Kony (film)

Koni (Bengali: কোনি) is a national award winning Bengali movie released in 1986 directed by Saroj Dey,^[1] starring Soumitra Chatterjee and Sriparna Banerjee. This film is an adaptation of a Bengali novel by the same name written by Moti Nandi. The film is about a girl living in Calcutta slums, who with help of her coach triumph over poverty and hardships. Film's lead Sriparna Banerjee was also a professional swimmer herself in the 1970s and at the time of casting a student of Jadavpur University.^[2]

In an 2012 interview, veteran actor, Soumitra Chatterjee, called Koni one of the best films of his career. He even recalled using film's catch-phrase "Fight-Koni-fight" in hard times, as a chant to himself to lift his "aging spirits". The phrase had become popular with middle-class Bengalis at the time.^[3]

Synopsis

Koni is an inspirational story of a coach and his trainee Koni who fight all odds to achieve their aims. Khidda (Soumitra Chatterjee) is a swimming coach who teaches swimming to underprivileged kids. He picks Kony (character played by Sriparna Banerjee) from a slum of Calcutta and grooms her to be part of the Bengal Swimming team to compete at the National Swimming Championship. However, politics, poverty and social stigma emerges as distinct roadblocks in their path.^[4]

Awards

• National Film Award for Best Popular Film Providing Wholesome Entertainment at the 32nd National Film Awards.^[5]

Cast and Crew

Cast

• Sriparna Banerjee as Kony
• Soumitra Chatterjee as Khitish Sinha (Khid da)
• Snigdha Banerjee
• Swarup Dutta
• Bimal Deb
• Subrata Sensharma
• Sidhartha Bose
• Dipankar Banerjee
• Bhola Bose
• Ashoke Mitra
• Arijit Guha

Crew

• Direction and screenplay: Saroj Dey
• Story: Moti Nandi
• Music Director: Chinmay Chattopadhyay
• Editor: Ramesh Joshi
• Art Direction: Subhash Singharoy
• Make Up: Basir Ahmed

References

External links

Kony at the Internet Movie Database