[Reader-list] compact disks and Celloloid in Punjab

[daljit ami]

Farmers’ suicides and Compact Disks.
With the collapse of Green Revolution the peasantry of Punjab is in crisis. The manifold crisis is being manifested in rising debts, increasing social tension and suicides. Social scientists and journalists are obviating it through studies and reports. The telefilm industry has also responded to this through two films i.e. Karza (Debt) and Rulda Jatt (Suffering Farmer). These two films are exception in the overall trend of comedy and masala films. Both these films have been released by a Bathinda based Audio-Video company Priya. These films have remarkable similarities of theme, language and end. The language is Malbi (a dialect of Punjabi spoken in the south of Satluj river), the theme is indebtedness of peasantry and end is suicide by the farmers. In Rulda Jatt the farmer commits suicide and in Karza the farmer’s whole family commit suicide.
The treatment of these films shows the story is to narrate the things rather then things being natural part of the story. The films have one location (village) and most of the action happens in the house of farmers. The dialogue seems to be lines of an article rather then part of natural conversation.
The sound track of these films has been made in completely unorthodox manner. We are familiar with play back singing but here we have play back artists. The dialogues are recorded in advance and artists take care of lip sync during shooting as the dialogues are played on audio player. In Karza a male voice has been used on three characters whereas a female voice have been used for two characters. No location sound or ambience sound is there whereas there is action going on that is supposed to make sounds. In both the films the tradition story telling singing style (Dhadhi) has been used. In Rulda Jatt the singing and dialogues are in continuity of story whereas in Karza the songs are to add masala (dream sequence, item song) or emotive appeal.
Almost all the artists and both the directors are new to the medium. The Director of Karza has experience of making music video so the hand held camera, crane and track has been used as they are being used in music videos. In the films village seems to be laughing at itself, as there is no other reason to laugh.


Regards
Daljit Ami
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