Synopsis

About the director

Buddhadeb Dasgupta (b. 1944) is one of the leading Indian filmmakers of the middle generation, and his films have won a number of domestic and foreign awards: e.g. Distance (Duratwa, 1978), Blind Alley (Andhi Gali, 1984) and The Red Doors (Lal Darja , 1996). He says of his film The Wrestlers, which won Best Direction at the Venice 2000 IFF and the Audience Prize at the Three Continents Festival in Nantes: “This is a film about my time, my country. It is an image of our intolerance, it tells of the eternal tension between beauty and ugliness, of dreams that cannot die. It is not just a story about violence, but also one of innocence, decency and simplicity which, however, may also become the source of destruction. We should remember that millions of people from the developing world have little idea about life beyond their frontiers, they have no awareness of even basic modern technology. These people are uneducated, superstitious, politically ignorant, yet they have profound human qualities – the capacity to love and to patiently endure suffering.”