Suman Ghosh on “The Scavenger of Dreams”: Fascinating Links Between Rich And Poor Made By Garbage

Filmmaker Suman Ghosh was inspired to create his most recent film, “The Scavenger of Dreams,” which had its world debut at the renowned Busan International Film Festival, by an article on how the affluent and the poor are linked via waste.

The movie, which starred national award-winning actress Sudipta Chakraborty and Shardul Bhardwaj of “Eeb Allay Ooo!” fame, was shown on Thursday as part of the A Window on Asian Cinema series.

A garbage collector and his family from Bihar who make a living by collecting trash from affluent areas of Kolkata were chosen by Ghosh, a National Award-winning filmmaker known for “Dwando,” “Nobel Chor,” and “Kadambari,” to represent the plight of those left behind in the “so-called modern and globalized world.”

One noteworthy remark from a New York Times piece that gave rise to the concept was, “One man’s garbage is another man’s treasure. It was about a trash collector in California, home to rich people like Mark Zuckerberg and other business moguls in the IT industry.

“I found it amusing that the rubbish is the sole link between the wealthiest and worst economic strata… And I believed that to be true everywhere in the globe,” Ghosh said in a video chat with PTI from Miami.

“The Scavenger of Dreams” is the director’s second Hindi movie, after the upcoming “Aadhaar,” which stars Vineet Kumar Singh of “Mukkabaaz” fame. Ghosh said that since “The Scavenger of Dreams” is an experimental movie about those who live on the outskirts, he and the actors were eager to do it.

It makes a statement about our culture. We now inhabit a highly modernized culture, or a “globalized world.” However, we truly turn our backs on a sizable portion of this society.

We don’t care to observe what is happening to them or how well they are coping to this technologically advanced, fast-paced environment. Whether or whether they are given the means to adjust to these changes is irrelevant to us. The world has evolved in many ways, yet for certain social classes, nothing has changed, he remarked.

Veteran Busan filmmaker “The Scavenger of Dreams” made his sixth appearance at the festival. One of the most prestigious film festivals in Asia, according to Ghosh, has treated him really well.

Busan also hosted screenings of his movies “Nobel Theif,” “Uncle Shyamal Turns off the Lights,” “Peace Haven,” “Mi Amor,” and “Aadhaar.”

The hopes and goals of Birju and his wife Sona are “formed through the garbage they collect,” according to the account. According to him, it also influences the tales parents tell their daughter.

“I found it fascinating that their dreams are formed through the garbage of someone else,” Ghosh said.

The director said that after seeing Shardul’s excellent performance as a monkey chaser in “Eeb Allay Ooo!” he decided to cast the FTII alum for the project.

“Fortunately, Shardul was his, I believe, junior at the Pune Film Institute, where my DoP Ravi Kiran Ayyagari also attended. So he set up a meeting with Bhardwaj for me when I visited Bombay once.

“I wanted a performer who would be sincerely interested in playing the part honestly. In addition, I found Shardul to be a really sympathetic individual with truly egalitarian ideals.

Chakraborty and the filmmaker have worked together four times, and according to the director, the actor shared his vision.

“This is not a movie that will make you rich. You won’t likely get popularity or other benefits from working on a significant project as a result of this. However, I had to produce this movie from the bottom of my heart, thus I needed performers who, despite their fame in other professions or anything, supported my cause.

The director, who previously collaborated on “Podokkhep” with Soumitra Chatterjee, a legend of Bengali cinema, is now working on “Puratan” with Sharmila Tagore and Rituparna Sengupta. In December, he will start filming the movie.

After about 15 years, Sharmila Tagore is currently working in a Bengali movie. She most recently worked on “Antaheen”. I just seen “Gulmohar,” so I asked her whether she had seen any of my earlier movies. I was lucky that she like my earlier movies. She enjoyed the screenplay that I read to her, he said.