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Mahatma - Life Of Gandhi 1869-1948
1968 330’ b&w English d/s Vithalbhai Jhaveri pc Gandhi National Memorial Fund m Vishnudas Shirali
Landmark compilation documentary on Gandhi, made with the assistance of D.G. Tendulkar, the author of the 8 vol. biography Mahatma, which is the source of the film’s narrative. Edited down from over 50 hours of footage assembled by Gandhi’s son Devdas, the film chronicles political events with little analysis e.g. the famous salt agitation, the Swadeshi movement, village reconstruction programmes, Gandhi’s march through the communal riots in Noakhali, his fast which almost singlehandedly forced an end to the Partition riots, etc. These events are intercut with footage revealing Gandhi’s unfamiliarity with world literature, his controversially conservative positions on birth control and his statement that under socialism all property would belong to God. Although there is very little material of Gandhi actually speaking, the film has been used as a standard reference for Gandhian iconography (cf. Attenborough’s biographical). Tendulkar, known mainly for his biography, studied film in Germany and Moscow and may briefly have been a student of Eisenstein. Director Jhaveri is a former jeweller and freedom fighter.