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It’s been almost three months since I have been in Mumbai. I was called in by Sudhir Mishra to edit a 90 minute international version of his new film, Tera Kya Hoga Johnny! It was a very interesting experience to take a film and reconstruct it in a different way. The Indian version is about 130 minutes long and one could not just throw away 40 minutes of the film. So the narration had to change and the story had to be told in a different way. As the film was made up of multiple characters and their stories, I tried to find a situation in the original film which would become the pivotal point of the new narrative structure. Once I had found that, I reworked the different stories from that pivotal point in a non linear narration. It was quite fun. I dismantled the rough cut and …

I was standing at the bar of a famous night spot in Mumbai sipping at Mango Vodkatini watching the young and old, bold and the beautiful, the rich and the famous.

So are you back in India? said a suave looking man with greying hair.

I recognised him like I recognise most of the rich and famous in Mumbai. I knew all these guys when they weren’t so rich and famous back in the late eighties and the early nineties, when they all drank Old Monk in ‘quarter’ bars like Casbah and Janta. They all swore by the Che and the revolution and had smoked at my Alvares house loft.

‘No!’ I said. ‘I am here for some time. I come and go.’

‘Working on a film?’ He queried.

‘Yup!’ I said. ‘Working on a film.’

‘What’s it about?’

I said ‘Well, It’s about… ‘

He quipped in ‘Which film …

iView Author:
Neil Patel
(Jaipur, India)

Email :
Npatelbollywood [at] gmail [dot] com

Why bother?

Why bother?
…as of of late this is the feeling I get. I finished my 4 year business degree in 2.5 years; I like to work efficiently! I moved to Mumbai with a script. Ahh, the city of efficiency! Maybe I should have gone for Hollywood instead. But I came to Mumbai believing in my work and skill! Wow! Brilliant! Amazing! Not really, there are thousands who have come and left before me. Why should I be given a chance?

I can beg producers, directors, and actors that I have written a great script, worthy of commercial production. But no one listens. So why bother? I have been told many things about Bollywood, and what goes on behind its doors. It’s …

IN MUMBAI

Please bare with my knowledge of grammer and tenses.

It’s around 5.30 in the morning. I am opening door of my train compartment. Sudden fishy smell captures my nose. The particular Mumbai smell… I have come to Mumbai for an official work. I will spend four whole days in this dream city. Though before this I have visited Mumbai two times but this time I am more mature and more filmy to understand Mumbai.

So now Mumbai is about to reach.. I am seeing boards of Nai gaon, , Mira Road, Dahisar etc etc. Also seeing halogen bulbs images in the water from my train. The tall buildings, bastis, roads, rickshaws are looking so different in the early morning halogen bulbs. I can’t remember any film maker has captured beauty of mumbai’s early morning…. People are still in their houses. Borivali station comes Train stops. I have to land …