Sarasaviya Film Festival and the fortunes of Sinhala cinema

Kalakeerthi Edwin Ariyadasa

Sarasaviya Film Festival, affords a strategic vantage point, to take a gainful bird’s-eye-view of the sixty-year-old sweep of the history of Sinhala cinema. In historical hindsight, it can be unambiguously asserted, that, the tradition of film festivals in Sri Lanka, was initiated by Sarasaviya - the film journal way back in 1964.

A whole series of film festivals followed in its wake. But with all that, even today, Sarasaviya Film Festival enjoys the position of the standard-setter.

The current 31st Sarasaviya Film Festival is, without any doubt, a far-cry from its early beginnings. In their pioneering days, Sarasaviya Film Festivals were rather a tame affair.

They held those early festivals, mostly at venues, located away from the centre of the city, as if thy were afraid to make too much noise. But, today, in contrast, a Sarasaviya Film Festival is a crucial cultural event in the country, involving a multitude of cities and communities.

First Sinhala film

The film community and the public at large, look upon this annual film festival as a defining event, in the process of the evolution of cinema culture in Sri Lanka.

As Sarasaviya Film Festival celebrates its 43rd year, Sinhala cinema itself has travelled some way, beyond its 60th year of existence, since the first Sinhala film appeared on the 21st of January 1947.

When Sinhala cinema had its birth sixty years ago, the world was still in the throes of the aftermath of a global war.

In Sri Lanka, then known as Ceylon, near universal employment and war-induced inflation ensured a steady flow of cash to most people, bringing in its slip-stream a euphonic sense of sudden affluence. The ever-present threat of death and destruction, inevitable in times of war, though muted to an under-tone, unleashed a keen urge for sensual pleasures.

The most widespread form of entertainment, available to masses of that day, was the legitimate theatre. In the new centres of human settlement, called into existence, through the imperatives of the war-effort, the travelling theatrical companies, received an adoration, that verged on the religious.

The Sinhala actors and actresses, who became mass-idols of the day, could not cope adequately with the ever-burgeoning demand for their plays. The live presence of a given actor or actress could happen only at one place at one time.

If the theatre companies were keen to rake in the available Shekels in a large volume, they had to devise a method of multiplying the appearance of these actors and actresses, so that they could perform simultaneously at several centres.

The crucial question was how could this “miracle” be achieved? Cinema, of course, held the key to the solution of this problem. The proposition was simple: convert the stage play into its “photographed” version-have several copies of it made and you get a simultaneous island-wide audience for your “play”. This exactly ways the thinking, that resulted in the birth of the first Sinhala film.

Stark economic factor

Thus, we begin to see, that, it was the stark economic factor, rather than the creative, artistic or the aesthetic, that determined the coming into being of Sinhala cinema.

The historical necessity that compelled the pioneering Sinhala film-makers to seek South Indian technical facilities and directorial talent, imparted a marked theatrical bias to the first Sinhala films. Viewed objectively, we have to accept the fact, that, this was a historically inevitable development.

However, it was to the credit of the Sinhala film-goer that he grew tired of this kind of film-fare, within the first decade itself. Unlike in our neighbouring sub-continent, where mass-taste tends to remain static for ages in the compact society of Sri Lanka, the nature attitudes adopted towards other art-forms, inevitably seep into cinema as well.

In consequence, the generality of film-goers in Sri Lanka discovered before long, that what was offered to them as Sinhala cinema, was neither Sinhala nor cinema in the real sense.

Rekhawa

It is in that background, that, Lester James Peries with his ‘Rekhawa’ (Line of Destiny) of 1956. Shot, almost entirely on location, when out-door film-making was an unheard-of phenomenon in this region, ‘Rekhawa’ was a considerable critical success, though a box-office flop at the time of its initial release.

To my mind, Lester James Peries’ greater achievement is in the field of film-taste. Undaunted and unfazed by the initial box-office failure of ‘Rekhawa’ he persisted.

Eventually, the film-goer escaped the hypnotic grasp of the formula-film and began to acquire a slowly maturing taste for films made in a truly cinematic idiom. Lester James Peiris is the most notable of Sinhala film-men, to have evolved entirely within the cinema tradition.

Cinematic talent

The 1960’s stand out as the decade that assembled the most spectacular array of cinematic talent in the early days of Sri Lanka cinema.

Lester James Peries’ “Gamperaliya”, released in the mid-sixties, was a climactic meeting in the early history of Sinhala cinema, between an exclusively Sinahala theme and an essentially cinematic interpretation. In 1965, “Gamperaliya” won the award for the Best Film in the Third International Film Festival organized by the Government of India.

Named the “Golden Peacock”, this Award was an impressive feather in the cap of Sinhala Cinema. From then on, the film in Sinhala acquired a prestige it did not possess earlier. People no longer felt that they should be apologetic about the Sinhala film, like an urban sophisticate about the coarse ways of his country cousin.

Golden Decade

I deem it proper to characterize the sixties as the Golden Decade of Sinhala cinema. In the sixties, a feeling for quality started troubling the conscience of most individuals connected with Sinhala cinema either as film-makers or film-goers.

A host of talented film-makers, who were essentially men of cinema, followed Lester James Peries into Sinhala cinema. Some among them, like Piyasiri Gunaratne, had obtained academic and practical film training abroad.

From the sixties on, Sinhala cinema began achieving a freshness through the contribution of such film-men as G. D. L. Perera, Titus Totawatta, Tissa Liyanasuriya, Siri Gunasinghe, Sugathapala Senerath Yapa, D. B. Nihalsinghe, Dharmasena Pathiraja, Ranjit Lal, Vijaya Dharmashri and of course Amaranath Jayatilake.

The momentum of those years, is still being felt in this era of the 21st century.

Of great significance is the evolution of outstanding acting talent. In their versatility Gamini Fonseka, Joe Abeywickreme and Tony Ranasinghe proved world-class. Malini Fonseka, Anoja Weerasinghe, Vasanthi Chaturani earned prestigious recognition, both here and abroad.

What is important to note is that, the transforming presence of these men and women from the early days of Sinhala cinema, still make waves down the corridors of time, enriching the cinema memory of our land.

In later years directors of significance, made a determined effort to venture out of the relative safety of the beaten-track of the formula and to utilise material which was unquestionably indigenous. An inevitable outcome of this trend was the search for social issues that dominated the mind of men and women in Sri Lanka.

Knitting up all these trends and tendencies into a practical resume, one could unhesitatingly state that the seventies opened with Sinhala films moving towards the process of evolving into a national cinema.

But, as the seventies progressed Sri Lankan cinema began to fall victims to unabashed commercialism.

In 1972, the State Film Corporation (now the National Film Corporation) was established in a State-sponsored bid to counter the ills that plagued Sri Lankan cinema.

In consequence, a good part of the cinema landscape of the subsequent years is dominated by the National Film Corporation and its giant presence.

The best achievement, to my mind, of the 35-year-old National Film Corporation, is that it has served as a catalyst for change in the field of Sinhala cinema. The Corporation has brought into being, a diversity of thinking about Sinhala cinema.

In the early days, the NFC paid considerable attention to the setting up of a bank of efficiently created screen-plays, the lack of which was considered the main contributory factor towards the deterioration of the quality of Sinhala cinema.

In the late seventies the character and the quality of the dialogue on Sri Lankan cinema, underwent a sudden change and a tone of unprecedented urgency entered into film-parleys.

Television

The reason for this development was the formal debut of television in Sri Lanka in 1982. In the affairs of Sinhala cinema in the late seventies, something like an atmosphere of life and death was in the air. For the first time since it began, Sinhala cinema was deeply disturbed, driving those connected with it, to an agonised soul-searching. The early 1980s were crisis years for Sri Lankan cinema.

In those years, the predominant fact about the status of Sri Lankan cinema was the rapid dwindling of cinema attendance. With the advent of TV, each home with television, became an exhibition point for films and teledramas.

Over and above this, a considerable number of cinema halls fell victim to terrorist attacks. Adverse impact of TV on cinema, in the early days of television, is a classical situation in international media. There were other threats that affected cinema. This was the VHS, which enabled each home to have its own programme of films. The advanced DVD, is still very much a bar to cinema attendance.

Those who were associated with film-making migrated to the field of teledrama. When, incomes dwindled to a trickle some cinemas had to be closed.

Fortunately for the film industry in Sri Lanka, this gloomy picture has begun to melt away. New cinema halls, rich with advanced equipment, have begun to emerge. Generous investment is made available to film-makers by some outstanding business establishments.

But, with all that, the urgent need is to usher in a new generation of young persons, adequately trained in film appreciation.

Way back in 1969, when the Junior University system was established, I was able to introduce the study of cinema at higher education level.

This effort, sadly, is now in abeyance.

Sarasaviya Film Festival, provides a fitting occasion to nurse upon the fortunes of Sinhala cinema and specifically its present status.

We have award-winning film-makers, whose works receive international accolade.

But, as we greet yet another Sarasaviya Film Festival, the dominant figure in the cinema landscape of Sri Lanka - Lester James Peries has made his farewell film. He is still the establishment to respond to.

It is time we impressed upon those who matter, that an authoritative discourse on the sixty years of Sinhala cinema, is an urgent cultural need.

We could make the current Sarasaviya Film festival, the opportunity, to make a determined commitment to initiate such a responsible and authoritative discourse.

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