Obhi Chatterjee’s widescreen feature film Shyama brings Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore’s classic Bengali dance musical to a global audience for the first time with its pioneering digital distribution strategy. The film its soundtrack album and related books are all released by Inner Eye under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence allowing personal copying and sharing. Shyama is also free online using the Java-based technology of Forbidden Technologies plc. The HD version suitable for home screenings is available worldwide using IndieFlix’ online VoD rental platform. Speaking as the free version went live Chatterjee says “Every Bengali has heard of Tagore and Shyama but how many non-Bengalis have? Over 70 years after its creation digital technology now allows us to help Shyama cross linguistic boundaries and bring it to new audiences all over the world.” So far the film includes the first translations of Shyama into English French German Hungarian Italian Portuguese and Spanish. Shyama which had its Asian Première at the 2009 Kolkata Film Festival features leading dancers singers and musicians from Santiniketan. Kaberi Chatterjee dances the title role of Shyama whose songs are performed by Manini Mukhopadhyay Bagchi. TS Vasunni dances the role of Bojroshen sung by Jayanta Chatterjee. “Shyama may be one of the first films to have a commercially viable business model based on allowing personal copying and having a free online version ” says Kaberi. “We want everyone who is interested to be able to watch Shyama in whichever format and language they like and wherever they are. In one of his most famous poems Tagore dreamed of a world where knowledge is free. We share that dream.” Shyama www.shyamathemovie.com
