Invaluable compendium on Lester’s Rekawa
Adasiya Vasaka Ridee Rekawa
Author: A.D. Ranjith Kumara
Publisher: Fast Publishers (Pvt) Ltd.
Price: Rs. 500
pp 250
Review: E. M. G. Edirisinghe
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RELIGION: Ganapathi
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CINEMA: Lester James Peries’s Rekawa is a landmark production in the
annals of Sinhala Cinema. It commemorated its 60th anniversary recently.
The year 1956 is of great significance for Sri Lanka.
What was realized and imprinted in the socio-cultural and political
sphere still carries and echoes its lasting impact left in the cultural
history of the country, with Rekawa carrying its mark to this day in the
realm of Sinhala cinema.
A.D. Ranjith Kumara, the indefatigable film journalist, in his
fertile imagination sensing the importance of celebrating the 50th
anniversary of Rekawa brings out a commemorative volume which is a
fitting tribute to our national cinema.
Literary accolades made at both critic and scholarly level on Rekawa
over the years are compressed into a single volume of substantial
content which is both a supplement and a compliment to Rekawa.
International cinema
The making of Rekawa forms the very foundation for a prestigious
Sinhala cinema, which exposed the international cinema audience to
Sinhala cinema, hitherto an unknown area restricted only for consumption
of the local audience.
Ranjith’s work itself, being a brief biography of film veteran
Lester, he explains how Lester did espouse the cause of Sinhala cinema
and goes on to introduce our greatest filmmaker to the reader in
fascinating revelations and revealing historical details so that the
cinema artists are treated to a complete study of the path leading to
the first edition of Sinhala classical cinema.
As a feature film artists Lester made two documentaries, Conquest in
the Dry Zone (1954) and Be Safe or be Sorry (1955) for the Government
Film Unit, an institution with which he was thoroughly dissatisfied as
the limited avenues it opened for him to make cinema his chosen future
career.
He decided to quit the Film Unit. Together with his erstwhile
team-mates in the Unit, William Blake and Titus Thotawatte, Lester left
the Film Unit for good to embark on a course to make a Sinhala cinema
which was just 10 years old at the time, and was strongly under the
influence of South Indian cinema by then.
The writer in his extensive coverage of makingRekawa, together with
its production history of the film which took 15 months to complete, the
difficulties, personnel and financial, which Lester and his team had to
confront, makes this volume the most comprehensive study on any single
Sinhala film made upto date.
The grand release of the film Rekawa on December 28 1956 at the Regal
Theatre was graced by the then Prime Minister S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike
whose participation itself reflects the impact the Sinhala movie had on
the people in general.
Rekawa however, was a total financial flop which was an indication
that the filmgoers at the time were out to watch pure entertainment
elements in a movie, and not the art in it or its cultural and social
relevance to the audience.
Significant feature
Most significant feature in the contents is the inclusion of the
entire script of Rekawa with its simple witty dialogues and suave sober
lyrical compositions.
Diverse views, reviews and comments written by such well-known
personalities in the cinema and art as Charles Abeysekera, Somapala
Ranaweera, Karunasena Jayalath, Tissa Abeysekera, Basil Wright, D.C.
Ranathunga, D.B. Dhanapala both in English and Sinhala are arranged in
chronological order mirroring their views on Rekawa in particular, and
the function of cinema in general.
Among those who wrote about Rekawa, one written by the then Minister
of Education W. Dahanayake is manifestly an outburst. His views were
rather devastating but conventional for his peculiarity of expression in
which he condemns the film because it was completely divorced of
Buddhist cultural background which was the predominant feature in rural
Sri Lanka. He believed that it was totally unrealistic, unethical and
alien.
First Sinhala film
In a highly worded commendation, M.A. de Silva says that Rekawa is
the first Sinhala film. However, the film in general attracted both
adverse and salutary comments from film and art critics, which goes to
prove that the Sinhala film at the time was a popular subject of
discussion among the English as well as the Sinhala reading public.
Apart from being the first Sinhala film to be shot on location, it is
also the first Sinhala film to have competed at international film
festivals such as the Cannes Film Festival.
Thus what Ranjith Kumara treasures in his work replete with narrative
as well as research material is of extreme importance for the
enlightenment of the reader seeking knowledge and learning the history
of Sinhala cinema.
Almost every page is well illustrated with scenes from the film and
pictures of the technical staff on location or in the studio. Ranjith’s
compilation is an ideal gift to the cinema enthusiasts and the student
of Sinhala cinema.
It leaves out almost nothing that should have been brought into
commemorate the first screening of Rekawa in 1956. No library on cinema
is complete without a copy of this volume of historical importance
adorning the book-shelves. |
