Abhinetri - Bengali
Shatabdi Roy has acted in over 200 films in Bengali and this is her first directorial venture. The film Abhinetri as the title suggests is about the trials and tribulations of an actress. The lead role is played by Shatabdi herself. I met Shatabdi while she was hurrying to the Vasavi auditorium to address the press with a bouquet in her hands. She had trouble speaking English and managed her Hindi quite well. While she spoke gracefully, she acknowledged compliments and suggestions as well by viewers. One person suggested that she should trim the film a bit and she nodded in the affirmative.
The film has intemittent flashback that shows the lonely life led by the actress after giving up her career. Shatabdi is a top heroine and gets involved with Siddarth her co-star who is not as popular as her. Siddarth is an egotist, arrogant and full of pride and cannot take Shatabdi hogging all the limelight. He inflicts pain on her though she is very understanding and just to hurt her he marries a director’s daughter Eliza after a passionate affair with Shatabdi.
Shatabdi is pregnant and attempts suicide, at that stage her producer helps her out of ignominy and gives his name to her daughter. They do marry but there is only loneliness in their lives because Shatabdi feels that her husband has compelled her to give up her happening career but as a producer he is making films with other heroines. Her husband tries to reason that there is a life beyond an actress but there is never any communication between them. Shatabdi becomes an alcoholic, her husband dies, her grown-up daughter is summoned but to her shock she too anounces that she wants to take films as her career.
The daughter is adamant and resolves to become an actress despite persuasion by her mother and boyfriend. Her boyfriend says that the industry is not a nice place its full of gossip and bitchy women. The young lady says she can’t believe it that knowing her mom is an actress that her lover could speak such things and leaves him. She says a man who can never respect her mother can never respect his lady as well. Meanwhile on the way to address the press to announce her decision of joining the industry she stumbles upon some glossies and gets to know that she is actually Siddarth’s daughter.
She feels betrayed, meanwhile Siddarth returns to Shatabdi and claims for his daughter. What happens is nothing but a continuation of the qualities in the progeny. The daughter tells Siddarth, “After all I have your blood in me”. The film ends on a contradictory note and I found it downright disgusting. The lover dates the actresses daughter knowing very well she is from a filmi family but when she announces that she wants to become an actress he objects. The girl inturn talks like a women in pride but ultimately does what the lover wants, refuses to join the industry.
She willingly jumps into bed with the man she loves but when she comes to know that her mother got pregnant before the wedding and the man whom she actually thought was her father is not troubles her. She realises that a woman is a commodity only when she sees the gossip written by filmi journalists. Till then she says films are her passion. We don’t know films are her passion till one day some old journalist uncle bumps into her and takes her to the producer. The film is very complex, confusing and actually shows that the film industry is not a place for decent (excuse me) girls.
I asked the director cum actress what made her work on a film like this she said it was based on the experience of twenty years in film industry. Whose? The actress says the girl eventually walks away because she was shattered by the truth that the producer is not her original father and that she was kept in dark about that. A confused story about actresses who are used in the industry like commodities. One lady here who says that the industry is full of deceitful people but continues to languish and thrive.
