Samskara (English title: Funeral Rites) is a 1970 Indian Kannada-language film written by U. R. Ananthamurthy based on his eponymous novel, and directed and produced by Pattabhirama Reddy.
[3][5][6] The Madras Censor Board banned Samskara because it was felt that the strong anti-caste message of the film could spark tensions among the public.
The story is set in a street in a small village called Durvasapura in the Western Ghats of Karnataka.
Narayanappa and his friends catch the sacred fish in the temple tank and cook and eat them, causing the Brahmins in the village to rise up against him.
Praneshacharya decides against taking this extreme step as he believes that Narayanappa can be convinced to renounce his immoral acts.
Chandri rushes home, finds that Narayanappa's body has started to rot, gets it cremated in secrecy, and leaves Durvasapura.
Praneshacharya is now caught in another dilemma, as to whether he will reveal his immoral act to the people of the village or keep quiet about it.
His tutor Malcolm Bradbury suggested he write about his experiences in India concerning the multilayered structure of time in Indian society.
[10][11] After completing the story, he sent the manuscript to Girish Karnad in India who got in touch with Pattabhirami Reddy and S. G. Vasudev, a painter, both with Madras Players, a Madras-based amateur acting group.
Vasudev became the art director and also brought in Tom Cowan, a photographer with the Commonwealth Documentation Division, Australia, as the cinematographer.
[8] The film required a localized dwelling of Brahmins as the setting and Vasudev found one in Vaikunthapura, near Sringeri in Mysore State (now Karnataka).