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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 not news to me, I heard it all before I came. Actually my view on Bollywood is “Nothing about Bollywood can surprise me, and Bollywood will never fail to surprise me.” I hear about people having their ideas and scripts stolen all the time. Most of us have actually seen it on the big screen too, as it seems every other film produced is a rip-off of something else. Seems like originality has gone out the window.

The thing with my script is I believe I have a great script and entertainer. I am not going to lie and say I can change the world or make people want to save the tigers with my story. It will entertain. It is original. It is a sure 5 stars out of stars. Well duh!! Shouldn’t any scriptwriter worth his own weight in salt say that? If the writer does not believe in his story, who will? The funny thing with this is, I have met many writers. Most of these writers go around carrying 10 scripts. It makes me wonder how many of these writers actually believe in their own stuff if they carry around so many scripts. Probably 1.3% I devoted a year to my ONE and only script. Wrote 8 drafts. I have pages and pages and videos and videos of research material. And I wrote a comic caper film!! (a genre that usually doesn’t see much research as it more writing down anything that can make someone laugh. If a joke only makes 7 out of 30 people laugh maybe it’s not a good joke or people are tired of hearing it, something I learned in my research, and helped me to write 8 drafts and filter out jokes and scenes that would not entertain)

Every time I narrated my script for a friend of foe, I watched their reaction on every word to see if they find funny what I find funny, or they enjoy the story presented to them. I will not lie, everyone I have narrated my story has loved it, and I have narrated it to over 50 people. I am not going to try to convince you if this is true or not, believe it if you want to.

So I have a good story, I should have no problem because if my “test market” of 50+ have loved it, some producer will give it least a listen. WRONG!

In the end, I don’t think that they are not willing to listen, they are just tired of listening. Scriptwriters can complain all they want (including me), but there are just no logical methods around it right now for your upcoming writer without an “industry in.” WHY? Well the answers lies on your DVD shelf and in the multiplexes. Bollywood produces 1000+ movies a year, or so I am told. How many of those films have you actually heard of? Maybe us more passionate people hear of the “smaller” films. But for the average Joe crowd, optimistically a 100?!? Out of those only 20 are “moneymakers!” What about the rest? Unfortunately, a lot of producers just do not know what they are doing. Out of the 1000 films, my guesstimate is that 500 are just producers making a film for someone they know and cannot even tell you what they are producing. There are scriptwriters in every corner, every profession, doctors to spot boys! This is where the problem lies. There are too many scripts out there. Most scriptwriter’s scripts are horrible. They may have the passion, but have nothing “people” would want to see. (By people, I mean your average Joe crowd. There are some scripts that many of us would appreciate but at a commercial level, they simply are not what your average person would like to see). I have met many writers. They have many scripts. Nothing worth putting on screen. Literally, of all the writers I met, only 1 had a script worth putting on celluloid. I met one small producer that I managed to narrate my script to. He actually said out of the hundreds of scripts he had seen, mine was the best he had received. Unfortunately he had other projects already in progress and could not help me, but told me if I could wait a year he would be very interested. Waiting a “Bollywood” year is unfortunately something I cannot do at this time.

After these meetings, I realized producers are just swamped with scripts from many writers. They have no proper way to sort through them. They have no way to sort out which scripts to read and which ones to throw straight into the trash without actually taking the time to read them. I know it is an oxymoron, but that’s how it is. So, when I tell a producer’s office I ACTUALLY do have a script worth reading, they think, “ya, that’s what they all say.” It’s hard to fight that. So why bother? No one cares to listen; their ears and desks have had enough!

I love when everyone in Bollywood says the “script” is the most important thing. Crazy how a film can be made in less then siz months here. Doesn’t surprise me. It does surprise me how stars agree to do films without a script in hand or people shooting films while a writer is still writing the script for that film. Ah, how important is the script here? This is why I believe Aamir Khan is the greatest asset of this industry. I would love to meet and talk to him, not because he is famous and atop Bollywood, but just because he knows the value of the script (as well as everything else in film making).

Back to my question: Why bother? I bother because I still know I got a great script. I just need to find someone who hasn’t got tired of hearing “I got a great script.”