Tanvir Mokammel (born 8 March 1955 in Khulna

Khulna

Khulna is the third largest city in Bangladesh. It is located on the banks of the Rupsha and Bhairab rivers in Khulna District. It is the divisional headquarters of Khulna Division and a major industrial and commercial center. It has a seaport named Mongla on its outskirts, 38 km from Khulna...

) is a Bangladesh

Bangladesh

Bangladesh , officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh is a sovereign state located in South Asia. It is bordered by India on all sides except for a small border with Burma to the far southeast and by the Bay of Bengal to the south...

i film director. He earned a Masters degree in English Literature at Dhaka University. His filmmaking career started in 1984 with a short film HOOLIYA (WANTED).

Filmography

• "HOOLIYA" (WANTED) / 28 minutes/16mm./B&W/1984/ an experimental film based on a political poem by poet Nirmalendu Goon

• "SMRITI EKATTOR" (REMEMBRANCE OF ’71)/ 60 minutes/ 35mm./ colour/ 1991/ a documentary on the murder of the Bengali intellectuals by the Islamic fundamentalists during the Bangladesh war of liberation in 1971.

• "EKTI GOLIR ATYAKAHINI" (TALE OF A LANE)/34 minutes/ U-matic/1993/ an ethnographic documentary on the life and the present condition of the Hindu conch shell makers living in the architecturally interesting ancient lane of Shakharibazar in Old Dhaka.
• "NADIR NAM MODHUMATI" (THE RIVER NAMED MODHUMATI) 130 minutes/ 16mm./ colour/ 1995/ feature film/ a deconstruction of the Hamlet theme on the backdrop of the Bangladesh liberation war of 1971.

Received three Bangladesh national awards for best story, best dialogue and best song. Shown in Tri-Continental Film Festival, Nantes, France.

• "ACHIN PAKHI" (THE UNKNOWN BARD) / 60 minutes / Beta Cam / 1996/ a documentary on the life and musicology of Fakir Lalon Shah, the doyen among the wandering sect of the folk-singers of rural Bengal known as the Bauls. Shot both in Bangladesh and in West Bengal of India.

Shown in Kathmandu and Sardinia, Italy, documentary film festivals

• "SWAPNAR SCHOOL’’ (A SCHOOL FOR SWAPNA) / 47 minutes/ Beta Cam/ 1996/ a documentary film about the alternative schools for the poor adults in Bangladesh and on the prospect of their education.

• "CHITRA NADIR PARE" (QUIET FLOWS THE RIVER CHITRA) /114 minutes/ 16mm./ colour/ 1998/ a feature film on the destiny of a Hindu family in East Pakistan who refused to migrate from their homeland after the partition of India in 1947.

Received seven Bangladesh national awards including the best film, best story, best script, best art direction and best director of the year. Shown in London, Oslo, Fribourg (Switzerland), Singapore, Delhi, Calcutta and Trivandrum film festivals.

• “IMAGES AND IMPRESSIONS” / 46 minutes/ 1999/a documentary on the ideals of the Folk High Schools in Denmark.

• "LALSALU" (A TREE WITHOUT ROOTS) 110 minutes / 35mm. / 2001/ a feature film based on the novel LALSALU, perhaps the best novel written on the rural Mulsim community by Syed Waliullah. The story centres around the life of a Mullah who established a false shrine in a remote village in Bangladesh.

Received eight Bangladesh national awards including the best film, best script, best cinematography, best sound and best director. Jury's special mention, 1st International Film Festival, 2003, Dhaka and shown in London, Rotterdam, Montreal, Quebec, Cinenouvo (Belgium), Jeonju (South Korea), Fukuoka (Japan) Tronoto (Bongo Festival) and Delhi International Film Festivals.

• "OIE JAMUNA" (A TALE OF THE JAMUNA RIVER) 60minutes/ Betacam/ 2002/ a documentary, a journey- film on the Jamuna river . The film-maker on a boat follows the mighty Jamuna all the way from where the Jamuna enters into Bangladesh to downstream where it confluences with the Padma, another major river of the Indian subcontinent. The film shows the condition of the Jamuna river and the people living beside it.

• "LALON" 35mm. / 2 hours 20 minutes / 2004/ a feature film on Lalon Fakir, a mystic song-composer of the 19th century steeped in Sufi tradition, Hindu Vaisnabism and Buddhist Tantrism and also a Guru among the Baul-Fakirs of Bengal. Lalon composed few hundred songs with profound depth and excellent sense of music. The film depicts the life and persona of Lalon Fakir using the lyrics of his songs.

Received Bangladesh national award for best Art Direction, 2008. Shown in Fukuoka (Japan), London, Cleveland, competitive section in Dhaka and in the of Goa (India) international film festivals and in Musée Guimet, France.

• "KARNAPHULIR KANNA" (TEARDROPS OF KARNAPHULI) 60 minutes/ Betacam/ 2005/ a documentary on the plight of the Chakma, Marma, Tripura, Mrung and other indigenous people of the Chittagong Hill Tracts.

The documentary was banned by the government of Bangladesh. Shown in Kathmandu documentary film festivals and in Musée Guimet, France.

• "RIDERS TO THE SUNDERBANS" (BONOJATRI) 60 minutes/ Betacam/ 2005/ a documentary/ a journey-film, in which the film-maker follows the odyssey of a group of fishermen's wives crossing the Sunderbans, the biggest mangrove jungle in the world. Through their journey the film unfolds the present condition of the jungle and also the plight of the poor people living around it.

• "BOSTROBALIKARA: GARMENT GIRLS OF BANGLADESH" 60 minutes/ digital video/ 2007/ a documentary on the female garment workers of Bangladesh depicting their lives, working condition and dreams.

Received the award of best documentary film of the year by Bangladesh Federation of Film Societies. Shown in Musée Guimet, France.

• "TAJUDDIN AHMAD: AN UNSUNG HERO" (NISSONGA SARATHI)100 minutes/ digital video/ 2007/ a documentary about Tajuddin Ahmad, the first premier of Bangladesh, who in absence of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, successfully led the liberation war of Bangladesh in 1971.

Received the award of best foreign language community documentary film by TVS television channel, Australia.

• "SWAPNAPHUMI" (THE PROMISED LAND) 90 minutes/ digital video/ 2007/ a documentary about the Urdu-speaking community of Bangladesh, popularly known as the Biharis.

Received the Award of second best documentary film by Film South Asia Film Festival, Nepal, 2009.

• "RABEYA" (THE SISTER)/ 35mm. / 105 minutes/ a feature film/ a deconstruction of Sophocles's play Antigone on the backdrop of the Bangladesh liberation war of 1971.

Books published

• "FILM AESTHETICS AND TWLEVE DIRECTORS" (Chalachitra Nandantotta o Barojon Director) in Bengali, a book dealing with the film aesthetics of Griffith, Eisenstein, Kuleshov, Pudovkin, Cocteau, Dziga Vertov
  Dziga Vertov
  David Abelevich Kaufman , better known by his pseudonym Dziga Vertov , was a Soviet pioneer documentary film, newsreel director and cinema theorist...
  
  , Stroheim, John Ford
  John Ford
  John Ford was an American film director. He was famous for both his westerns such as Stagecoach, The Searchers, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, and adaptations of such classic 20th-century American novels as The Grapes of Wrath...
  
  , Renoir, Godard, René Clair
  René Clair
  René Clair born René-Lucien Chomette, was a French filmmaker.-Biography:He was born in Paris and grew up in the Les Halles quarter. He attended the Lycée Montaigne and the Lycée Louis-le-Grand. During World War I, he served as an ambulance driver. After the war, he started a career as a journalist...
  
  and Satyajit Ray, Sahitya Prakashoni, 1985.

• "FILM" (Chalachitra), a brief history of the world cinema, in Bengali, published by Bangla Academy, 1987.

• "MARXBAD AND SAHITYA" (Marxism and Literature), a collection of essays, mostly literary criticism and on different authors of Bengali literature, also essays on Gramsci or on the problem of alienation.

• "SYED WALIULLAH, SISYPHUS AND QUEST FOR TRADITION IN NOVEL" (in Bengali), a book of literary criticism on the novels and short stories written by Syed Waliullah, perhaps the most prominent writer among the Muslim community of Bengal, published by Muktodhara, 1988.

• "NICHUTOLAR MANUSH", translation of Maxim Gorky's play The Lower Depths, into Bengali, published by Viswasahitya Kendro, 1997.

• "CHARLIE CHAPLIN: TRIUMPH OF THE TRAMP" (Bhabaghurer Digbijoy), in Bengali, on the life and craft of Charlie Chaplin as an actor and film-maker, Sahitya Prakasoni, 1996.

• "GRUNDTVIG AND GONOSHIKYA", a book on the theories of alternative education for the downtrodden and disadvantaged people of the rural areas, 1997.

• "ART OF CINEMA" (Cinemar Shilparup), in Bengali, a collection of essays on different aspects of the aesthetics of cinema, published by Agami Prokashoni, 1998.

• Also articles concerning different socio-political issues, poems, short stories, book reviews, translation works, theatre and film criticism in different newspapers and journals.

Organisational

• President, Bangladesh Short Film Forum, 1985-1987, 1995-1997

• Vice President, Bangladesh Federation of Film Societies, 1991-1993

• Jury Member, 15th Rabat International Film Festival, 2009

• Director, Bangladesh Film Centre (BFC)

• General Secretary, Ritwik Film Society, 1987-91

External links

• Homepage of Tanvir Mokammel