Kannada film ‘Dollu’, which clinched two National Awards on Friday, ran into a controversy. It won the Best Kannada Feature Film Award and Jobin Jayan clinched an award for the ‘Best Location Sound Recordist’ (for sync sound films only).
Confusion arose when Oscar-winning sound designer Resul Pookutty posted on social media that the film was dubbed and was not a sync sound film.
Nithin Lukose, the sound designer of ‘Dollu’, reacted by saying, “I pity the judgement of the jury who couldn’t differentiate between a dub (sic) and sync sound film.”
Sagar Puranik, the film’s director, told DH that the film’s team never claimed an award in such a category.
“To be honest, there is no mention of sync sound in the award categories. The audiography category of the awards has three subsections: sound design, final mixing and location recording. So, there is no question of us applying for it,” said Sagar, adding that there must have been a lapse from those who created the award templates.
The film talks about urbanisation hurting indigenous folk art forms, in this case, ‘Dollu Kunitha’. Sagar explains how they created the sound for the film.
“We tried dubbing it in a studio. But obviously, it’s a difficult process with eight to ten drums and many people involved. So, we called technicians from Kerala and went out of town to recreate the entire sound. Beat by beat, we recreated the sound between mountains. But, yes, we have also used sound from live recording as well. Perhaps the jury recognised our efforts and acknowledged it,” he said.