Rong’kuchak (Echoes)

poster5Through Ianche, a Garo poet, the film tries to understand what it feels to be a poet without a written language. Once this saddening truth is felt and understood in its entirety can you write again? The Garos have their own language but no script to write and hence they have been using the English alphabet for centuries now. Ianche, an accomplished poet finds himself tormented and unable and unwilling to write anymore. He can see his people completely abandoning their rich culture and he believes that the only way to save himself and them is to author a script. dominic

DIRECTOR’S NOTE

My grandfather was one of the oral storytellers in the village. The best part of growing up in the village was getting addicted to these great stories of our land. What could be more beautiful than listening to stories in a tree house (Borang) of the farm, in the middle of the forest, gazing up at the moon, surrounded by the sound of all the unimaginable creatures of the forest. These are the very reasons why I am a filmmaker today.

My short film Rong’kuchak (Echoes) was a tribute to all the storytellers of my village who are no more. The word Rong’kuchak is a combination of two words Ro’ong (stone or rock) and Kuchak (to respond). I remember when I was a kid we would shout out to the forest and it would call us back. I asked my father the reason for it, he told me that it was a voice of our forefathers that was responding to us.dominic5

A’chik language is very beautiful language, especially when used to tell stories. There is certain rhythm and flow in it – rhythm of nature or flow of streams or sound blowing wind. Listening to these great storytellers you realized that the beautiful thing about oral story telling is that the story themselves act like an living organism, they evolve, transform. Though the essence of the story will be intact but when you listened to it, it always sounds new and fresh depending on the imagination of the story tellers. They will add something new to the story that you didn’t hear previously. But unfortunately when I took Garo subject in class VII, I realized there is something wrong with the flow of language in written words. I found it difficult to read, most probably the reason was that I had been learning in English ever since I knew how to read and write. So when I was started readin Garo in Roman script, my brain played tricks. The beautiful oral story that I was awed by was not same anymore when I read them in the Garo books, something was lost in adapting the oral story into written words in Roman script and the loss was irretrievable. Maybe the script was good enough to capture the plot but not the essence of it. Body without soul. I imagined if we could really capture them in written language then the A’chik script had to be something that resembled musical notation.

If you watch the first sequence of the film, where the oral story teller chokes in the middle of his story telling and dies, it tells everything. May be he choked with words and stories. It’s a great loss, it pains me. The film is the portrayal of my pain for the lost, for my inability to write them in A’chik, So this film

 

 

CREDITS

A Poem By

Tony Xavier

Main Cast:

Jobyllyne D Shira, Lovita J Morang, Phillip Oske Sg,

Celestine Koksi Sangma, Jordan Chisim.

Produced by:

Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute.

Written and Directed By

Dominic Megam Sangma

Cinematography

Tojo Xavier

Editor

Renjith Kuzhur

Sound Designer

Imon Chakraborty

Production Design

Ranajit Gharai

Colorist

Jayadev Tiruveaipati

Voice Dubbed By

Julius Basaiwmoit

Music By

Riley Lee- Being Time

Extras:

Grace Shoshang.

Felicita Chisim.

Saroj Devi

Chongkam Momin

Wansuk Momin

Paul Danggo

Calis Momin

AbbaTenny Gabil

Jesse Kurbah

Sengobirth Chisim

Greatcilda Cheran

Alice lohe

Phrangkie Khonglah.

Tesang Cheran.

Dario Dawa

Waranlak Metkarujit.

Asha Raksam.

Tangme Chada.

Alvin Nengminza.

Dora D Shira

Sourav Rai

Sasha Singh

Tribeyny Rai

Shikha Gupta

Kim Jung Heum

Meyeinla Longchar

Suresh Burman

Milkha Sangma

Abhijit Burman

Tengnang .Dawa.

Jordan Chisim.

Genevie Chisim

Tesang Chisim

Steven Ao

Alexander Poe

Ashoke Poe.

Art Department

Jaytu Mondal

Sayantan Mondal

Production Controller

Pradeep Acharya

Subhash Jha

Costume Designer

Neeraj Agarwal

Wansuk G Momin

Make Up

Bonny Chakraborty

Prabir Kumar

Camera Asssistant

Tarun Kumar Rakeshiya

Naresh K Rana

G Venu Madhav

Sound Assistant

Partha Halder

Vineet Vashistha

Sumanto Dutta

Sudeepta Sadhukhan

Rachit Pasi

Ateesh Chattopadhay

Mikhail Chambugong

Arka Ghosh

Assistant Director

Tenang Dawa

Amey Mule

Ashok poe

Alexander Poe

Camera and Light

Tarak Das

Santosh Hansda

Purnendu Das

Himanshu Mondal

Dilip Chakravorty

Dakhina Ranjan

Robi Mullick

Pullack Hait

Swapan Baidya.

 Art Setting

Raju Bose

Tarun Baidya

Bikas Dey

Location Courtesy

Reevu Wangdi

Ranajay Basu

Hem Dhillon

Kunal Banerjee

Supported In Garo Hills

Fr. Abong Marak

Sembertush

Milkior Chisim

Kimde Raksam

Supported In Shillong

Aaron Raksam

Leenora Raksam

Rev Teseng Gabil

Lucy Megam

Osim Chambugong

Sis Mary Megam

Sengrang Jongskye

Special Thanks

Nilotpal Mazumdar

Sanjaya Pattanayak

Tengrak Rongmuthu

Romel Dawa

John Sangma

Patrick Sangma

Twister Momin

Anil Kajamalla

Santosh Damdhere

DI Executive Producer

Mangesh K Bhalerao

DI Producer

Arvind Singh

Excutive Director

J.Naidu

Head Operation

R.Shanker

V.P Business Development

Rajiv Ghosh

Technologist

Mithun D’souza

DI Editorial Team

Venkat Naraharisetty

Soma Sundaram

Krishnan kumar Selvaraj.

Muthural Ranalingam

Milind Kamble

Chetan Gaikwad

Alagappan Balram

Modem Mehesh

Palyekar Sony Anthony

P.Mohan

Deepak Srivstav

Mohammed Ghose.

 

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Dominic Sangma Written by:

Dominic is a filmmaker working on his first Feature film. His A.Chik film Rong’kuchak/ ECHOES has won awards.

One Comment

  1. Somewhere sometime
    September 16, 2016
    Reply

    Director I don’t know who you are but I think I want to marry you because you are such an idol to me. And you are so cute! Proud of you.

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