Resul Pookutty's Oscar score, music to Indian ears

Mumbai: Resul Pookutty is suddenly a well-known word across the nation. He has bagged an Oscar and a BAFTA nomination and has made it to Hollywood's Cinema Audio Society's nominations for his audio work in Slumdog Millionaire. But not many know who exactly sound designer Resul Pookutty is and what he does.

He is the talent that created amazing sound designs in Mithya and Saawariya as well as in Mixed Doubles and Zinda.

Resul Pookutty's name is seen on posters and credit rolls of films but people are yet to figure what exactly he does in the world of moviemaking.

36-year-old Resul Pookutty is one of the best known sound designers in the industry. A graduate of Pune's FTII, Resul has been in the industry for 12 years now with a filmography that has an interesting mix of biggies like Saawariya, Dus Kahaniyaan, Black, Gandhi My Father, Zinda, Bluffmaster and small independent films like Amu, Raghu Romeo and Mixed Doubles.

"While I cater to the mainstream cinema, there is also another section of films which I personally relate to. There are friends of mine, there are people who come up with brilliant ideas, who have no money to make. I also idenitfy with them where I do far more creative work and with constraints," said the now celebrated sound designer.

Starting his career with Rajat Kapoor's lesser known film Private Detective, Resul came into limelight with his work in Black. Black was a songless film but the sound got everyone talking. Then there are films like Gandhi My Father where Resul's work went unnoticed.

"Gandhi My Father was one of my most emotional, troubled films. I got emotional. I wept. I was emotionally troubled while mixing the film. There is lot of me in the film. I tried to get a particular texture, a kind of ageing effect in Gandhi's voice from his young to old days. We worked on that with actors, in the mixing stages, to get a particualr texture which involved a lot of multi microphoning and multi track recording and effectively used that," said Pookutty.

The good work gave him an opportunity to work with one of his favourite directors, Danny Boyle, whose Slumdog Millionaire is now the toast of critics at the Oscars.

Though things have slowly changed in terms of recognition for technicians and appreciation for experimentation in the Indian film industry, Resul still feels that sound gets stepmotherly treatment.

But the Oscar may ensure that when next time you catch a film, you will hear it as much as you see it.