Of genocide and liberation: the works of Tareque Masud

AT the time of writing, freedom-loving Bangladeshis are observing with pride and sadness the 50th anniversary of the liberation war of 1971 in which at least three million people were killed and many times that number physically displaced, economically destroyed or psychologically traumatised. In 20 years many of those artists, including myself, forgot that Lear Levin had done so much filming.” Naila Khan would seem to be talking to herself as she continues on the ups and downs of the history of the film until it finally got to be made: “Was Lear waiting for a young film-maker like Tareque Masud? Tareque Masud’s words reflected as much his deep respect for his subject as they mildly rebuked the opportunistic ways of the city art collectors: “Sultan resembled the Sufi mystic of yore in many ways. America—which records the attraction that many men and women in one of the poorest countries on earth feel for the richest and most powerful but which is also the most violent and exploitative, especially towards poor and helpless immigrants from the three continents of damnation and woe.” Tareque Masud knew what he was talking about, married as he was to an American film animator and editor, and spending some time each year in the U.S. When I first saw Matir Moina, I could immediately recognise the narrative elements making for the film since Tareque Masud had spoken to me in detail about them, himself and his friends at the madrasa to which he was forcibly sent; his suffering, quietly disapproving mother; his little sister who had to pay with her life for the father’s obstinate ways; his loving, idealistic uncle who was the antithesis of the father; and, above everything else, a nation on the boil clamouring for freedom from a cruel oppressor.