Patibana; A movie on a serious social issue that many kept under the carpet
Award winning debut film direction of Rabin Chandrasiri, the producer of one of the landmark films in Sri Lankan film history “Dadayama” (The Hunt”) is now being screened at Ricky Fort, Ritz Borella and other MPI theatres around the country.
Made based on a serious social issue that was and is engulfed in Sri Lankan society, ‘Patibana’ (Perception) won the Best Director award at the recently held SAARC Film Festival 2015 and Introduced a number of fresh faces to Sri Lankan cinema, the film stars Sampath Sri Jayasinghe, Niroshan Wijesinghe, Chandrasoma Binduhewa, Shanika Bandara and many other talented stars.
The story revolves around the issue of killing of people branding them as those connected to the underworld, the film tackles an issues that was not spoken of and discussed in public fora or through mass media.
Assistant directors are Subasinghe A Wijeratne and Harsha Lakshan Dayaratne and the film is edited by M.S. Aliman. Art director is Sirinatha Wickremasinghe, sound recording is by Sashika Ruwan Marasinghe, cinematographer Lalith Maxwel Thomas and musical score is by Nadeeka Guruge.
Story, script and direction are by Rabin Chandrasiri and Patibana is produced by W. G. Seetha De Silva.
Filmmaker Rabin Chandrasiri an ardent film buff from the time he was a child, used to watch all kinds of films including South Indian Tamil and Hindi movies.
A past student of Dharmasoka College, Ambalangoda, Rabin Chandrasiri started his professional career as a Government Surveyor in the Survey Department of the Republic of Sri Lanka. He left the Survey Dept. in 1979 for employment in Saudi Arabia as a Survey Party Chief for a period of two years.
Back in Sri Lanka, he started his first feature film with Vasantha Obeysekera who directed same which was titled as Dadayama (The Hunt). This film was selected as the official nominee for the Ninth International Film Festival of India in 1983, held in New Delhi and bagged 9 awards, inclusive of the Best Film award and the Presidential Film award at the festival 1983 held in Sri Lanka.
“I used to watch movies from the time I was in Grade two class and continue to have this interest,” said Rabin Chandrasiri speaking to the TV Times.
“Having returned from the Middle East in 1982, I went to meet Vasantha Obeysekera with a script I had written. But there was a regulation at that time that the script had to be approved by the Film Corporation.
So Mr. Obeyesekera said that he already possessed a script that was passed by the Corporation and we could do so if I wished. That was the famous ‘Dadayama’” he said.
‘Dadayama’ which was made based on Adeline Vithanrana murder trial and released in 1983 became a hit but was hindered by the 1983 riots. According to 1997 government committee, ‘Dadayama’ was one of the 10 best films of the first 50 years of Sri Lankan cinema.
Asked as to what he was doing in cinema since ‘Dadayama’ to ‘Patibana’, Mr. Chandrasiri said that he had been involved in a 12-year long legal battle starting from the District Court to Appeal Court and the Supreme Court over the rights of the ‘Dadayama’ story.
Speaking on ‘Patibana’ Mr. Chandrasiri said that he had a large number of debut actors and actresses as he wanted to make a ‘natural movie’.
However he expressed concern over the monopoly enjoyed by the film theatre owners so that other films are also screened in between Sinhala films. “This is extremely unfair by the filmmakers and their works of art,” he said.
“I thought filmmaking was a difficult task but now I find that screening the film is even more difficult,” he said with a tone of disappointment.
‘Patibana’ has also received an invitation from the renowned Singapore Film Festival.
