that that you thought girls were only good at research until your experience with your assistant editor...
Yes. This was the first time that I met a female who was a tech-savvy, someone who doesn't like to conceptualise and do research.