16 Facts About D Djajakusuma

Djadoeg Djajakusuma was an Indonesian film director and promoter of traditional art forms.

In 1951, D Djajakusuma joined the National Film Corporation at the invitation of Usmar Ismail.

In early 1946, with the Dutch colonial forces in control of Jakarta, D Djajakusuma fled to the new national capital at Yogyakarta.

Meanwhile, D Djajakusuma was put in charge of censoring radio broadcasts in Republican-held areas, a duty he held until the Dutch captured Yogyakarta on 19 December 1948.

Production was completed on a low budget; D Djajakusuma later recalled that their camera had to be powered by a car battery.

In 1954 D Djajakusuma directed two comedies, Putri dari Medan and Mertua Sinting.

When he returned to Indonesia, he worked with Ismail and fellow Perfini employee Asrul Sani to establish the National Theatre Academy of Indonesia, which promoted realism; the Indonesian dramatist Putu Wijaya described the realism promoted by the academy as more Indonesian than Western, while D Djajakusuma considered inspired by the Italian neorealist movement.

In 1960 D Djajakusuma released his first film based on traditional wayang stories, Lahirnja Gatotkatja; the traditional puppetry had fascinated him as a child, and he greatly enjoyed the character Gatotkaca.

That year D Djajakusuma served as production manager for Ismail's Pedjuang and directed Mak Tjomblang, a comedy adapted from Nikolai Gogol's 1842 drama Marriage.

Towards the end of his time with Perfini, D Djajakusuma again became active in traditional arts.

Meanwhile, D Djajakusuma helped promote art forms such as the Betawi lenong and Javanese ludruk over a period of several years.

In 1977 D Djajakusuma served on the jury of the Indonesian Film Festival.

Perempuan dalam Pasungan won the Citra Award for Best Film at the 1981 Indonesian Film Festival, and Djajakusuma expressed an interest in making several further films; this was never realised.

In 1983 D Djajakusuma served as dean of the Faculty of Arts at IKJ, and in 1984 he went to the Three Continents Festival in Nantes, France, where two of his films were shown to critical acclaim.

In early 1987 Djajakusuma's doctor diagnosed him with heart disease, which led Djajakusuma to begin dieting and stop smoking.

However, while Ismail preferred to focus on national-level themes, D Djajakusuma was more drawn to simple, locally relevant storylines with educational messages.