Musings and Experiences of a first timer
The pangs, the angst, the agony, the nervousness, and more importantly the final result, it all kept hitting me a week before I was finally going to have a camera in my hand, and shoot something I believed in, something that could be pure crap, but something that I could cherish and call it my own film, my short film. When I first wrote my short script, the whole journey behind it, the sudden urge to make a film, it all tails back to my previous article, which explains the reason to follow my passion just two months before my boards. Having a script in hand, having a camera (Sony PD170) in my hand, having people ask you about your film constantly, and hoping that the final clip doesn’t turn out to be a piece of crap. It certainly could. But that’s how the cookie crumbles. And I was no Santosh Sivan or Shivajee Chandrabhushan to come out with beautifully etched shots, but the hope hits you, you still hope that you can be a Santosh Sivan someday, and no matter how bad we are, we still want a final result similar to these geniuses.
The script was finished, around two pages written, very vaguely described and still for me, it was a fully structured screenplay. After all, your shit is always gold to you, it was to me too.
I narrated my idea to a few of my friends, most of them didn’t know what I wanted to say,and I couldn’t clearly express what I wanted to make, but I narrated it to myself a million times sitting in the bathroom, sitting and making random posters, calling up actors, calling up my crew, arranging the tiniest of nitty-gritties, and more importantly I started to under estimate the film, and it was on purpose.
Whenever somebody came up to me asking me about my short film idea, I told them it was going to be really bad, it was going to be stupid, it was all because I didn’t want to think I’m going to make some award winning short, if I did, and it didn’t happen, maybe I would happen never to think of making one again.
But no, I realised that no matter how short the film is, or how low the budget is, producing and directing a film, even for a single day, is one tough job. Tough being an understatement. I kept struggling, my actors had very limited timings, travelling with an old woman to too many places wasn’t intelligent, and having to live with the tiniest of expectations. It all adds to the adreline rush, it all adds to the excitement. Chaffeurs and cooks coming up to you for a split second appearance, and the excitement in their eyes, and also the dissappointment of telling them that “Yeh picture theatre mein nahin aayegi yaar” and “Aapka shot lena thoda mushkil hoga”
All my locations were interesting, the most being the cremation ground I shot in. As I entered the place, a strange aura greeted me, something dark and obviously not pleasant, something very morose. Fortunately, I found some incidentally interesting shots, and the experience turned out good. But the flies all over, and crows, and the last trip van, and more importantly, death struck relatives meating out the cremation. But as the camera went on, the relatives faces pepped up, and the expressions changed, and some of them got up to be in the camera, and somewhere the unfortunate part hit me. The same relatives crying next to the body have no objection being all happy for the camera. I refused to shoot the corpse being burnt. The family had no objection. I did. I never would like to cache in on somebody else’s miseries. And the last thing I would do is, take in a camera and shoot the corpse being burnt. A mockery of emotions, and insensitive.
But this first location shoot was the most satisfactory, there were many more, and now I can proudly say that making movies, big or small, isnt a cakewalk, and I can surely understand the angst and the sleepless nights a filmmaker goes through. I didn’t sleep the night before. And the toughest goes for the makers of independent cinema, I salute thy Shivajee Chandrabushan, Frozen.
Jo bhi karte ho, karte raho, filmein banate raho, bakwaas banao, acchi banao, lekin banao zaroor. And if this experience is probably an inch of what an actually film goes through, then all I can say is
Picture Abhi Baaki Hai Mere Dost ïŠ
P.S-Would like to thank Magik, Shivajee Sir, Rick and all the PFC mates for helping me out in some way or the other ïŠ
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Jehan, this is really awe inspiring to see how you killed all inhibitions and got behind the camera. This is thoroughly inspiring. Just cannot wait to see the short film. I’ll be honest with you. From all the posts I have read from you, this comes to me as though the teenager in you suddenly became a man, just when you drew those posters sitting in bathrooms, Just when you felt uncomfortable saying “Aapka shot lena thoda mushkil hoga”,just when you picked up the camera. Awesome!
Thanks Alot Neeraj Sir
I’m floored.
I guess kabhi toh bada hona hi tha
Haha!
Jehan
First of all I really don’t think I deserve so much that my name appears in your post like thrice…anyway thanks for that :-).
Yeah it is the madness of a filmmaker who just for the passion of it chooses to walk this road. Once you choose the path you can’t complain about the hole one is in…after all people told you apne paise se picture mat banaa…kissi aur ka paisa lagaa aur jiyne experiment karne hai kar le…but then you chose to try it on yourself first :-).
So the analogy was drawn to tell you that now that you have chosen the path just keep doing it. As you yourself have mentioned it.
Bas film banate raho. Lambi race ke ghode ho bhai :-).
Oh Shivajee sir,
And I used your name just to use the whole independent cinema point, but haha thanks alot 
ab toh films boards ke baad hi banegi.
Thanks for reading it
Jehan- great start to something really interesting ahead for you.Looking forward to hearing more from you on this front after your exams.and yes would love to see your first short film too
Thanks Alot Sethu Sir :D
Will show the film to all PFC walaas, Il probably be chucked as an author after watching that.
wow Jehan, to take up the mantle and start rolling the camera just prior to ur exams says a lot abt the ‘passion’ that u possess. pikture kab nikal rahi hai bhai. waiting eagerly to hear more abt ur tribulations and ‘passionate-efforts’ in the next post…
exam jaldi khatam karo yaar…. wait nahi hota…
Hey J! u made my day! hell it rhymed… occupational hazard oye! way to go. waiting to see ur ‘J’enius @ work!
Thanks alot Satyendra bhai! :D
email de dena?
Arrey yaar padhai hoti nahin, socha camera ke saath khichdi paka loon,will surely show it to you!
@K-Thanks alot yaar,i wrote all this right after the shooting, so i simply puked all this out and LOL i was frustrated! :D Aaj picture ki editing hai yaar! scared!
Jehan, how can we see your work? Is it fully done yet? Thanks for sharing.
Wow…Indian cinema needs more people like you…remember that a man who made 8mm short film with his friends later on ruled the art form..Spielberg…Wish you all the best for you boards and film making career…
Thanks alot arun! :D
And Thanks a ton Ram V!
@Both-the appreciation feels awesome! And the movie will be going through the final edit tomorrow, and its done! please drop your emails, I shall email,or would be putting it up on youtube!
Thanks again!