In a significant development, Indo-Bangla joint production 'Sankhachil' was released simultaneously in theatres of the two countries today, the Bengali New Year's day, celebrated with equal gusto on both sides of the border.
"This will open new frontiers for filmmakers of both West Bengal and Bangladesh who equally suffer due to limited audiences and geographical barriers," said Prosenjit Chatterjee, the main lead of the Goutam Ghose directed Sankhachil and one of its producers.
"There could be further scope for joint collaborations for tapping each other's market and simultaneous or almost simultaneous releases," Prosenjit told PTI before Sankhachil's premier here this evening.
Before the partition-themed Sankhachil, 'Belaseshe' (2015) was released in Bangladesh after it's successful run in India and was received well by the audiences there.
"If the flow gets momentum it will help in reviving the prospect of content-rich cinemas in different genres made on both sides of the border. There has to be a mechanism which had been suggested during FICCI frames meet but somehow did not fructify," Prosenjit said.
Sankhachil co-producer Habibur Rahman Khan of Bangladesh said the release on Bengali new year day in the two countries was significant considering the sentiment Bengalis associate with the day and the film will strike a chord with thousands affected by the partition.
Khan had earlier co-produced Goutam Ghosh's 'Padma Nadir Majhi' (1993) and 'Moner Manush' (2010).
"We are on the lookout for a model with a corpus from both sides which will make the joint Indo-Bangla mechanism more practicable on the lines of Europe," he said.
Sankhachil, starring popular Bangladesh actress Kusum Sikdar, has Bangladesh's Faridur Reza Sagar and India's Mou Raychowdhury on board as co-producers.
"You can call it a truly representative Indo-Bangla co-production in every sense," Goutam said.
