Andjar Asmara
Andjar Asmara | |
---|---|
Born | Abisin Abbas 26 February 1902 |
Died | 20 October 1961 | (aged 59)
Nationality | Indonesian |
Known for |
|
Spouse | Ratna Asmara |
Abisin Abbas (Indonesian:
After leaving Dardanella in 1936, Andjar established his own troupe. He also worked at a publishers, writing
Early life and theatre
Andjar was born Abisin Abbas
Around 1925, having had little success in Batavia, Andjar moved to
In the late 1920s, after spending some two years in Medan with the daily Sinar Soematra,[9] Andjar returned to Batavia and in 1929 helped establish the magazine Doenia Film, a Malay adaptation of the Dutch-language magazine Filmland; although an adaptation, Doenia Film also contained original coverage of the domestic theatre and film industry.[2][10] At the time, the cinema of the Indies was becoming established: the first domestic film, Loetoeng Kasaroeng (The Lost Lutung), was released in 1926, and four additional films were released in 1927 and 1928.[11] Andjar wrote extensively regarding local cinematic and theatrical productions; for example, the Indonesian film critic Salim Said writes Andjar inspired the marketing for 1929's Njai Dasima, which emphasised the exclusively native cast.[b][12] In 1930 Andjar left Doenia Film and was replaced by Bachtiar Effendi.[13]
Andjar became a writer for the theatrical troupe Dardanella in November 1930, working under the group's founder Willy A. Piedro.[c] Andjar believed the troupe to be dedicated to the betterment of the toneel as an art form and not only motivated by financial interests, as were the earlier stambul troupes.[d][13] He wrote and published many plays with the group's backing, including Dr Samsi and Singa Minangkabau (The Lion of Minangkabau).[4][13] Andjar also worked as a theatre critic, writing several pieces on the history of local theatre, sometimes using his birth name and sometimes his pseudonym.[14] In 1936 Andjar went with Dardanella to India to record a film adaptation of his drama Dr Samsi, which followed a doctor who was blackmailed after an unscrupulous Indo discovered he had an illegitimate child.[15][16] The deal fell through, however, and Andjar left India with his wife Ratna.[17][18]
Film career and death
Upon his return to the Indies, Andjar formed another theatrical troupe, Bolero, with Effendi, but left the troupe around 1940 to work at Kolf Publishers in Surabaya. Effendi was left as the head of Bolero,[15] which then became more politicised.[19] At Kolf Andjar edited the publisher's magazine Poestaka Timoer.[1] As his work entailed writing synopses and serials based on popular films for Kolf's magazine, he became increasingly involved in the film industry. He was soon asked by The Teng Chun, with whom he had maintained a business relationship, to direct a film for his company Java Industrial Film (JIF);[2] with this Andjar became one of several noted theatrical personnel who migrated to film following Albert Balink's 1937 hit Terang Boelan (Full Moon).[20][21]
After handling the marketing for
During the
After Indonesia's independence, Andjar moved to Purwokerto to lead the daily Perdjoeangan Rakjat.[1] After the paper collapsed,[33] he returned to film, film a piece entitled Djaoeh Dimata for the Netherlands Indies Civil Administration in 1948.[34] This was followed by two additional films, Anggrek Bulan (Moon Orchid; 1948) and Gadis Desa (Maiden from the Village; 1949), both based on plays he wrote several years earlier.[1] In 1950, Andjar published his only novel, Noesa Penida, a critique of the Balinese caste system, which followed lovers from different levels of the social hierarchy.[35] Meanwhile, he continued to write and publish paperback serials adapted from local films.[36]
Andjar's screenplay Dr Samsi was finally adapted as a film in 1952 by Ratna Asmara, who had become Indonesia's first female film director with her 1950 film Sedap Malam (Sweetness of the Night). The adaptation starred Ratna and Raden Ismail.[7][37] It would prove Andjar's last screenwriting credit during his lifetime.[26] Although no longer writing films, Andjar remained active in the country's film industry. In 1955 he headed the inaugural Indonesian Film Festival, which was criticized when it gave the Best Picture Award to two films, Usmar Ismail's Lewat Djam Malam (After the Curfew) and Lilik Sudjio's Tarmina. Critics wrote that Lewat Djam Malam was easily the stronger of the two and suggested that Djamaluddin Malik, Tarmina's producer, had influenced the jury's decision.[f][38]
In 1958 Asmara became the head of the entertainment magazine Varia, where the fellow director
Legacy
Andjar's toneels were generally based on day-to-day experiences, rather than the tales of princes and ancient wars which were standard at the time.[7] Regarding Andjar's toneels, the Indonesian literary critic Bakri Siregar writes that Andjar's stage plays, as well as those of fellow dramatist Njoo Cheong Seng, revitalised the genre and made the works more realistic. However, he considered the conflict in these works to have been poorly developed.[40] Andjar believed that the Padangsche Opera's performances influenced other troupes in West Sumatra to adapt the toneel format, which later spread throughout the Indies.[3][41]
Matthew Isaac Cohen, a scholar of Indonesian performing arts, describes Andjar as "Indonesia's foremost theater critic during the colonial period", noting that he wrote extensively on the history of theatre in the Indies. Cohen also believes that Andjar also worked to justify the toneel style and distance it from the earlier stambul.[42] Even after entering the film industry, Andjar considered the theatre more culturally significant than cinema.[17] However, the Indonesian journalist Soebagijo I.N. writes that Andjar remains best known for his film work.[6]
Andjar was one of the first native Indonesian film directors, with Bachtiar Effendi, Soeska, and Inoe Perbatasari.[g][43] Said writes that Andjar was forced to follow the whims of the ethnic Chinese film moguls, which resulted in the films' shift toward commercial orientation, rather than the prioritisation of artistic merit.[44] The film historian Misbach Yusa Biran writes that Andjar and his fellow journalists, upon joining JIF, brought with them new ideas that helped the company flourish until it closed after the arrival of the Japanese;[45] the company and its subsidiaries released fifteen films in two years.[46]
Filmography
- Booloo (1938) – as story writer
- Kartinah (1940) – as director, scriptwriter, and story writer
- Noesa Penida (1941) – as director and story writer
- Djaoeh Dimata (Out of Sight; 1948) – as director and story writer
- Anggrek Bulan (Moon Orchid; 1948) – as director
- Gadis Desa (Maiden from the Village; 1949) – as director and story writer
- Sedap Malam (Sweetness of the Night; 1950) – as story writer
- Pelarian dari Pagar Besi (Escape from the Iron Fence; 1951) – as story writer
- Musim Bunga di Selabintana (Flowers in Selabintana; 1951) – as story writer
- Dr Samsi (1952) – as story writer
- Noesa Penida (Pelangi Kasih Pandansari) (Noesa Penida [Pandansari's Rainbow of Love]; 1988) – as story writer (posthumous credit)
Notes
- ^ Pen may have been Parada Harahap, who had been Andjar's editor at Bintang Hindia (I.N. 1981, p. 213).
- Indonesian archipelago are one people, had been read at the Second Youth Congress (Ricklefs 2001, p. 233).
- ^ Piedro, the son of a circus performer, was of Russian descent and initially wrote many of Dardanella's stage plays (Biran 2009, pp. 14, 17).
- ^ In his final letter as editor of Doenia Film, as quoted by Biran (2009, pp. 6, 14, 20), Andjar wrote that he was joining Dardanella to help promote toneel as an art form to the best of his abilities.
- Indonesian culture in his films (Sen & Hill 2000, p. 156).
- ^ Said (1982, p. 44) writes that Malik had previously influenced a contest for favourite actress in 1954, ensuring that an actress from his company, Persari, was chosen.
- , pp. 97, 102)
References
Footnotes
- ^ a b c d e Encyclopedia of Jakarta, Andjar Asmara.
- ^ a b c d e Said 1982, pp. 136–137.
- ^ a b c d Cohen 2003, pp. 215–216.
- ^ a b c d e f TIM, Andjar Asmara.
- ^ Eneste 2001, p. 23.
- ^ a b I.N. 1981, p. 212.
- ^ a b c Filmindonesia.or.id, Dr Samsi.
- ^ Biran 2009, pp. 99, 108.
- ^ I.N. 1981, p. 214.
- ^ Biran 2009, pp. 43–44.
- ^ Biran 2009, p. 379.
- ^ Said 1982, p. 20.
- ^ a b c Biran 2009, pp. 6, 14, 20.
- ^ Cohen 2006, pp. 347, 402.
- ^ a b Said 1982, pp. 136–138.
- ^ Biran 2009, p. 23.
- ^ a b Biran 2009, p. 25.
- ^ JCG, Dardanella.
- ^ Bayly & Harper 2007, p. 116.
- ^ Said 1982, p. 27.
- ^ Biran 2009, p. 169.
- ^ Biran 2009, p. 210.
- ^ Biran 2009, p. 213.
- ^ Biran 2009, p. 266.
- ^ Biran 2009, p. 217, 278.
- ^ a b Filmindonesia.or.id, Filmografi.
- ^ Karsito 2008, p. 23.
- ^ Biran 2009, pp. 334–351.
- ^ Said 1982, p. 35.
- ^ Mahayana 2007, pp. 209–215.
- ^ Biran 2009, p. 329.
- ^ Said 1982, p. 34.
- ^ I.N. 1981, p. 215.
- ^ Said 1982, pp. 36–37.
- ^ Mahayana, Sofyan & Dian 1995, pp. 86–88.
- ^ a b Filmindonesia.or.id, Abisin Abbas.
- ^ Swestin 2009, p. 104.
- ^ Said 1982, p. 43.
- ^ a b Pringgodigdo & Shadily 1973, pp. 96–97.
- ^ Siregar 1964, p. 68.
- ^ Cohen 2006, p. 347.
- ^ Cohen 2006, pp. 347–348, 394.
- ^ Said 1982, p. 107.
- ^ Said 1982, p. 30.
- ^ Biran 2009, p. 220.
- ^ Biran 2009, pp. 383–385.
Bibliography
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- "Andjar Asmara". Encyclopedia of Jakarta (in Indonesian). Jakarta City Government. Archived from the original on 4 July 2012. Retrieved 7 August 2012.
- "Andjar Asmara" (in Indonesian). Taman Ismail Marzuki. Archivedfrom the original on 7 January 2010. Retrieved 2 September 2012.
- Bayly, Christopher Alan; Harper, Timothy Norman (2007). Forgotten Wars: Freedom and Revolution in Southeast Asia. Cambridge: Belknap Press. ISBN 978-0-674-02153-2.
- ISBN 978-979-3731-58-2.
- Cohen, Matthew Isaac (August 2003). Trussler, Simon; Barker, Clive (eds.). "Look at the Clouds: Migration and West Sumatran 'Popular' Theatre" (PDF). New Theatre Quarterly. 19 (3). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 214–229. S2CID 191475739. Archived from the original(PDF) on 23 October 2014. Retrieved 3 September 2012.
- Cohen, Matthew Isaac (2006). The Komedie Stamboel: Popular Theater in Colonial Indonesia, 1891–1903. Athens: Ohio University Press. ISBN 978-0-89680-246-9.
- "Dardanella". Encyclopedia of Jakarta. Jakarta City Government. Archived from the original on 4 September 2012. Retrieved 4 September 2012.
- "Dr Samsi". Filmindonesia.or.id (in Indonesian). Jakarta: Konfidan Foundation. Archived from the original on 17 April 2014. Retrieved 7 August 2012.
- Eneste, Pamusuk (2001). Buku Pintar Sastra Indonesia [Handbook of Indonesian Literature] (in Indonesian) (3rd ed.). Jakarta: Kompas. ISBN 978-979-9251-78-7.
- "Filmografi" [Filmography]. Filmindonesia.or.id (in Indonesian). Jakarta: Konfidan Foundation. Archived from the original on 16 April 2014. Retrieved 7 August 2012.
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- Karsito, Eddie (2008). Menjadi Bintang [Becoming a Star] (in Indonesian). Jakarta: Ufuk Press. OCLC 318673348.
- Mahayana, Maman S. (2007). Ekstrinsikalitas Sastra Indonesia [Extrinsic Events in Indonesian Literature] (in Indonesian). Jakarta: RajaGrafindo Persada. ISBN 978-979-769-115-8.
- Mahayana, Maman S.; Sofyan, Oyon; Dian, Achmad (1995). Ringkasan dan Ulasan Novel Indonesia Modern [Summaries and Commentary on Modern Indonesian Novels] (in Indonesian). Jakarta: Grasindo. ISBN 978-979-553-123-4.
- ISBN 978-0-333-24380-0.
- OCLC 4761530.
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- Sen, Krishna; Hill, David T. (2000). Media, Culture and Politics in Indonesia. Melbourne: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-553703-1.
- Siregar, Bakri (1964). Sedjarah Sastera Indonesia [History of Indonesian Literature] (in Indonesian). Vol. 1. Jakarta: Akademi Sastera dan Bahasa "Multatuli". OCLC 63841626.
- Swestin, Grace (July 2009). "In the Boys' Club: A Historical Perspective on the Roles of Women in the Indonesian Cinema 1926 – May 1998". Scriptura. 3 (2). Surabaya: Petra Christian University: 103–111. ISSN 1978-385X. Archived from the originalon 16 April 2014.
External links
- Andjar Asmara at IMDb