Smita Patil honored in special tribute, Rekha releases book about the legendary actress - written by Ms. Lalita Tamhane

From an article in Mid Day magazine- 09-24-09 ..


"Prateik Babbar (the late actress' son) will attend the documentary screening on his mom Smita Patil at the Dinanath Mangeshkar hall today. The event will pay a tribute to the late actress, and feature prominent filmmakers expressing their views on her work".



Prateik Babbar (Smita Patil's son - who bears a striking resemblance to his mother)


"Prateik will also be speaking at the event. Prateik is immensely proud of his mom's body of work and was involved behind the scenes in the creating of the show. Says a source close to the actor, "He is an introvert and hates talking in public events. He gets stage jitters, but this will be different. He is planning to talk about the influence of his mom on him."

Overwhelmed
The event will begin with a commentary and a slide show of images and stills from the actress' movies. Sachin Khedekar and Sonali Kulkarni will participate in the commentary. Then there will also be a section on her regional Marathi movies and songs. Prateik, who watched the rehearsals of the show, got extremely emotional while watching images of his mom on screen.

Prateik says, "I feel very overwhelmed. I just want to know as much as I can about her, as I really never knew her. It's an extremely emotional moment for me."

Big scale
The event will be interspersed with comments and discussion of Smita's movies with the audience. This is the first time a tribute has been organised on such a big scale. Talking about it, Smita's sister Manya says, "It's a multi media event which has rare clips and images from her movies. There will also be a group of singers who will cover some of her popular Marathi songs." Earlier in the week, a book on Smita's films was launched by actress Rekha."

see video clip of the event HERE

Rekha and Smita Patel were close friends, and Rekha actually presented the Filmfare Award for Best Actress to Smita Patil in 1981 for the film Chakra.




Below - a very young Smita Patil...





After I posted this article from Mid-Day, I read here that a new book has indeed been published about Smita Patil written by journalist Ms. Lalita Tamhane .. and released by the legendary actress, Rekha, at this event (thanks to MPS for the correction: "The book on Smita Patil is not written by Rekha, but by the film Journalist Ms. Lalita Tamhae. This is the 2nd and more detailed edition of the book. It was released by Rekha. There is NO documentary on Smita Patil, but a multimedia presentation broadly tracing her life, esp her professional life via film clips, songs and a live narration by Ms. Sonali Kulkarni and Sachin Khedekar." )





Now, of course, I must find a copy of this book for myself! Im so glad that Smita Patil is being remembered and that her important legacy is being carried on.

* I also truly hope that the party who owns the footage of the interview with Smita Patil from Indian television from 1985 will someday make it available legitimately.. And really.. why dont they make a movie about her? She deserves a full length documentary!


MORE PHOTOS OF THE EVENT HERE!!!

More info soon

Read a tribute to her written in 2005 just after her 50th birthday