Books on cinema theory: Seagull was the first to publish cinema theory in a sustained manner, opening up a discourse on cinema in its interactions with other arts, history, psychology, politics, sociology, etc. Seagull won the country’s prestigious DAVP awards for the best produced books of the year for two of its three first titles.
Subsequently, Seagull has continued its initiative in this area by publishing the diaries of Andrey Tarkovsky, the memoirs of Eisenstein, and filmscripts by Krzysztof Zanussi and Reinhard Hauff; a volume of cinema writings by Pudovkin is in the pipeline. These projects have involved working with international scholars, translators, researchers and editors; they have meant negotiating co-publishing arrangements or rights deals with foreign publishers. As a result, Seagull has a good relationship with a wide range of publishers abroad.
Post-production filmscripts: There was no tradition of serious cinema publishing in this country, and certainly no initiative to document the contemporary experimental, alternative cinema that was flourishing in the 70s. In the years before video, in a country with few archival reference opportunities, studying serious cinema directly and closely was almost impossible. For students of cinema, and for our cultural heritage in general, this was a major lacuna in documentation. Seagull published this country’s first and only post-production filmscripts, reconstructing the films shot by shot in close conjunction with the director, from the shooting script and the final edited version. These filmscripts remain as enduring documents of a rich and important tradition of serious filmmaking in India. They include major films by Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Shyam Benegal and Jabbar Patel.
‘Shorts’, this country’s first-ever international festival and national competition of short and documentary films: Seagull conceived and organized this festival, finding the funding, and collaborating with the Federation of Film Societies of India, and the consular cultural wings of USA, Britain, France, Germany, Soviet Union, Canada, Czechoslovakia, Poland. Documentary packages were sent by several countries outside Europe and America as well. With its distinguished national jury and multiple venues within the city, this festival generated tremendous excitement, giving the documentary form its due for the first time in this country. It inspired the now established regular government short-film festival.
Splice, a film journal: A response to the need for a serious film periodical that offered an Indian perspective on cinema, both national and international, Splice filled the gap between gossipy mainstream commercial magazines and the struggling ‘little magazines’ in regional languages. Splice set out to take a ‘closer and more immediate look at the Indian film scene’, through filmscripts, interviews with filmmakers and artistes, reviews, previews, overviews, sociological studies, analyses of films, etc. in the ‘interests of the serious critical dialogue that the new Indian cinema needs to sustain it’. Each of its four issues was packed with valuable discourse and documentation.
It is important to note that it was Seagull’s contacts, growing out of its credibility and goodwill in the field, that enabled it to gain access to these films and film personnel, who cooperated in what they perceived as a common cause: the promotion of film appreciation and the development of an audience for serious cinema.