Cinema Bandi Analysis

Cinema Bandi (2021)

Directed by: Praveen Kandregula
Produced by: Raj & DK
Written by: Vasanth Mariganti
Streaming on Netflix.

It has a very interesting premise, initially when I watched the trailer - it felt a bit similar to Sainma. Villagers trying to do something with film. But while, watching the film - it has a different tonality. This film has a mix of Tharun Bhascker and Venkatesh Maha - it has the quirks and humor of a Tharun Bhascker film and the humanitarian angle of a Venkatesh Maha film. A lot of the film reminded me of our experiences with short films in college - finding actresses, messing up with basics and learning them the hard way, etc. The screenplay is solid with structure, inciting incident, Act 1, all is lost moment and the redemption. The plot of who lost the camera was interestingly opened by them looking at the videos, and then intercutting to that piece of the story. The climax reminded me of Cinema Paradiso - where they captured the joy people get by watching movies. 

I read a piece on how 'Everybody is a filmmaker at heart' is insulting to filmmaking as a profession, and how you won't say 'everybody is a doctor at heart'. It's an interesting argument, perhaps that comes from a point of view of mise-en-scene and crafting the production design, costumes, hair and make up to communicate something. But I think the idea of films, filmmaking is so broad and perhaps an exact, specific word to use would be content/creator. The film tries to capture the satisfaction of creating - and that satisfaction need not come only with creating art house cinema - it could come from a masala movie, or even a Tiktok video. So the film celebrates creating and is trying to encourage that. I get it, probably the word filmmaker is too broadly used that Martin Scorsese is also a filmmaker, and so is an Insta influencer. But, what's wrong in that? We call everybody humans, that doesn't make anyone any less of a person.