Janani (1993 film)

Janani (1993 film)
Roopa Ganguly in a still from the film
Directed bySanat Dasgupta[1]
Screenplay byPartha Banerjee
Ashutosh Sarkar
Sanat Dasgupta
Story byMahasweta Devi
Produced bySanat Dasgupta[2]
StarringRoopa Ganguly
Debesh Roy Chowdhury
Shuvojit Dasgupta
Gyanesh Mukherjee
Edited byProsanto Dey
Music byPartha Sengupta
Running time
130 minutes
CountryIndia
LanguageBengali

Janani[a] (lit. 'Mother') is a 1993 Bengali film directed and produced by Sanat Dasgupta[b] with a financial assistance from National Film Development Corporation of India.[4][5] The film narrates the life of a little boy and his ostracized mother who is isolated from him as she is believed to be a witch in the village she lives in.[6][7] It is based on a Bengali short story named Bayen (Bengali: বাঁয়েন) written by the renowned Bengali author Mahasweta Devi.[8] It was scripted by Partha Banerjee, Ashutosh Sarkar and Sanat Dasgupta himself.[9] The music of the film was scored by Partha Sengupta.[10] It stars Roopa Ganguly in the central role.[11][12]

The film won the National Film Award for Best Film on Other Social Issues in 1993 for its delicate portrayal of an obscurantist practice like witchcraft, prevalent in certain parts of the country.[13][14] The film was internationally screened under the title Mother.[15] For its social issues, the film attracted attention at several international film festivals. It was nominated for the Crystal Globe Award but lost to Mariano Barroso's film My Soul Brother (1994).[16] It won the Prize of the Ecumenical Jury - Special Mention at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, 1994.[17][18] It was also screened in the category "Cinema of Today : Reflections of Our Time" at the Montreal World Film Festival, 1994.[19] It was also screened at several other international film festivals including Cairo International Film Festival, 1994 and Dhaka International Film Festival, 1994 as closing film.[20] The film was not theatrically released in India.

  1. ^ "Roopa Ganguly on playing Draupadi in Mahabharat: I made double the effort, reported to sets at 5 am". Top Lead India. 29 May 2020. Retrieved 16 October 2021.
  2. ^ "হারিয়ে যাওয়া সেই ছবির কথা". reader.magzter.com. Anandalok. Retrieved 19 March 2020.
  3. ^ "Media Gallery -". sanatdasgupta.weebly.com. Retrieved 29 May 2017.
  4. ^ "Janani (1993)". The Times of India. Retrieved 29 December 2019.
  5. ^ "Mahasweta Devi on celluloid". The Statesman. 3 August 2019. Retrieved 9 December 2019.
  6. ^ "SM2-Gender: LESSON 2 GENDER, CULTURE AND HISTORY". sol.du.ac.in. Retrieved 5 June 2017.
  7. ^ "Bengali films | Talking about cinema | Page 6". chasingcinema.wordpress.com. Retrieved 5 June 2017.
  8. ^ "JANANI (1994)". BFI. Archived from the original on 20 August 2017. Retrieved 30 May 2017.
  9. ^ "Media Gallery -". sanatdasgupta.weebly.com. Retrieved 30 May 2017.
  10. ^ "Media Gallery -". sanatdasgupta.weebly.com. Retrieved 30 May 2017.
  11. ^ "Watch video: BJP MP Roopa Ganguly sings at farewell ceremony as she retires from membership of Rajya Sabha". Free Press Journal. Retrieved 31 December 2023.
  12. ^ Janani (in Polish), retrieved 17 June 2017
  13. ^ "Directorate of Film Festival" (PDF). iffi.nic.in. Archived from the original (PDF) on 28 September 2011. Retrieved 29 May 2017.
  14. ^ "National Film Awards (1993)". gomolo.com. Retrieved 21 July 2019.
  15. ^ "KVIFF | Mother". www.kviff.com. Retrieved 29 May 2017.
  16. ^ "My Soul Brother: a film by Mariano Barroso. Film at Spain is culture". www.spainisculture.com. Retrieved 21 July 2019.
  17. ^ Cite error: The named reference Kar was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  18. ^ Visarius, Karsten. "Interfilm - Das Netzwerk kirchlicher Filmarbeit!". old.gep.de. Retrieved 23 July 2017.
  19. ^ "Awards & Achievements -". sanatdasgupta.weebly.com. Retrieved 29 May 2017.
  20. ^ "Awards & Achievements -". sanatdasgupta.weebly.com. Retrieved 30 May 2017.


Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).