Arun Khopkar

Arun Khopkar is an award winning filmmaker based in Mumbai who has directed two feature and several non-feature films that have won awards globally. He is also a three time recipient of the Golden Lotus, the highest National Film Award for his short films. He is also an engaged film scholar, teaching theory and practices at academic institutes and has contributed theoretical papers about film aesthetics amongst other subjects to both national and international journals. His book on Guru Dutt in Marathi has won a National Award for the best book on cinema. A graduate in film direction from FTII, in 1974, Arun Khopkar’s short films are outstanding examples of interaction between cinema and the other art forms. Khopkar’s varied interests in music, art, dance, poetry and architecture amongst others find a cinematic expression in his films. His films do not simply “document” the art forms and the individual artist’s work in the same but rather as he says, “Common to all my films on art is an effort to use the language of cinema -variable lighting, lensing, camera movements and the rhythm of montage- to bring out those aspects of my themes, which are not on the surface.