My earliest memory of N.L.Balakrishnan is his role as the bird watcher in ‘pattanapravesham’, in search of the elusive bull finch. The funny sound of that bird (not sure whether that’s how it sounds for real. A few years back, some of us googled and youtubed unsuccesfully to find the truth) used to play in my mind whenever this bearded big man’s name came up. That’s perhaps the only role of his, or maybe onemore in Kakkothikkavile appooppanthaadikal that left an impression in my mind. But thanks to the mathrubhumi weekly, which decided a few years back to run a series based on his still photographs, many of us learned more about the remarkable man whose physique we used to laugh at. That series, titled ‘Aa Photoykk pinnil’ (Behind that photograph), read like the history of Malayalam parallel and middle cinema, literature and arts. Behind the scenes photos, like this first one with filmmaker Aravindan, writer Zachariah and two others posing like convicts, the second one- a still from Shobhana’s debut, third from Aravindan’s Kaanchana seetha, fourth — a lighter moment between poets kaavalam and P.Bhaskaran, the last — filmmaker Padmarajan with an artist whose name I cant remember. More than the photographs, it’s those little evocative notes filled with anecdotes written by the big man himself, which accompanied these photographs that made it so precious. Every week, when mathrubhumi arrived, I used to flip straight to the centrespread, where Balakrishnan’s photographs would appear. That series ended sometime last year, and was later replaced with archival pictures by another photographer. Missing was the charming down to earth writings of the fat man, who found it hard to survive each day without a full bottle of liquor and a plate of pork. In a society where hypocritic sermons against liquor earned people respectability and positions, he started a forum for better spirits to fight for the drinker’s rights. And a look at his book shelf is enough to put as all flipkartians and amazonians to shame. Salutes, big man!
Posted on: Fri, 26 Dec 2014 18:48:22 +0000