Shivendra Singh Dungarpur (born 25 August 1969) is an Indian filmmaker, producer, film archivist and restorer. He is best known for his films '' Celluloid Man'', '' The Immortals'' and '' CzechMate: In Search of Jiří Menzel''. He has also directed several award-winning commercials and public service campaigns under the banner of Dungarpur Films. He is the founder Director of Film Heritage Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation and restoration of India’s film heritage. Shivendra Singh Dungarpur is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival. He has been elected three times to the Executive Committee of the

International Federation of Film Archives The International Federation of Film Archives (french: Fédération internationale des archives du film, FIAF) was founded in Paris in 1938 by the Cinémathèque Française, the Reichsfilmarchiv in Berlin, the British Film Institute and the Museum ...

(FIAF) at the elections held at the FIAF Congress 2017 in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...

, FIAF Congress 2019 in Lausanne and the online FIAF Congress in 2021.

Education and early life

Dungarpur was born in

Patna Patna ( ), historically known as Pataliputra, is the capital and largest city of the state of Bihar in India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Patna had a population of 2.35 million, making it the 19th largest city in India. ...

, Bihar and belongs to the erstwhile royal family of

Dungarpur State Dungarpur State was a princely state during the British Raj. Its capital was the city of Dungarpur in the southernmost area of present-day Rajasthan State in India. In 1901 the total population of Dungarpur State was 100,103, while that of t ...

that still has its family seat in

Dungarpur Dungarpur is a city in the southernmost part of Rajasthan, India. It is the administrative headquarters of Dungarpur District. It is the fastest developing town in the southern part of Rajasthan, alongside Aspur ''tehsil''. History Dungarpu ...

Rajasthan Rajasthan (; lit. 'Land of Kings') is a state in northern India. It covers or 10.4 per cent of India's total geographical area. It is the largest Indian state by area and the seventh largest by population. It is on India's northwestern s ...

and is the nephew of

Raj Singh Dungarpur Raj Singh Dungarpur (19 December 1935 – 12 September 2009) was a president of Board of Control for Cricket in India. He played first class cricket for 16 years and was in and out of the Board of Control for more than 20 years. He was a sel ...

. He attended

The Doon School The Doon School (informally Doon School or Doon) is a selective all-boys boarding school in Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India, which was established in 1935. It was envisioned by Satish Ranjan Das, a lawyer from Calcutta, who prevised a school mod ...

, graduating in 1987. He went on to do a degree in History (Hons) from St. Stephen's College, Delhi and shifted to Mumbai soon after to begin his career in film as an assistant director to writer-lyricist and director,

Gulzar Sampooran Singh Kalra (born 18 August 1934), known professionally as Gulzar, is an Indian Urdu poet, lyricist, author, screenwriter, and film director known for his works in Hindi cinema. He is regarded as one of greatest Urdu poets of this ...

and worked with him on films like ''Lekin'' and '' Libaas''. Subsequently, he enrolled in the Film and Television Institute of India,

Pune Pune (; ; also known as Poona, ( the official name from 1818 until 1978) is one of the most important industrial and educational hubs of India, with an estimated population of 7.4 million As of 2021, Pune Metropolitan Region is the largest i ...

to study film direction and scriptwriting. He graduated from FTII in 1994. He was first introduced to the cinema by his maternal grandmother, Usha Rani, Maharani of

Dumraon Dumraon is a town, near Buxar, Buxar city and nagar parishad corresponding community development block in Buxar district in the Indian state of Bihar. Dumraon is one of Bihar's oldest municipalities and one of India's oldest princely states also ...

. It was with her and his grandfather

Maharaj Mahārāja (; also spelled Maharajah, Maharaj) is a Sanskrit title for a "great ruler", "great king" or " high king". A few ruled states informally called empires, including ruler raja Sri Gupta, founder of the ancient Indian Gupta Empire, an ...

Kamal Singh of Dumraon that he first saw classics ranging from ''

Pakeezah ''Pakeezah'' (; ) is a 1972 Indian Hindustani language, Hindustani-language Musical film, musical romantic drama film that was written, directed, and produced by Kamal Amrohi. The film stars Ashok Kumar, Meena Kumari, and Raaj Kumar. It tells ...

'' to Chaplin, Buster Keaton,

Laurel & Hardy Laurel and Hardy were a British-American comedy duo act during the early Classical Hollywood era of American cinema, consisting of Englishman Stan Laurel (1890–1965) and American Oliver Hardy (1892–1957). Starting their career as a duo in t ...

and Danny Kaye at summer evening screenings on 16 mm and 8 mm projectors in the verandah of their home in Dumraon.

Career

Shivendra Singh Dungarpur started his production house Dungarpur Films in 2001. Under this banner, he has directed and produced commercials and documentaries for numerous brands over the years. In 2014, he founded Film Heritage Foundation to preserve India's endangered film heritage. Film Heritage Foundation is a non-profit organization based in Mumbai which is dedicated to supporting the conservation, preservation and restoration of the moving image and to developing interdisciplinary programs to create awareness about the language of cinema. Shivendra Singh Dungarpur is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival. He is a supporting member of the Fondazione

Cineteca di Bologna The Cineteca di Bologna is a film archive in Bologna, Italy. It was founded on 18 May 1962. Since 1989, it has been a member of the Fédération internationale des archives du film (FIAF). It has been a member of the Association des cinémath ...

, Italy along with the legendary Pathé film company. He is a member of the Artistic Committee of the

Il Cinema Ritrovato Il Cinema Ritrovato (meaning "cinema rediscovered") is a festival dedicated to the history of cinema, screening classics, retrospectives and showcasing the latest restored films from labs and archives around the world. The majority of the films sh ...

Festival in Bologna and also a member of the Honorary Committee of the Nitrate Picture Show, George Eastman House's Festival of Film Conservation. He was a member of the Expert Committee of the National Museum of Indian Cinema.

Filmography

Shivendra Singh Dungarpur directed his first documentary in 2012, called Celluloid Man, which won the

National Film Award for Best Biographical Film The National Film Award for Best Biographical Film is one of the National Film Awards presented annually by the Directorate of Film Festivals, the organisation set up by Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, India. It is one of several award ...

and National Film Award for Best Historical Reconstruction/Compilation Film. The filming of the documentary began in 2010 and it was completed in May 2012. The film premiered at the Il Cinema Ritrovato Festival in Bologna, Italy on 26 June 2012. It was the opening film at the Sierra Leone International Film Festival, 2013, and the Kyiv International Documentary Film Festival, 2013 where it won the "Nestor The Chronicler" award for the best archival film. In 2018, Dungarpur was invited by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to speak about his efforts in preserving India's cinematic heritage, which was followed by a screening of his documentary Celluloid Man. Dungarpur's second documentary The Immortals was completed in August 2015 and premiered at the 20th

Busan International Film Festival The Busan International Film Festival (BIFF, previously Pusan International Film Festival, PIFF), held annually in Haeundae-gu, Busan (''also'' Pusan), South Korea, is one of the most significant film festivals in Asia. The first festiv ...

in October. This film is a personal journey travelling through time and space to unravel hidden stories and rediscover objects and images that at one time were an integral part of the lives of these artists through which their creations came into being. The film was screened at the 17th Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival and was the opening film in the Documentary Section at the 21st

Kolkata International Film Festival The Kolkata International Film Festival (KIFF) is an annual film festival held in Kolkata, India. Founded in 1995, it is the third oldest international film festival in India. The festival is organized by the West Bengal Film Centre under the W ...

. The Immortals won the Special Jury Award in the National Competition Section of the

Mumbai International Film Festival The Mumbai International Film Festival for Documentary, Short and Animation Films (MIFF) is a festival organized in the city of Mumbai (formerly Bombay) by the Films Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India. It ...

(MIFF) for Documentaries, Short and Animation Films in 2016. and was screened at the 30th edition of the

festival in Bologna in the same year. In 2018, Dungarpur released the 420-minute documentary CzechMate: In Search of Jiří Menzel, based on the life of Czech film and theatre director, screenwriter, and actor, Jiří Menzel. The seven-hour-long film was eight years in the making and features extensive interviews with 85 filmmakers, actors and film historians including

Woody Allen Heywood "Woody" Allen (born Allan Stewart Konigsberg; November 30, 1935) is an American film director, writer, actor, and comedian whose career spans more than six decades and multiple Academy Award-winning films. He began his career writing ...

Ken Loach Kenneth Charles Loach (born 17 June 1936) is a British film director and screenwriter. His socially critical directing style and socialist ideals are evident in his film treatment of social issues such as poverty ('' Poor Cow'', 1967), homelessn ...

, and

Emir Kusturica Emir Kusturica ( sr-cyrl, Емир Кустурица; born 24 November 1954) is a Serbian film director, screenwriter, actor, producer and musician. He also has French citizenship.http://www.serbia.com/emir-kusturica-artist-builder-and-anti-glo ...

. The film had its debut at a screening at the UCLA Film & Television Archive in September 2018 and has also been screened at the 20th Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival. The film has been showcased at the 24th Kolkata International Film Festival in November 2018, the

in Bologna, and screenings in Prague, Slovakia and London. The

British Film Institute The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves film-making and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery (United Kingdom), National Lot ...

and Sight & Sound The International Film Magazine polled "CzechMate – In Search of Jiri Menzel" in the top 5 Blu-Ray and DVD releases of 2020 in a vote by eminent film critics.

Acting

Shivendra acted in the film “Knock on the Door” directed by Ranjan Palit along with a cast of actors that included Naseeruddin Shah,

Adil Hussain Adil Hussain () is an Indian actor who has worked in Indian cinema, including art house cinema and mainstream Bollywood, as well as international cinema, in films such as '' The Reluctant Fundamentalist'' and '' Life of Pi'' (both 2012). He re ...

Nandita Das Nandita Das (born 7 November 1969) is an Indian actress and director. She has acted in over 40 feature films in ten different languages. Das appeared in the films ''Fire'' (1996), ''Earth'' (1998), '' Bawandar'' (2000), '' Kannathil Muthamittal' ...

Ratna Pathak Shah Ratna Pathak Shah (born 18 March 1957) is an Indian actress and director known for her work in Hindi theatre, television, and films. Her extensive work in theatre includes a series of plays in both English and Hindi. She rose to prominence when ...

and

Amrita Chattopadhyay Amrita Chattopadhayay is a Bengali film actress. Her debut film was Buddhadeb Dasgupta's ''Anwar ka Ajab Kissa'' After that, she acted in a number of Bengali, Hindi, and multilingual films. Early life and education Amrita did her schooling at ...

. The film was selected for the International Film Festival of Rotterdam (IFFR) in 2023. In 2022, he was offered a role in the Hindi film "Ghoomer" directed by

R. Balki R. Balakrishnan, popularly known as R. Balki, (born 16 April 1964) is an Indian filmmaker, screenwriter and former Group Chairman of the advertising agency Lowe Lintas (India). He is best known for directing ''Cheeni Kum'' (2007), '' Paa'' (200 ...

where he plays a prominent role along with a cast comprising

Shabana Azmi Shabana Azmi (born 18 September 1950) is an Indian actress of Hindi film, television and theatre. One of India's most acclaimed actresses, Azmi is known for her portrayals of distinctive, often unconventional female characters across several ge ...

, Saiyami Kher, and

Abhishek Bachchan Abhishek Bachchan (born 5 February 1976) is an Indian actor and film producer known for his work in Hindi films. Part of the Bachchan family, he is the son of actors Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bachchan and the grandson of poet Harivansh Rai Bach ...

Short films and television

Shivendra directed a 26-episode series ''Rahe Na Rahe Hum'' produced by Contiloe Films for Star TV and hosted by scriptwriter and lyricist Javed Akhtar. He also produced a five-episode serial for Doordarshan based on the classic novel Bhoole Bisre Chitra written by Shri Bhagwati Charan Verma. Dungarpur Films has produced two short films ''I became…'' and ''Room 19''. ''I became…'' was given a gold medal at the IDPA Awards 2006 for the Best Short Fiction film of the year. It also won the award for the Best Short Film at the Marbella Film Festival in 2007 and was shortlisted for the Kathmandu Film Festival 2008.

Awards

*2016 – Special Jury Award for "The Immortals" in the National Competition Section of the 14th Mumbai International Film Festival (MIFF) *2014 – Special Jury Award for Celluloid Man at the 13th edition of the Mumbai International Film Festival (MIFF) *2013 – His first feature-length documentary Film " Celluloid Man" (2012) has won two National Awards in India at the 60th National Film Award for Best Historical Reconstruction/Compilation Film and for Best Editing. He also won the "Nestor the Chronicler" award for the best archival film for Celluloid Man at the XII Kyiv International Documentary Film Festivalhttp://www.filmfed.org/NFAW2012.pdf *2013 – Bimal Roy Memorial Emerging Talent Award for "Celluloid Man"

Film preservation and restoration

Shivendra was a donor for the British Film Institute's restoration of Alfred Hitchcock's silent film, The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog. In 2010, Dungarpur was approached by Martin Scorsese's organization World Cinema Project, which was interested in restoring the 1948 classic Kalpana directed by Uday Shankar. Shivendra facilitated the restoration of the film that was done by Martin Scorsese's World Cinema Foundation, that was premiered in the Cannes Film Festival Classic section in 2012. In 2013, he collaborated with the World Cinema Foundation again for the restoration of the 1972 Sinhalese film "Nidhanaya" directed by eminent Sri Lankan filmmaker Dr. Lester James Peries. The restored version of the film was premièred at the Venice International Film Festival, 2013.

Film Heritage Foundation

In 2014, Film Heritage Foundation, a non-profit organization was founded by Shivendra Singh Dungarpur. The organization preserves India's cinematic heritage, and supports the conservation, preservation and restoration of the moving image and develops interdisciplinary educational programs that use film as an educational tool and create awareness about the language of cinema. This is the first non-governmental organization dedicated to the conservation of the moving image in India. Film Heritage Foundation was accepted as an associate member of FIAF (

) at the General Assembly held in Sydney in April 2015. In 2022, under the aegis of Shivendra Singh Dungarpur, Film Heritage Foundation’s restoration of the Malayalam film Thampu (1978) directed by the auteur Aravindan Govindan was selected for a world premiere in the Cannes Classic section of the Cannes Film Festival 2022. The restoration partners of 'Thamp̄u’ and Jalaja, the actress from the film and Prakash Nair, producer, General Pictures, walked the red carpet lead by Shivendra Singh Dungarpur to announce the film. The screening of the film was held on 21 May 2022.

Writing

Shivendra's essay "Magic of Celluloid" has been published in the book "From Darkness into Light – Perspectives on Film Preservation and Restoration" edited by Rajesh Devraj. Shivendra Singh Dungarpur was among twenty film scholars, archivists and historians from different countries invited to contribute an essay to a landmark publication titled “Keeping Memories: Cinema and Archiving in Asia-Pacific” edited by Nick Deocampo and published by the Southeast Asia Pacific Audio-visual Archive Association (SEAPAVAA), Film Development Council of the Philippines, Vietnam Film Institute, through Ateneo University Press. He has written for several publications and newspapers including IIC Quarterly Journal, The Telegraph, The Hindu and The Tribune.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Dungarpur, Shivendra Singh Living people 1969 births St. Stephen's College, Delhi alumni Delhi University alumni Film and Television Institute of India alumni The Doon School alumni People from Patna Conservator-restorers Indian film producers Indian film editors Indian documentary filmmakers Film producers from Mumbai Film directors from Mumbai 20th-century Indian film directors 21st-century Indian film directors National Film Award (India) winners