O Friend, This Waiting! - Dr. Sunil Kothari

O Friend, This Waiting! is a film on Kshetrayya’s padams by Bharatanatyam exponent Justin McCarthy and Sandhya Kumar. Made in 2012, it won an award in art film category at the 63rd Film Festival. It is an unusual film weaving in poetic sensibilities of both the film makers and exquisite visuals by cameraman Amit Mahanti.
The film of 32 minutes duration is unusual in the sense that with the padams of the Telugu poet Kshetrayya, one expects that there will be more of abhinaya performed by a dancer. However, the script writers Justin and Sandhya have focused on evoking a mood through brief words about devadasis: sacred and profane, a maid of gods and prostitute, her disappearance. The poems she danced portrayed intense love for gods, then for Kings, patrons, her social status commented upon with exquisite visuals of the river, the palace, the flowers, the lotus leaf, a garland, two feet with ankle bells, green leaves, interiors of the palace, old mansion with stained glasses, school children running in a building with old architecture- a cascade of images, often breathtaking which linger long in memory after the film is over.

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