ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on Tanvir Mokammel, a Bangladesh filmmaker bent on forging an alternative tradition of filmmaking in the country to explore issues related to national identity formation in the light of key moments in its history, such as the partition of Bengal in 1947 and the birth of Bangladesh in 1971. Mokammel’s films, as well as his published work, represent traumas associated with these divisive, decisive movements in Bangladesh’s history, and the diasporas and marginalization of minorities that ensue from them. With sympathy as well as insight, and making use of classics not only of Bangladeshi literature but also of the masterpieces of the western tradition, he traces the impact on individual lives of events in the region that transcend borders and fissure relationships, unsettling seemingly moribund ways of life. In particular, my chapter will highlight Mokammel’s sympathy for refugees, subalterns, and doubly colonized sections of Bangladesh, and depict his filmic response to their plight.
