The Way the Elephant's Image is used in Local and Foreign Cinema (Based on Somarathna Disanayaka's Film "Bindu" and M.A Thirumugam's Film "Hathi Mere Sathi")

Abstract

Cinema can be considered as a medium of re-creation of motion. Not only the art but also the industry have inculcated in this medium of cinema. The film illuminates a certain kind of culture and it questions that culture at the same time. The elephant is known as the largest mammal living on the land who belongs to the species of Mammalian. Sri Lankan elephant can be identified as the most intelligent elephant among the other Asian elephants who owns one of the highest capacities in the development of brain. The cinema has taken elephant for its productions in order to showcase cinema's glory as well as its internal reading. The elephant has been used in several dimensions in cinema especially in political, social and humane aspects. The main objective of this research based on the two films of "Bindu and "Hathi Mere Sathi" is to study how the image of elephant has been built in local and foreign cinema. In that process the two films were selected according to the random sampling method. Then these films were analyzed with the methods of content analysis and interviews as the research methodology. The elephant's image is used in different dimensions in local and foreign cinema and it can be identified as social, political and humane dimensions. At the same time it can be identified that the directors of these films had faced so many difficulties in handling the elephant for their cinematic objective. So according to the conclusions gathered from this entire research it can be suggested that the elephant can be used creatively and effectively in cinema in order to find a solution for elephant and human conflicts.