My acting debut, first shorts n now d oscar speech (plz bear)
Those who can – DO.
(And yes…Do be do be do too.)
Those who cant – CRITICISE.
i have always belonged to the second category. And have been quite vocal too. To admit it honestly, its great fun. No, not because you judge someone’s work and pass a verdict. Because you are excited about that filmmaker’s new film, a new album, a new voice and every new teaser. And then to dissect and discuss what you liked and what you didnt. why my freinds liked that one which i hated ? its simply great. May be thats the beauty of cinema, it means different things to different people.
But this time,the tables turned. After lot of blah-blah, me and some of my friends decided to do a reality check. Have been following filmaka.com’s online competition for some time. And when they started the indian edition with www.filmaka.in, thought it was the right time. If nothing else, its just good creative exercise. To put few words on a blank paper and to get them translated on camera…shit!! it doesnt happen. i wrote it like that, i thought it will be like this. Nah, its not coming across. Are, but how would i know. Lets c, if its really like this. Otherwise, you know…..
Excuses are always many
And they are always silly!!
The topic for the month was nieghbours. Neighbours ??!! In the last five years that i have stayed in mumbai in five differnt places, have never known my neighbour. That concept doesnt exist in the big city. Nobody actually knows who stays next door. And on top of that, if you are bachelor then you are uninvited. In small n non-metro towns, its exactly the opposite. This was the first thought that came to my mind. Decided to do something with this story. Wrote something around that, forwaded it to few friends. Its ok. Ya, its working. Its not going by Syd Field rules. There is no first act, second act, final act. Nahi re, kuch bhi kya ?? Ya ya, kuch bhi. Forget all the rules. Let me just see if i can say something with the camera. OK. Then go ahead!!
In six days office work, have to do everything in just one day. sunday. Dont even have time to go for location hunting or actors. Its just all jugad or as they say, guerilla style. So, lets call the freinds and lets do something at my house only. So, we worked out the script in reverse order. We have one house, can have few charcters and have to put the neighbours angle with the personal experince…..something that can happen in that premise.
My roomie is actor. So, he was the obvious choice. Asked a friend to shoot it. Few asked, whats your budget ? Give us some money,we can do better job. Can shoot better. I said its zero budget. If you are looking for money, forget it. It its passion, you are invited. (ok ok, enough philosophy). Just before the sunday shoot, my roomie had jaundice. He was in his hometown. Not coming. Shit!! My camerman’s dad had mild heart attack. cant shoot. more shit!! ok, will manage somehow. i will act. what??!! cant think of anyone else. whats the big deal ? we are just trying out things. A friend’s student who is still learning the camera was more than willing to come and shoot. Sunday morning…..he was there. We met for the first time, discussed few things and started shooting. Gosh, am so bad actor. No, its not happening!! Shit, i thought it otherwise. the camera guy having some problem with the audio. Even got my servant to act. He would smile everytime we would roll the camera. One light fused. Ok…Rs 1000 gone. The zero budget finally went upto 4.5K. Finshed the shoot by evening. Edited it in the night. Was dead tired. Nah…the end is not coming across. Nah…its becoming too long. the duration has to be between 1-3mins. how do i cut it down ? Finally somhow managed something and submitted it. Here’s the link…
http://www.filmaka.in/watchvideo.asp?id=3E173496-56F4-42AA-86C8-BBD7754091BC
And wow!! The first round was peer to peer voting. Some 90-95 films were there and everyone had to vote for 5 best. In the list of top eight, my film made it to 8th position. seven more were selected by fiilmaka guys. total 15 ( 8+7) moves to jury level. Some things must have worked. Few commented and said they have experienced something similar. May be that was the point that they connected too. But what happened in the end ? I smiled. Ya, ya, i know. The first cheque of Rs 10,000 came soon. I said to myself, ok i belong to VVC school of film production. If my film makes money,everyone gets something. If not, its just passion that counts. Ha ha ha. So, shared it with everyone except friends – 1k, 2k or just peanuts. Friends, they are always taken for granted. :-)
For jury level, was asked to submit one more film. Same topic – neighbours. My personal experience is done and over. Could not think of anything new. Had written a short story for a freinds short film some time back. Its also based on personal experince..not exactly like this but something similar. Lets twist this a bit.
Same problem…have just one day. No location, no actors. My home and some freinds. Mailed the story to few freinds. Reactions were same…ya its working. May be…depends on how u shoot it. The Syd Field followers were postive this time…yes,it has three acts this time. But then its diffcult to pull it. My reaction…whats the big deal. Chill. Lets just shoot. I dont aspire for anything fancy. Forget about those great production values. Let me just see if I can get the basics right. Similarly, shot the next film on one sunday….morning till evening and then edit during night. KK, Vasan and Dipankar…they are all there in the film. Thanks guys!! The girl is my colleague Priya. Kartik and Vasan also sat down during the edit. This shot is better or that one. They decided almost everything. Dipankar’s first reaction was shit, he is such a bad actor!! I said chill. Its ok.
Realised i cant be objective. Its impossible to be when you are judging your own things. Its really difficult to figure out if its working or not. So, Here’s the link to the final one…
http://www.filmaka.in/watchvideo.asp?id=311C8700-E42D-4BEA-BC36-CDB42E57F013
or open www.filmaka.in and check out the film sexy neighbour. Its on homepage now.
And wow, good news again. In the jury level, there were 15 entries. Manged to make it to the finals and again at the last position. Three guys moves to final every month. The annual final will have 36 finalists making one film each on a given topic.
Now,waiting for the cheque of 20K. Will again go the VVC way. It feels great. And this oscar speech has become quite long. So, not boring you guys anymore. Do watch the films if possible. Bouquets, brickbats or anything thats handy is welcome. I have hippos skin. So dont shy away. For everything that is good, i did it. For everything that’s bad…i did it too. And i had thousand limitations and million excuses. But then as i said earlier, Excuses are always many
And they are always silly!! (in no particular order )…I want to thank God,A,B,C…….Pfc……Z.
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
Hi Somen !
U didnt submit anything for PFC-One ?
Playback…no ya. was thinking. but then 124 is alredy huge number!! we r already going nuts thinking how to handle it.
Maybe you should check out Gateway on Pixtelevision ! Its Hollywood baby !
Ahem!! PnU
@Vasanbala…u missed this line in d post…”So, shared it with everyone except friends – 1k, 2k or just peanuts. Friends,they are always taken for granted.” So hav kept some peanuts for u too!! ha ha ha.Okay then,dont buy that bag. let d cheque come.
Playback..ya,knw abt it. but its good exercise here.
@ Phoenix
So how does it work at PFC ? U and Oz do all the “behind the scenes work” ?
its Oz all the way. and many chungu mungus like me across d world doing lil bit of this n that. thats it.
okie ! thanx
P(L)AYBACK –
“@ Phoenix – So how does it work at PFC ? U and Oz do all the
n add a fatass to two takasses. it becomes fattack ass and more passion!!
fatass my brownass….sale takass…
congrats Phoenixnu! Will be cheering you all the way to the big jackpot…!
PnU – simply loved the two shorts. Your Man Friday acts well. And if this is the return on investment that you get for your films, then count me in as an investor for the next one
Subrat-thnx.thnx a ton 4 d offer. Bt its risky busines!ROI nt sure alwys.
DnC…Thnx ya. Nid tht.
he he he… I am from Gwalior too. I also need a month’s free stay in Bombay. :D
Great piece of work Somen.
PNU,
Awesome!!! Glad to finally see the baby ;)
What I love about film is that many say that there is only one way to do something, take a shot, write a script, etc., yet sometimes it is those who screw normal convention that make the best stories. There are places here where normal convention was thrown out the door, and the films are better for it.
And, keep making shorts. I think they are tougher than features and it takes a lot to make a short this well, let alone two…
Somen, liked ur shorts! congrats n gud luck for the finals!!
congrats somen,..way to go…!
hope u make many more films which catch the stream of ur poetic thoughts..
Finally! Jeeo ustaad, main aapka naamkaran karne waala hoon….
“The GOD of Small Things”!^:)^
Good Post Somen… though could not watch the films as it wasn’t downloading on my comp… congrats…