[Reader-list] A Throw of Dice (Prapancha Pash), NCPA, Mumbai, 19th October 2012 , 8:00pm

[rohitrellan at aol.in]

A film by Franz Osten with live musical accompaniment by Orchestra Tuten & Blasen

In 1997, a group of film industry stalwarts headed by late Hrishikesh Mukherjee founded the Mumbai Academy of Moving Image as a not for profit Trust. The main intention was to organise an annual International Film Festival of which the film industry and the country can be proud of. MAMI aims to foster a climate of good cinema. Appreciation of good cinema, stripped off all the limiting labels of art and commercial, can only come about through exposure to the best of films the world has to offer. The festival is the first step in that direction.




Renowned Indian filmmaker Mr. Shyam Benegal is the Chairman of the MAMI Board and President of the Festival. In its 14th edition, the Mumbai Film Festival is moving to South Mumbai business district of Nariman Point. With National Centre for Performing Arts complex, Inox, art deco theatre Liberty Cinema and Trident Hotel, all in close proximity of walking distance, a festival complex atmosphere is being established.




Orchestra “Tuten und Blasen”
For more than 30 years, Tuten & Blasen has played it's own kind of music: in streets and squares, in circus tents and concert halls - and in cinemas: film concerts to selected silent movies from the 1920s. In the beginning it was the rough, loud, strange and unexpected that distinguished the music of "Tuten & Blasen". Traces of these features can still be found, but they have been refined. Today their music is a very unique blend of jazz, afro and latin elements.


Warm and full brass sets by David Byrne, polyrhythmical "funeral music" by the Ewe from Ghana, percussive samba and afoxé sounds from Brazil and the Africa-inspired compositions by Hans Schneidermann, the founder of the band, make up the main part of the band´s programme.


For more than 20 years, "Tuten & Blasen" has played live music in cinemas - to various silent movies from the twenties: Anders als die Anderen, Asphalt, Dida Ibsens Geschichte, Die Carmen von St. Pauli and Hamburg hat’s eilig.


The orchestra "Tuten & Blasen" is invited by the Goethe-Institut Max Mueller Bhavan and Mumbai Film Festival and will perform a cinema concert to accompany the silent film "Prapancha Pash - A Throw of Dice (Schicksalswürfel)". After Mumbai, they will perform the same concert in Hyderabad.




Prapancha Pash / Throw of Dice (Schicksalswürfel ) (1929, 80 mins)
The 1929 silent film by German-born director, Franz Osten, is based on an episode from the Indian epic "The Mahabharata". The movie is about two kings vying for the love of a hermit's daughter, the beautiful Sunita. The two kings, Ranjit and Sohan share a passion for gambling and decide to play a game of craps to determine who will marry Sunita. Sunita wishes to marry Ranjit. Ranjit loses the game to the nefarious Sohan and as a forfeit becomes his slave. Sunita soon uncovers the truth about Sohan's evil deeds and to escape punishment he hurls himself off a cliff into the rapids below. Ranjit and Sunita are reunited and married.




This second Indian film by Franz Osten is considered by many to be his greatest achievement. It was shot in black and white on 35mm film. It contains thousands of cast members and animals and was shot on location in Rajasthan.




Nitin Sawhney, composer of the new 2006 score, describes the film as "a cross between Chaplin, Cecil B. DeMille and an early Bollywood movie." On many occasions, it has been compared to a Cecil B. DeMille film for its levels of extravagance.