This reunion has been in the making for three long decades. Two giants of Malayalam cinema- veteran filmmaker Adoor Gopalakrishnan and superstar Mammootty have just wrapped up work on their fourth film together-Padayatra. The two stalwarts of cinema are collaborating for the first time in 32 years.&nbsp;<h2>Adoor Gopalakrishnan and Mammootty's past work</h2>The reunion is especially meaningful given the actor and filmmaker’s shared history. Adoor and Mammootty have worked together in critically acclaimed films like Anantaram, Mathilukal and Vidheyan.&nbsp;In fact, Anantaram fetched Mammootty the National Film Award for Best Actor.&nbsp;Adoor, recently in an interview with India Today, stated that Mammootty is the only actor who has acted in four of the 13 films he has made.&nbsp;He said, “He is probably the only actor who has been repeated in so many of my films — four out of the 13 films I have made. I’m also happy to note that he won National Awards for two of my earlier films. His performance in this film will also be outstanding. It is set to be released in cinemas, and I’m hoping it will be received well.”&nbsp;Their fourth film together - Padayatra- also has Mammootty serving as the producer of the film. It is also special as it marks Adoor’s return to cinema after a decade, after his 2016 film ‘Pinneyum Padayatra’.&nbsp;Naturally, the much-awaited reunion has led to increased interest among the Malayalam cinema audience. Both mammoth talents, Adoor and Mammootty, have built careers around being game for tough material, which makes their latest collaboration one of the most awaited Malayalam films to look out for.&nbsp;Also read: <a href="https://www.wionews.com/entertainment/four-national-awards-and-counting-bramayugam-to-vidheyan-a-look-at-all-of-mammootty-s-best-actor-wins-1784391749310">Four National Awards and counting! A look at all of Mammootty's Best Actor wins</a>&nbsp;Padayatra will be released in theatres later this year and an official announcement is yet to be made.<h2>'Goal is just to make films'</h2>While the filmmaker is considered as a arthouse giant, Adoor said he does not distinguish between art cinema and commercial cinema. "The goal is just to make films, without putting unnecessary classifications on them," he said.&nbsp;Over a career spanning more than six decades—beginning with his time at the Film and Television Institute of India in 1962—Adoor Gopalakrishnan has chosen quality over quantity. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he works deliberately at his own pace, producing a relatively small body of feature films.&nbsp;Reading remains a constant anchor throughout his life. Even when he isn't behind the camera, the director spends his time immersed in books, using those quiet periods to observe, reflect on, and better understand the world around him.

Malayalam cinema giants Adoor Gopalakrishnan and Mammootty are collaborating on a film titled Padyatra. This is the director-actor's fourth collaboration. The film is special for both stalwarts in more ways than one. 

This reunion has been in the making for three long decades. Two giants of Malayalam cinema- veteran filmmaker Adoor Gopalakrishnan and superstar Mammootty have just wrapped up work on their fourth film together-Padayatra. The two stalwarts of cinema are collaborating for the first time in 32 years. Adoor Gopalakrishnan and Mammootty's past work The reunion is especially meaningful given the actor and filmmaker’s shared history. Adoor and Mammootty have worked together in critically acclaimed films like Anantaram, Mathilukal and Vidheyan. In fact, Anantaram fetched Mammootty the National Film Award for Best Actor. Adoor, recently in an interview with India Today, stated that Mammootty is the only actor who has acted in four of the 13 films he has made. He said, “He is probably the only actor who has been repeated in so many of my films — four out of the 13 films I have made. I’m also happy to note that he won National Awards for two of my earlier films. His performance in this film will also be outstanding. It is set to be released in cinemas, and I’m hoping it will be received well.” Their fourth film together - Padayatra- also has Mammootty serving as the producer of the film. It is also special as it marks Adoor’s return to cinema after a decade, after his 2016 film ‘Pinneyum Padayatra’. Naturally, the much-awaited reunion has led to increased interest among the Malayalam cinema audience. Both mammoth talents, Adoor and Mammootty, have built careers around being game for tough material, which makes their latest collaboration one of the most awaited Malayalam films to look out for. Also read: Four National Awards and counting! A look at all of Mammootty's Best Actor wins Padayatra will be released in theatres later this year and an official announcement is yet to be made. 'Goal is just to make films' While the filmmaker is considered as a arthouse giant, Adoor said he does not distinguish between art cinema and commercial cinema. "The goal is just to make films, without putting unnecessary classifications on them," he said. Over a career spanning more than six decades—beginning with his time at the Film and Television Institute of India in 1962—Adoor Gopalakrishnan has chosen quality over quantity. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he works deliberately at his own pace, producing a relatively small body of feature films. Reading remains a constant anchor throughout his life. Even when he isn't behind the camera, the director spends his time immersed in books, using those quiet periods to observe, reflect on, and better understand the world around him.

Malayalam cinema giants Adoor Gopalakrishnan and Mammootty are collaborating on a film titled Padyatra. This is the director-actor's fourth collaboration. The film is special for both the stalwarts in more ways than one.&nbsp;

Padayatra: Mammootty, Adoor Gopalakrishnan team up after 3 decades

Recently, a number of national dailies remembered an almost forgotten filmmaker from Kerala, Adoor Gopalakrishnan. Adoor, probably the most prolific of his contemporaries, is credited for his role in bringing the &ldquo;Indian New Wave&rdquo; of the 1970s to distant shores of Kerala. In 2016, he has reached the 50th year of his life with cinema, and the theatrical release of Pinneyum establishes Adoor Gopalakrishnan as the only active filmmaker of his generation.

His Swayamvaram (One&rsquo;s Own Choice, 1972) is widely hailed as a pioneering work that launched the Malayalam New Wave. After a series of documentaries, Adoor set about to create Elippathayam (The Rat Trap, 1981). Considered as one of the finest of Adoor&rsquo;s creations, Elippathayam depicts the feudal life in Kerala. The film competed in the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes film festival of 1982. Eventually, it won the Sutherland Trophy from the British Film Institute (BFI) for being the most original and innovative film of the year.

With Elippathayam, the Malayalam New Wave arrived in the global film festival circuit.

Gopalakrishnan graduated from the newly opened Film and Television Institute of India (FTII). His contemporaries at FTII, trained under the redoubtable maverick filmmaker Ritwik Ghatak, emerged as some of the finest auteurs that the film school has ever produced. Mani Kaul, as Gopalakrishnan mentioned in an interview, joined the school&rsquo;s acting course with Asrani but eventually switched to directing films. John Abraham followed soon. Kumar Shahani was there too. Ghatak, as evident from some of his interviews, preferred Shahani over all the others.

The making of Mani Kaul&rsquo;s pathbreaking debut Uski Roti (Our Daily Bread, 1969) was assisted by John Abraham, after which the latter returned to the southern industries to make his debut that appeared in the same year with Swayamvaram. Abraham was joined by G. Aravindan - a cartoonist and thespian - who turned to filmmaking in the 1970s. Together they constituted the Malayalam New Wave camp; making films that were very different from those produced by their national and regional peers, such as Kaul, Shahani, and Mrinal Sen.

They formed film-cooperatives and collectives without relying heavily on uncertain state subsidies or loans. Gopalakrishnan established Chithralekha Film Society; it was the first film society in Kerala that aimed at production, distribution, and exhibition of films in the co-operative sector. Abraham similarly started the Odessa Collective with the intention of starting a people&rsquo;s cinema movement.

Adoor Gopalakrishnan&rsquo;s career spans across five decades, during which he made 13 fictional films and a number of documentaries/non-fictional works on indigenous performing arts and other cultural forms of Kerala. Some of the documentaries that he has directed over the years, among others, are&nbsp;Dance of the Enchantress (2007), Kalamandalam Ramankutty Nair (2005), Koodiyattam (2000), Kalamandalam Gopi (1998).

With Kaul, Aravindan and Abraham not alive anymore, and Shahani inactive for decades, Gopalakrishnan survives as the only auteur of the Indian New Wave who is still alive and kicking. Whereas Shahani&rsquo;s last fictional work till date happens to be his adaptation of Tagore&rsquo;s controversial novel Char Adhyay in 1997, Adoor&rsquo;s latest film Pinneyum, starring Kavya Madhavan and Dileep, has just been released across the nation.

Apart from making films, he continues to voice his views on issues that concern his world. For instance, the government recently intervened into the internal matters of FTII by forcing its choice of director on the institute despite protests, Gopalakrishnan responded instantly through interviews and articles in leading national dailies.

Looking back at Gopalakrishnan&rsquo;s filmmaking career, many have voiced misgivings about what is lacking from his oeuvre. He has always been branded as a realist; his debut film being championed as something that initiated a certain kind of realism in Malayalam cinema. He is seen as less radical than Abraham in his politics and much less experimental than Aravindan in his aesthetic impetus.

Gopalakrishnan&rsquo;s Mukhamukham (Face to Face, 1984) and Kathapurushan (Man of the Story, 1995) aroused controversy for their seemingly problematic readings of Marxist politics in Kerala. With the rise of caste politics, in and outside the academia, and the appearance of Dalit studies, criticism of Gopalakrishnan has assumed a new force. Earlier, he was seen as only less radical than Abraham but now he is branded as an implacable conservative whose cinematic world is peopled by the upper-caste, middle-class Nairs, the group to which himself belongs to. Dalits appear as fringe characters, either as the voluptuous, seductive woman in Elippathayam or the slave-like, emasculated landless peasant in Vidheyan (The Servile, 1993).

For a reviewer in The Indian Express, Gopalakrishnan&rsquo;s new film seems even more problematic with his implicit sympathies for upper castes suffering for caste-based reservations.I have not yet got a chance to watch Pinneyum and, therefore, unable to comment on what the reviewer says. But, keeping the allegations against Gopalakrishnan in mind, what I suggest is that the charm of Gopalakrishnan does not lie in what his detractors are looking at.

Gopalakrishnan is the filmmaker of the familiar, more specifically, of subjects and people that are more familiar to him. To borrow the title of an M. K. Raghavendra book, his cinema is seduced by the familiar. His films revolve inevitably around his own experiences. Kathapurushan is decidedly quasi-autobiographical. The others are not, but none of them moves beyond his sensory experiences in the world of the Nairs.

Adoor&rsquo;s men, the grand old patriarchs, leave their ancestral universe only when they are hounded and thrown out. Entrapped in that world, his women can leave home only when they run away or die. Sitting cosily in his armchair, the auteur looks at the changes passing by; the nouveau riche Gulf migrant buys the ancestral homes of the Nairs, the land reforms initiated by the Communists impoverish them, and the lower castes serve them no longer. 
 
<img alt="" class="img-responsive" src="http://s.wionews.com/photos/adoor-20160823081725.jpg" />

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Elippathayam: sitting cosily in his armchair, the auteur looks at the changes passing by... 
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Notwithstanding the common assumption of him being a realist, Adoor Gopalakrishnan moves on to explore the dark, sinister depths of his world and confronts the alternative realities that coexist. Like Ajayan in Anantharam (Monologue, 1987), he comes up with multiple narratives and realities that are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

Notwithstanding the common assumption of him being a realist, Adoor moves on to explore the dark, sinister depths of his world

Recently, a number of national dailies remembered an almost forgotten filmmaker from Kerala, Adoor Gopalakrishnan. Adoor, probably the most prolific of his contemporaries, is credited for his role in bringing the “Indian New Wave” of the 1970s to distant shores of Kerala. In 2016, he has reached the 50th year of his life with cinema, and the theatrical release of Pinneyum establishes Adoor Gopalakrishnan as the only active filmmaker of his generation. His Swayamvaram (One’s Own Choice, 1972) is widely hailed as a pioneering work that launched the Malayalam New Wave. After a series of documentaries, Adoor set about to create Elippathayam (The Rat Trap, 1981). Considered as one of the finest of Adoor’s creations, Elippathayam depicts the feudal life in Kerala. The film competed in the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes film festival of 1982. Eventually, it won the Sutherland Trophy from the British Film Institute (BFI) for being the most original and innovative film of the year. With Elippathayam, the Malayalam New Wave arrived in the global film festival circuit. Gopalakrishnan graduated from the newly opened Film and Television Institute of India (FTII). His contemporaries at FTII, trained under the redoubtable maverick filmmaker Ritwik Ghatak, emerged as some of the finest auteurs that the film school has ever produced. Mani Kaul, as Gopalakrishnan mentioned in an interview, joined the school’s acting course with Asrani but eventually switched to directing films. John Abraham followed soon. Kumar Shahani was there too. Ghatak, as evident from some of his interviews, preferred Shahani over all the others. The making of Mani Kaul’s pathbreaking debut Uski Roti (Our Daily Bread, 1969) was assisted by John Abraham, after which the latter returned to the southern industries to make his debut that appeared in the same year with Swayamvaram. Abraham was joined by G. Aravindan - a cartoonist and thespian - who turned to filmmaking in the 1970s. Together they constituted the Malayalam New Wave camp; making films that were very different from those produced by their national and regional peers, such as Kaul, Shahani, and Mrinal Sen. They formed film-cooperatives and collectives without relying heavily on uncertain state subsidies or loans. Gopalakrishnan established Chithralekha Film Society; it was the first film society in Kerala that aimed at production, distribution, and exhibition of films in the co-operative sector. Abraham similarly started the Odessa Collective with the intention of starting a people’s cinema movement. Adoor Gopalakrishnan’s career spans across five decades, during which he made 13 fictional films and a number of documentaries/non-fictional works on indigenous performing arts and other cultural forms of Kerala. Some of the documentaries that he has directed over the years, among others, are Dance of the Enchantress (2007), Kalamandalam Ramankutty Nair (2005), Koodiyattam (2000), Kalamandalam Gopi (1998). With Kaul, Aravindan and Abraham not alive anymore, and Shahani inactive for decades, Gopalakrishnan survives as the only auteur of the Indian New Wave who is still alive and kicking. Whereas Shahani’s last fictional work till date happens to be his adaptation of Tagore’s controversial novel Char Adhyay in 1997, Adoor’s latest film Pinneyum, starring Kavya Madhavan and Dileep, has just been released across the nation. Apart from making films, he continues to voice his views on issues that concern his world. For instance, the government recently intervened into the internal matters of FTII by forcing its choice of director on the institute despite protests, Gopalakrishnan responded instantly through interviews and articles in leading national dailies. Looking back at Gopalakrishnan’s filmmaking career, many have voiced misgivings about what is lacking from his oeuvre. He has always been branded as a realist; his debut film being championed as something that initiated a certain kind of realism in Malayalam cinema. He is seen as less radical than Abraham in his politics and much less experimental than Aravindan in his aesthetic impetus. Gopalakrishnan’s Mukhamukham (Face to Face, 1984) and Kathapurushan (Man of the Story, 1995) aroused controversy for their seemingly problematic readings of Marxist politics in Kerala. With the rise of caste politics, in and outside the academia, and the appearance of Dalit studies, criticism of Gopalakrishnan has assumed a new force. Earlier, he was seen as only less radical than Abraham but now he is branded as an implacable conservative whose cinematic world is peopled by the upper-caste, middle-class Nairs, the group to which himself belongs to. Dalits appear as fringe characters, either as the voluptuous, seductive woman in Elippathayam or the slave-like, emasculated landless peasant in Vidheyan (The Servile, 1993). For a reviewer in The Indian Express, Gopalakrishnan’s new film seems even more problematic with his implicit sympathies for upper castes suffering for caste-based reservations.I have not yet got a chance to watch Pinneyum and, therefore, unable to comment on what the reviewer says. But, keeping the allegations against Gopalakrishnan in mind, what I suggest is that the charm of Gopalakrishnan does not lie in what his detractors are looking at. Gopalakrishnan is the filmmaker of the familiar, more specifically, of subjects and people that are more familiar to him. To borrow the title of an M. K. Raghavendra book, his cinema is seduced by the familiar. His films revolve inevitably around his own experiences. Kathapurushan is decidedly quasi-autobiographical. The others are not, but none of them moves beyond his sensory experiences in the world of the Nairs. Adoor’s men, the grand old patriarchs, leave their ancestral universe only when they are hounded and thrown out. Entrapped in that world, his women can leave home only when they run away or die. Sitting cosily in his armchair, the auteur looks at the changes passing by; the nouveau riche Gulf migrant buys the ancestral homes of the Nairs, the land reforms initiated by the Communists impoverish them, and the lower castes serve them no longer. Elippathayam: sitting cosily in his armchair, the auteur looks at the changes passing by... Notwithstanding the common assumption of him being a realist, Adoor Gopalakrishnan moves on to explore the dark, sinister depths of his world and confronts the alternative realities that coexist. Like Ajayan in Anantharam (Monologue, 1987), he comes up with multiple narratives and realities that are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

Adoor Gopalakrishnan: The filmmaker completes 50 years in the world of the familiar

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Padayatra: Mammootty, Adoor Gopalakrishnan team up after 3 decades

Adoor Gopalakrishnan: The filmmaker completes 50 years in the world of the familiar