'In Search Of Rahat'.

                                                      


                                                        

                                                                   Rahat Yusufi

A couple of years ago I finally was able to contact  my fellow film maker Rahat Yusufi after a gap of five years.For five years I had no idea where he was and nobody I knew could tell me about his whereabouts in Bangalore where he lived. He had separated from his family and was on his own. As he was generally perceived as  an eccentric person I feared for the worst when I could not locate him. So there I was talking to him one fine morning, his voice voice coming clearly excited from a village in Ratnagiri Dist. in Maharashtra.He was well and was part of a school in a village called Panhale on the border of Maharashtra and Goa.The school was run by Vasant Gangavane, a well known activist friend we all knew. Rahat had been residing in the school campus for the last five rears and was surviving by making small documentaries for the activists and NGOs of that region.and was taken care of by the school. A great sigh of relief!

During the conversation, he told me that he had the basic equipment to make small films on his own and described the beautiful place he lived in which sounded very nice to me..He invited me to visit him and since I was in a wandering mood I promptly accepted the invitation. He said that I could stay with him in the school guest house where he himself was residing and the food was provided by the school mess.That was perfect. When I gave a serious thought to his invitation I decided that to make my trip more meaningful I must do something there in terms film making since he had the means to make films.So I suggested to Rahat that we make a film there while I was there. He asked me "On what?" and I said almost spontaneously "On ourselves".I told him in a  lighter vein that since nobody was making a film on us why not make a film on ourselves.But I told him that the film need not be in  the mode of self glorification but just a record of our lives in a certain factual manner, what we have done, what we think and our cinema. Suddenly it was making sense: we decided that we can take care of the camera alternately while we shoot each other and construct a film. The prospect of vising this obscure village Panhale was becoming even more exciting..

So there I was one clear night on  a train to Ratnagiri with my personal belongings and a set of digital video tapes and an extra battery for the camera Rahat had asked me to bring with me. I followed his instructions and got down at Ratnagiri station,walked to the main road, took a bus to a town called Lanja on the highway leading to Goa from where Panhale was just four kilometers down the road. After two and a half hours of journey when the bus turned into the bus stop of Lanja I saw Rahat eagerly waiting there at the corner. When we hugged each other I found a much thinner and older looking Rahat but a very happy one to see me. Vasant Gangavane's son Vishu had brought him to the bus stop in their little yellow Nano car to receive me.That was my first ride in a Nano. After we turned left after four kilometers of drive towards Goa after a  hundred meters  the school building appeared  on the right side of the road and then after a short distance on the left the hostel compound and the guest house where Rahat lived..I had arrived for what was going to be one of my most memorable film-making experiences my life!

Once I settled down and got familiar with the environment, we met Vasant Gangavane and his family and saw the village surroundings.The very next day  we were on he road with the camera and accessories. Just two of us: Rahat and myself. The smallest film unit I ever worked with! I had never operated a camera myself before but very quickly I learnt the basics and I took my first shot of Rahat sitting under a  big tree, Rahat's favorite spot. Since the camera had option for only a built-in microphone we did not need a sound recordist; not that we had choice. We just started shooting whatever came our way while wandering along the landscape.Things started flowing easily. Rahat and I began from where we had left last time when we met, whenever it was, alternately taking over the camera while taking to each other.

Two days passed and  I started constructing the film in my mind. I realized that the film was becoming a little ambiguous. It needed more focused  approach.It  was Rahat's space: he lived there and led a certain way life.The film had to be about Rahat Yusufi. I told this to Rahat. Rahat tried to protest but I convinced him that it made more sense than making a very vague description of our lives.That is when the roles got divided. I took over the camera and sat behind it and Rahat became the subject of the  film. Then I began constructing the film in my mind from that point of view as I went along shooting the film. In house he lived, the school to which he was  connected and the open spaces around. I started talking to Rahat and he started recounting his life from his childhood to the present state he was in. So there I was shooting in a beautiful unobtrusive environment: the landscape, the trees and the spiders, the village, its people most of all the beautiful lovely children of the school.I cannot describe how liberating the experience of making this film was for me It was eating, sleeping, breathing and  walking cinema. No producer, no script, no cameraman to explain the shot to, no light boys, no production manager....and no audience in the mind. Just two of us interacting with each other and at times I alone with the camera in the wilderness. On some occasions Rahat would take over the camera from me and talk to me randomly whatever he felt like.But in my mind I kept on constructing the film and took  it to a logical conclusion, all about the life of Rahat Yusufi. At times it all looked so absurd and weird, just two us sitting in an open landscape recording a serious interview about life and cinema while the traffic moved relentlessly  some distance away on the Mumbai Goa highway!

That two weeks of shooting, roaming,eating drinking and talking  was one the  most fulfilling experiences of my life.In  two weeks I shot by way interviews the life of Rahat Yusufi in his own words, the environment he lived in and the beautiful landscapes of Ratnagiri district.For Rahat it was like getting back to civilization  He got reconnected to his friends and got links to others who lived far far way in foreign lands. I left Panhale on a big high. I had gone through an experience of film making which was free of  any anxiety  and I could practice my art without any doubt whatsoever in my mind. It has been quite a while since I shot the film and I have seen  the rushes of the film several times, much admired by my friends and admirers, but for some reason I have not got down to editing  the film as yet. Meanwhile Rahat has  edited a simple version of the film with his own perspective.He  has put up that version of the film on a site for people to have window to his life. It is a concise version of the film but nevertheless it gives an idea of what transpired there in that fortnight in Panhale. It was for me a celebration of my life in cinema.I hope to make another version of the film as soon I get an opportunity to do so and screen it for everyone to see. The film will be titled "In Search Of Rahat".

Meanwhile if you do wish have a look at the edited version by Rahat Yusufi click on <http://www.cultureunplugged.com/storyteller/Rahat_Yusufi#/myFilms> If possible I will  put up some  portions of the 'Rushes' in this blog whenever possible. 

Vishnu Mathur.

August 20, 2013.