CHAPTER 2 – CHITHRA DARSHAN FILM SOCIETY (1979 -2001)
We felt the need for a film society with good members from film industry/legal/professional bodies in 1979. Sri S.V. Venkataraman , as President, took the initiative to bring in such good members into new Film Society called Chithra Darshan Film Society. I became the Founder Secretary and Sri R.Ramakrishnan became the Joint Secretary and Sri E.K.Krishnan became Treasurer. Sri S.Kamalahasan ,the well known Film Star, agreed to become Vice President. Sri C.Lakshmi Narain, a leading Advocate, became our Vice President.Sri N.R.N.Aiyar, Secretary of English Electrical Co., became another Committee member.A leading Labour Law Advocate,Sri Dwarakanathan, drafted the Byelaws of the Society as a Founder Committee Member. Sri Ananthu(Close Associate of Sri K.B.) became our Committee Member. Sri Ramakrishnan, Civil Engineer, was also our Committee Member.
Chithra Darshan Film Society became active from November,1979, with the screening of Neo realistic film”KUDISAI”, prior to its commercial release. Very soon we had a retro of Satyajit Ray Films.
As a film society, Chithra Darshan Film Society was functioning systematically.We had monthly meetings at all our committee Members’ houses by rotation. New Members were admitted only after approval by the Committee. We had our own monthly booklets about our activities with Sri C.L.N.as Editor. Sri Kamalahasan took care of Advertisement in the back cover page of our Booklets. We promoted the diploma films made by NFAI ,Pune, and Film & TV Institute of Chennai by holding separate shows. Sri S.Kamalahasan helped CDFS in arranging good films like Garam Hawa and Shatranj ke Khiladi.
With the active members like Sri K.S.Sridhar we had good Kannada films for our screening. Very soon we earned a good name as a society patronising all Indian language films. Very soon we joined Federation of Film Societies of India. The total strength of film society members in Chennai was more than 3000. MFS had about 1500 members,. ICAF had about 750 members. Our CHITHRA Darshan had about 500 members. In addition we had Movie Appreciation Society , Chennai Film Society and Madras Progressive Film Society.
In those days two screenings of all films supplied by FFSI will be screened at ABHIRAMI Theatre Complex.Later one screening will be at Abhirami ( for MFS) and the second (for other Societies)will be at PILOT Theatre.
In the end of 80s I became Treasurer of FFSI (Southern Region) and later as Regional Secretary and Secretary. FFSI (SR) had more than 100 Film Societies affiliated. Around this stage Sri E.Thangaraj joined FFSI (SR) as Treasurer. We took the initiative of forming Kerala State Level Office at Trivandrum. Sri KS Govindaraj,Secretary, and myself as Regional Secretary attended the inauguration of KSLO and also met the then Governor of Kerala, Shri Ramachandran, as a courtesy call. We had a Press Meet from FFSI (SR) at Mysore regarding formation of Chalana Chitra Academy at every State. We also took the initiative to spread the Movement at Collegelevel. We also had a Press Meet at Kolcutta by all the four regions of FFSI . I became a R C member of FFSI, after a short break around 2000.
Around end 90s fall in film society membership has started due to various reasons like multi channel non stop TV/fall in supply of films by Embassies through FFSI etc.
( TO BE CONTINUED)
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