India’s cinematographer Santosh Sivan honored at the 77th Cannes: Became the first Indian to receive the prestigious ‘Pierre Agenaux Excellence in Cinematography’ Award

The 77th Cannes Film Festival concluded on 25 May. This time, while 4 Indian filmmakers received awards, on the other hand, India’s world famous cinematographer Santosh Sivan was awarded the prestigious ‘Pierre Agenaux Excellence in Cinematography’ honor of Cannes 2024. Along with this, Estonia’s young cinematographer Kadri Koop was given the Special Encouragement Award. Agenaux started this award in 2013. Agenaux, a company that makes cameras and modern lenses for shooting films, is the official partner of the Cannes Film Festival. Agenaux company was the first to invent the SLR (Single Lens Reflex) camera and zoom lens. Not only this, the camera of this company sent close-up pictures of the surface of the moon for the first time on 31 July 1964 in NASA’s Ranger 7 moon mission. In 2013, this company started the Life Time Achievement and Encouragement Award in the field of cinematography in association with the Cannes Film Festival, which is continuing till date. Ceremonial dinner hosted for Santosh This time this honor was given to Indian cinematographer Santosh Sivan. On this occasion, Santosh’s master class and a grand ceremonial dinner were organized at the Majestic Hotel. On this occasion, Cannes Film Festival Director Theri Fremon said that India is a great country for cinema and after a long time, India’s great presence is being seen in the Cannes Film Festival. However, Indian films have been shown in the Cannes Film Festival since the beginning. Fremon praised Santosh and said that he is a genius in his art and he has given cinematography a new artistic height. Emmanuel Sproul, head of the Engenieux company, said that Santosh is one of the greatest cinematographers in the world. He is India’s greatest cinematographer at present. His body of work is the most spectacular. French actress Melanie Laurent and Chinese-French actress Jing Wang also underlined the importance of Santosh. India’s Ambassador to France Javed Ashraf discussed Santosh Sivan’s Hindi films in detail and said that his work is amazing. Recalling the premiere of Mani Ratnam’s film ‘Dil Se’ in Berlin, he said that along with Shahrukh Khan and Preity Zinta, the audience also liked Santosh’s beautiful cinematography. Preity Zinta said – You become relaxed when Santosh is around. On this occasion, actress Preity Zinta also recalled the moments spent with Santosh during the shooting of the film. She said that when you are acting in front of Santosh’s camera, your happiness increases. You become relaxed because you can trust him. You are filled with satisfaction because you feel that some miracle is going to happen. On this occasion, video messages of well-known personalities of Indian cinema were shown in which Shahrukh Khan, Aamir Khan, Mohanlal, Shekhar Kapoor, Vidya Balan and Mani Ratnam etc. shared their experiences of shooting with Santosh Sivan. Santosh has done cinematography for about 57 films and directed more than 17 films. These days he is busy shooting for Aamir Khan and Rajkumar Santoshi’s film ‘Lahore 1947’ and Ritesh Deshmukh’s film ‘Raja Shivaji’. Along with this, he is also busy shooting for his film ‘Juni’. Santosh said – I have been a bad husband. Santosh himself expressed his gratitude on this occasion and said that cinematography is such an art in which no wall of language and countries becomes a barrier. As easily as I work in Tamil and Malayalam cinema, I work in Hindi cinema, Hollywood and world cinema with the same ease. He told that once he was invited by the Cinematographer Association of Japan and he stayed with them for 50 days. He saw that he was singing the famous song ‘Chaiya Chaiya’ from his film ‘Dil Se’. Sivan said that cinematography is a global art and hence it is universal. He said that I have always been a bad husband who often left my wife and son alone due to work. Today they are here and they must be happy. He remembered his parents and grandmother from whom he learned the rich culture of Kerala. Cannes respects not only actors and directors but also technicians: Santosh Santosh said in an exclusive conversation that we Indians should learn from the passion, commitment and style with which the Cannes Film Festival is organized. These people respect and honour not only actors and directors but also technicians. Technicians play a very important role in making cinema. Without them you cannot make films. On the other hand, Santosh said about his long cinematic journey that it has been amazing. I became a cinematographer because I wanted to travel and see the world. You see that one life is not enough to shoot even Hindustan. I have not been able to shoot at many places in India where I have wanted to shoot for years. When I got the membership of American Cinematographic Society 10 years ago, I could have easily settled in Hollywood. But I chose to stay in India because the cinema I can imagine here cannot be done there. When there is so much work to do in India itself, what is the need to go anywhere else? However, if I get an opportunity to work anywhere in the world, I work and come back to my country India. I will take a long break from cinema and do farming. He said that while making a documentary on farmers, I realized that the best work in the world is farming. If I was not a cinematographer, I would have been a farmer. I thought that my son should grow up in a natural environment away from urban pollution, so I bought land in Puducherry and built a house. He also likes all this. I will take a break from cinema and do farming. I cannot do both the jobs together. After completing all the shooting that is left for me, I will take a long break from cinema and do farming. Bollywood is also adopting the South’s formula When asked that when we think about Indian cinema, only Mumbai cinema comes to mind, which is not true. The cinema of Bengal, Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu is also very big, then what will we call an Indian cinema? Santosh said- Now the situation is changing. This is happening slowly. Now we have started using a new word – Pan Indian film. In recent years, South Indian films became very popular in North India, especially Bollywood. Bollywood has also started adopting the South’s formula. At the same time, due to big hero, superhero, larger than life and OTT, you have to make it very big for the theater and have to show it. That’s why now Bollywood is also changing. The voice of the actors and directors is being heard. But I believe that ultimately both cannot be the same. For example, Malayalam cinema has a special character. They must have their own house plan. On the trend of South Indian film directors like Sandeep Reddy Vanga and Atlee making Bollywood films, he said that this is a temporary trend. You remember that Raj Kapoor and Karan Johar also did such experiments. But what happened? They can never be the same. The character of every kind of cinema will remain in India because it is connected to the culture. Author: Ajit Roy (Senior journalist and film critic)

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