‘People of Assam too lazy to accept new things”: Musician Joy Baruah

Guwahati May 9, 2019:

The Assamese entertainment industry is finally starting to enjoy a breath of fresh air. Be it actors, filmmakers, lyricists or musicians – people from Assam are making a name internationally for their quality work.

In recent times, the Assamese film industry is reaching heights with movies like ‘Bornodi Bhotiyai’, ‘Village Rockstars’, and many more.

But despite earning accolades in the award area, people of Assam are yet to accept these films wholeheartedly.

Anupam Kaushik Bora, director of ‘Bornodi Bhotiyai’ has lamented that although the film is running well, a lot of people are yet to watch it as the cinema-going crowd is still ignorant about Assamese cinema.

Speaking about the revival of the long-ailing Assamese film industry, ace musician Joy Baruah exclusively told Inside Northeast that it takes people to warm towards newer trends in filmmaking. “Even Jyoti Prasad Agarwal’s first film ‘Joymoti’ (1935) was accepted by a very few people”, Joy says.

“The people of Assam take a long time to understand a special good thing. We the people of Assam are little lazy to understand or accept things easily. We have world-class cinema from Assam. We had talkies before talkies came to light, we had sound before the rest of the cinema industry came up with good sound”, says Baruah.

Joy further adds that Jyotiprasad Agarwala had gone down to Pakistan to make a movie, but Assam has world-class filmmakers like Jahnu Baruah whose films are internationally acclaimed. “So, we are not lacking in terms of talent but public understanding of what a good thing is”, he laments.

“We need to be better receivers of good things,” Joy says.