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Cinema in Calcutta 1897 – 1939 WestminsterResearch http://www.westminster.ac.uk/research/westminsterresearch Journeys in and Beyond the City: Cinema in Calcutta 1897 – 1939 Ranita Chatterjee Faculty of Media, Arts and Design This is an electronic version of a PhD thesis awarded by the University of Westminster. © The Author, 2011. This is an exact reproduction of the paper copy held by the University of Westminster library. The WestminsterResearch online digital archive at the University of Westminster aims to make the research output of the University available to a wider audience. Copyright and Moral Rights remain with the authors and/or copyright owners. Users are permitted to download and/or print one copy for non-commercial private study or research. Further distribution and any use of material from within this archive for profit-making enterprises or for commercial gain is strictly forbidden. Whilst further distribution of specific materials from within this archive is forbidden, you may freely distribute the URL of WestminsterResearch: (http://westminsterresearch.wmin.ac.uk/). In case of abuse or copyright appearing without permission e-mail [email protected] Journeys in and Beyond the City: Cinema in Calcutta 1897 ‐ 1939 Ranita Chatterjee PhD 2011 Journeys in and Beyond the City: Cinema in Calcutta 1897 ‐ 1939 Ranita Chatterjee A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the University of Westminster for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy November 2011 Acknowledgements The successful completion of this thesis was made possible by many who I would like to thank. I especially wish to thank Anadi Bose who generously opened up the studio records at Aurora and provided all possible assistance during my visits there. Thanks are also due to the staff at Aurora who aided in the access to various materials, patiently responded to my many enquiries and offered endless cups of tea while I leafed through file after file. I am grateful to the staff at the archives and libraries I visited over the course of this research, who made available a range of research materials and offered leads to other possible materials, including at NFAI, Pune; Sahitya Parishat, Calcutta, the library at the Film Studies department at Jadavpur University and the National Library. I am particularly grateful to Asim Mukherjee and Swatidi in the National Library for going beyond their call of duty to assist in the research process. Thanks are also due to Mr. Sasidharan, former director at NFAI, for facilitating access to several films. Devajit Bandyopadhyay gave up his time to allow access to his remarkable personal collections. Thanks also to Sugata Sinha for making available various articles and Robin Banerjee for sharing his memories and experience as a film journalist from the 1940s. This thesis would not have been possible without the continued encouragement, support and critical feedback of my supervisor, Rosie Thomas. I thank her for the many enriching conversations, as also for her generosity. Thanks also to Daya Thussu, my second supervisor, for his comments and support over the years. This research was made possible by institutional and financial support by the CREAM research centre at the University of Westminster. I would especially like to thank Peter Goodwin and Joram Ten Brink for support received over the years. A special note of thanks also goes out to Mike Fisher - his assistance and quiet words of understanding lent an air of calmness at frenetic moments. Several people have spurred me on over the years. This project may never have started but for the infectious enthusiasm of Ira Bhaskar and Ranjani Mazumdar and their persistence in promoting film studies in Delhi those many years ago, while Ravi Vasudevan’s writings inspired me to do film history. Moinak Biswas always gave me time at short notice and shared material and information. Steve Hughes’ enthusiasm and belief has been invigorating and inspirational. In particular that one afternoon in Oxford renewed my faith in early cinema research in India. Ian Christie first stimulated my interest in early cinema research and interactions over the years have been enriching. Conversations with Manishita Dass and a shared first encounter of a new archive in Calcutta provided a sense of fellowship in the early stages. Exchanges with Sudhir Mahadevan are always stimulating and anticipated with much excitement. Many friends have sustained me with their friendship over the years. I am grateful to Indira Ghosh for her generous hospitality in Pune, and to Richa and Rajesh for putting me up when I first arrived in London. A loving thanks to Khila, Bhavesh, Devaki, Devyani and Anil Bisht for giving me a home away from home. I also thank Anil Bisht for reading and commenting on the early drafts and Khila Bisht for editing during the transfer stage. I am especially appreciative of the friendship of Jayeeta Lala Chatterjee for being there through the ups and downs of my life in London. Thanks are also due to Jane Huston for her friendship, and to Bagpuss, in whose company much of this thesis was written and whose demand for my attention reminded me that there was a world beyond my desk. To my friends in and around JG 41, thanks for the conversations, the comments and the camaraderie… there are too many to name. A few words cannot adequately express my appreciation for the unwavering belief, support and love from my family. Thanks especially go out to my uncles, Subhendu Ghosh and Ashok Chowdhury, and my aunt, Bharati Roychoudhury who sadly could not continue her struggle to see the realization of this thesis. Thanks to my father for his confidence in all I do, even if he is not always in agreement. I fondly thank my brother for holding the fort while I have been away and for taking time out from his extremely busy schedule to read parts of this thesis. Thanking my mother would be absurd for I can never thank her enough for her support and simply for being there always. I’m sure she was delighted at my decision to embark on this Ph.D and will be utterly relieved at this moment. I dedicate this thesis to Ma. ABSTRACT This thesis is a historiography of early cinema in Calcutta and moves away from the received paradigm of ‘national’ cinema to consider the larger transnational framework within which to narrate histories of early cinema. It also positions the city as a critical frame from which early film historiography can be generated. The study maps out the emergence of the Calcutta film industry, from its beginnings in 1897 to the rise of the studios and its stabilisation by the 1930s. In the process the study challenges received film history to reveal a complex, multi-layered and robust film industry in Calcutta that emerged concurrently with Bombay – a narrative that has largely been written out of nationalist discourses of ‘Indian cinema’. The thesis addresses a lacuna in the history of film in South Asia by shifting the focus to Calcutta, from Bombay; by moving away from the film text to focus on institutional history; and by moving from an interrogation of production histories to placing histories of film circulation at the centre of film historiography. This is the first enquiry based on studio records to discuss film history in India in this period. It accesses rare industry documents found in the archives of the Aurora Film Corporation, the oldest surviving film studio in India. The Aurora papers bring to light new evidence on the everyday workings of the film industry in the 1930s, including details of circulation practices and trans-regional networks that inextricably link the three key industries of Bombay, Calcutta and Madras in complex relationships. The Aurora papers also reveal details of transnational circulation amongst the Indian diaspora in the 1930s and broadens the canvas of enquiry into early South Asian cinema. Thereby this study connects the Calcutta industry to other global film production/distribution centres of London and Hollywood, to other film nodes in colonial India – Bombay, Madras, Lahore, Rangoon – and to other film nodes across the Indian Ocean – in Fiji, Singapore, Mombasa and Baghdad. Table of Contents Prologue i Introduction: Journeys… Into Film History, the City and the Archive 1 The Wonders and Limits of the Archive A Review of Literature Thesis Chapter Outline Chapter 1: Calcutta in the Nineteenth Century 25 The City and its Peoples Culture and Entertainment in the City Nineteenth Century Circuits: Colonial Entertainment, Trade Networks and the Arrival of Screen Technology Chapter 2: Films: The Calcutta Story 50 The Contested Space of Received Film History The Early Years Rise of Silent Features: An Industry in the Making The Studio Era: Industrial Mode of Production The Sound Era Calcutta: Talkies: In Search of a New Framework Madras in Calcutta Chapter 3: Cinema in the City 122 Mapping Cinema in the City Conditions of Cinemas Territory of India: Case Calcutta Chapter 4: Aurora Film Corporation 184 From Company to Corporation Distributors in the Eastern Territory National Ambitions: The Madras Office Distributors for Northern Studios Bombay Dreams: The links with Imperial Movietone Sound Effects: Aurora, Imperial and the Talkies Chapter 5: Transnational Journeys 235 Beyond the Ocean: Aurora’s Transnational Ambitions Global Indian Film Chapter 6: Pushing Boundaries, Traversing Frontiers 257 Appendix 1 277 Bibliography 280 “A Reader asked the other day whether any films were being made in India. I have news of one that Mr. Madon [sic] made in Calcutta some months ago and sent to Pathe’s Paris studios for developing. It is called “Harishchandra” and was played by Indians. The picture was exhibited at the Elphinstone Tent in Calcutta and met with such great success as to encourage the infant industry.
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