Conversations with Mani Ratnam

by Baradwaj Rangan

RANGAN: What is your attitude towards messages in movies? RATNAM: I don’t make movies to give messages. Films are about sharing an experience or sharing your angst or your concerns about something with a larger group of people. If the film gives you an experience and if it puts you in another person’s shoes, and you become aware of that person or that issue through the film, then I think it’s doing its job. It’s a convenience to think that your film has a message and that’s why people are seeing it. There are so many inputs in life that come from different factions. Films are just one of them. You can’t give yourself too much credit saying that films influence people. I think that people are influenced only if they want to be influenced, and more importantly, only if they are already predisposed towards what you’re saying. A message can only make a film the flavour of the month. I don’t meet people on the road and say, ‘I have a message for you.’ Why would I do that on film?