Sound statuette signals shift


“Not even in my wildest dreams did I think I’d win an Oscar nomination,” said Resul Pookutty, hours before he flew out of the country to the 81st Academy Awards. When he finally held aloft the prized gold statuette, it was the grand climax to a career that began in a Kerala village.

The youngest of PT Pookutty and Nabeeza Beevi’s eight children, Resul attended a government school in Vilakkupara in Kollam district.He was fascinated by films but never thought he would work with some of the biggest names in world cinema.“Nobody in my family has any connection to the world of entertainment or films,” he said. The physics graduate’s entry into films was pure chance. “When I applied to Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune, I thought it would be a natural progression of physics,”says Pookutty, who went to MSM College, Kayamkulam. It was only after the week-long orientation course at FTII, which all candidates are given on cinema and filmmaking, that he realised what the course was about. “That’s when I understood the role sound plays in film.”

He didn’t get through the first year, so he returned to Thiruvananthapuram and spent the next year preparing to take the entrance exam again, while also studying law. Joining FTII in 1991 was a major turning point. “It is not a technical institute but an art school with a major focus on film and allied arts,” he said.

His desire to do live sound took him to Mumbai. “I always wondered why our films sounded so bad while Western films sounded so natural. I realised that our films do not give that experience because of the way sound is done,” said Resul.

He got his first break on Rajat Kapoor’s Private Detective. “He insists on absolute silence on the sets,” said cinematographer Ravi K Chandran, who worked with Resul on
Black, Saawariya and Ghajini.

While Resul was working on Saawariya he got a call from the Indian producers of Slumdog
Millionaire. “As a student in FTII, I had a picture of the cult film Trainspotting in my room. I couldn’t believe I was going to work with the same Danny Boyle,” Resul said. “When I first met him, he had a list of films I’d worked on and asked me which of them he should watch; I was struck by his humility,” Resul said. . “I told him he could have his pick since a part of me is there in every film.” Doing live sound for Slumdog was no mean feat. “It was shot in a very unconventional way, to capture live sound in the city of Mumbai was very challenging,” he pointed out. Resul did the location sound mixing, giving Ian Tapp and Richard Pryke, who won the Oscar along with him for best sound mixing, all the raw material. “Since post production was done in London, I had no direct interaction with Rahman though we did exchange a lot of material,” he added. Resul, who also won the BAFTA, is the first Indian to win the Cinema Audio Society awards. And he is glad technicians in Indian films are getting the attention they deserve. “Unlike other countries, technicians here are usually looked down upon,” he lamented.

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