Actor Sanath Gunatillake’s maiden direction, ‘Ekamath Eka Rataka’ (Once Upon a Time), a story woven around a strong-willed girl and her strange relationships with two men will be released from June 4 at Regal Colombo and other CEL circuit cinemas around the country.
Based on the short story, ‘Pour une nuit d’amour’ written by the most prominent French novelist of the late 19th century, Emile Zola (1840-1902) the film is played by Sanath himself in the lead role opposite Nirosha Perera. Roshan Ravindra, Chandani Seneviratne, Tony Ranasinghe, Damitha Abeyratne, Semini Iddamalgoda, Chandana Silva, Himali Sayurangi, Kumara Thirimadura, Lioni Kothelawela, Kanchana Kodithuwakku, Nilmini Buwaneka, Duminda Weerawardane, Thanuja Dilhani and Mahinda Silva are the others in the cast.
The story shows how a young girl (Nirosha Perera) from a wealthy and noble family develops an intimate friendship with her nanny’s son (Roshan Ravindra), who becomes a lawyer later on with the help of the noble family itself. This happens despite the parents’ desperate attempt to find a suitable partner for their young daughter who has come back after completing her studies.
At the same time the young girl falls in love with the music played by the ugly, bulky orphan with a deformed face (played by Sanath) who is living in front of this rich family. Her passion for the music will lead to a tragic climax as this deformed person imagines that this young girl loves him, and his entire existence builds around the young girl’s love.
“This story would have happened or could happen at any place, in any country, at anytime to any human being. I feel that the human nature represented in this cinematic work symbolizes some common qualities of which a few could be considered as human weaknesses or human qualities,” said Sanath elaborating about his selection.
Speaking on the discovery of the story Sanath said “Almost 10 years ago, Sudath Rohana, a well-known tele-drama director and also a very good friend of mine related to me a French short story.
The story and its characters fascinated me. He said that he was interested in doing a teledrama based on that and also invited me to play the lead role. But it never happened. When I asked him about it later on, I realized that he had already forgotten it. I was curious to know about this story and wanted to study it,”.
However Sanath who only was aware about the storyline had to undergo a difficult time in finding the original book. “I went in search of Mr. Corporeau, former Cultural Councellor of the French Embassy in Sri Lanka, who introduced his assistant, Juliette Donadieu and she took a great effort to find this story,” the actor turned director said.
Juliette searched for the book on Internet and discovered that the book stocks were exhausted in France. She was able to obtain a copy of this rare book from a Belgian bookshop, with the support of her brother. She offered me the book, Emile Zola’s Naïs Suivi de Pour Une Nuit d’Amour (Emile Zola’s Naïs, followed by For a Night of Love).
Then I was fortunate to meet Ms Niroshini Gunasekera, Senior Lecturer in French at Kelaniya University who provided me with an excellent translation of the book, Sanath reminded those helped him to complete ‘Ekamath Eka Rataka’ with gratitude.
Sanath made a special mention about the late music maestro, Dr. Premasiri Khemadasa who played a vital role writing the musical score.
‘I strongly feel that he was the only person who understood this film perfectly. With his advice, we recorded the fluit, the theme music before filming. Mater’s advice, his explanations were a great encouragement to me in my debut in this career’. I regret and feel unfortunate that he is not alive to see the final outcome of the film, Sanath said in a sad note. |
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