A job

Trying a local job in Meerut after a long time.

In typical fashion, it’s an inside job that some guys were trying to get for a while, but weren’t getting. So I was roped in.

Met the people, explained what I was all about and then appear to have gotten the job.

It’s a funny kind of thing where people are ready to value the equipment more than the people’s skills. But I guess that’s the level of expertise that they’re used to.

The newspaper ads kind of give it all away- a Canon 5d Mk 2 rents for 2000/- per day, but an operator with it is only 1000/-. OK, that’ll really be an ‘operator’ only, but still there should be some respect for a person’s talents and skills.

I’m doing the job to get an entry into this market, because it is potentially as big as the broadcast market or the one for religious stuff. So I’m doing the job cheaper than market rates, hoping that I might be able to make a breakthrough somewhere.

I feel like my father did when he lost that election and had to re-build his life, starting as a lawyer, then lecturer and then trade unions once again. I’m rebuilding too, lets see how it all shapes up.

Besides we’ve been hit by age of abundance in equipment, which means prices of the lower end productions have gone completely down. The good part is that the same tools are available as the higher end guys and you can do fairly high quality stuff at reasonable prices.

Sounds confusing, but that’s my state of mind right now.

A Festival

Recently I was sent a link by Withoutabox, the online film festival submission service.

I’d used it to enter my documentary ‘the Karims: A Sporting Dynasty’ in a festival, so I was already linked to website. What caught my eye was that this festival was in New Delhi, the first ever sports film festival in India. Purely on an impulse, I called up the contact given on Withoutabox. He said send the documentary, I had a DVD lying around so I sent it off.

About ten days back a reply came- the documentary has been selected for the festival. My first thought was- so what! See I’m a die hard ‘small’ movie person who awaits to be ‘discovered’ by a prestigious European Film Festival, not this small thing in Delhi.

Anyway I informed Aasif Karim about the festival, and he immediately offered to come for the festival. I advised him against it assuming it was a small festival. I wrote to the festival organiser, who turned out to be a ‘fan’ of Aasif’s, having seen him bowl in the Cricket World Cup of 2003, in Durban- the world record performance. So the festival got excited about having Aasif present, and my advice to Aasif was gladly by -passed.

Slowly, events started unfolding- Aasif Karim’s personal presence made it a ‘big’ festival- which other festival could boast of that- a sportsman coming to show his own documentary. Lets see how the festival shapes up but its already a ‘big’ film festival, media coverage guaranteed.

What was it- the documentary’s destiny? Mutual needs of the sports person and the festival? or simply my old fashioned thinking that needed to be dropped?

Maybe a combination of all of this.

The Historian’s House

Went to meet a local historian yesterday, with a family friend. It turned out that the historian too was a family friend- he had known my father for many years and had even attended my wedding long years ago.

Then we got talking of history, which of course was the reason I had gone there. I learnt lots and lots in the space of an hour. But more fascinating to me were the artifacts that he had gathered.

I was interested in the stone figure of a dancing girl that he had, I assumed it was a replica done by a modern artisan. But it turned out to be an original figurine from the Gupta period, well over twelve hundred years old! It appears that someone found it while digging the foundation of his house in Delhi and passed it on to the historian.

Then there were the remnants of a Buddhist pillar, clearly Buddhist in their design and stylistics. Except that they had been found at the Jama Masjid in Meerut, India’s second oldest mosque. It seems that there are still remnants of a Buddhist wall in the mosque- suggesting that it was possibly a Buddhist monastery before being converted into a mosque.

The historian’s house was painted white, with spot lights over artifacts rather than the usual flat illumination of an urban middle class house. Sort of gave it an air of tranquility with beauty, without the aesthetic elements dragging attention to themselves. The man himself was so simple he got a plastic chair for himself to sit near us, rather than drag the sofa seats.

It will be fun interacting with such characters if that series takes off.

Anurag Kashyap’s GULAAL

I seem to have missed out on the Anurag Kashyap phenomenon almost entirely, partly because his movies were difficult to obtain in Nairobi, where I was based in the last fourteen years.

Finally saw GULAAL at my nephew’s insistence (yes, he’s a movie buff). It can’t be called a proper ‘movie’ viewing as I saw the movie on my laptop over two sessions.

Terrific movie, pretty much a movie unlike any other. With characters that ranged from the familiar to totally outlandish, a plot that mixed in familiar and unfamiliar elements in equal quantities, and a totally outlandish, unconventional musical score. There’s bad language in the dialogues, as seems to be the rule in smaller movies nowadays. The actors and technical qualities ranged from bad to good, but I’m judging as a ‘classicist’ in cinema.

Godard and Tarantino are obvious inspirations, but using the angle of Rajputs as a sort of ‘old world’ mafia in India, equating them with Nazism or the Italian mafia, was certainly a novelty. (Or at least so it seemed to me, an ‘outlier’ to the world of Indian cinema right now). In terms of the script that was the novelty I thought the movie would follow, but it moved more onto the youngsters and their confusions before eventually re-uniting with the main theme.

The young people, urban youngsters in small town India seemed totally devoid of any independence of thought or action, seemed totally at the mercy of more cynical powers. This is by and large true of urban youth in North India today, but I’m sure there is more to the youngsters- they have to have their dreams and ideals.

The other odd part of the movie was the use of song, it seemed to be totally out of control element with a mind of its own- much like the musician character in the movie. Parts reminded you or other overseas movies, but definitely there must be no other movie in India using music like this. I think this was because the music seemed to refer to nuances that weren’t there in the script, but here the story did manage to hold it all together.

That’s what makes Anurag Kashyap’s world unique in Indian cinema. Which is a good position to be in as a filmmaker. 

The DVD guy

Looking for a DVD in my hometown, in my usual manner asked all the known people, got quite a few different answers.

Finally, just drove down a road I know, where I’d gotten DVD copies made earlier.  Stopped at an interesting looking shop- it was full of vintage electronics, VHS players, cassette decks etc. Parked on the street outside and went in.

It was a treasure house, full of movies, both local and foreign- not exotica like the newest Iranian or East European movies, but plenty of stuff. Surely the only time in my life that I’ve actually seen a Mani Kaul movie’s DVD being sold, that too of ‘Uski Roti’!

Turned out the owner was a young guy, very passionate about cinema- he had Ray’s Charulata as well. And of course in typical fashion he had all the latest technology too- when I wanted DVD copies he said take it on a SD card and buy a card reader, all of which is cheaper than a pen drive or DVD disc.

To me, all the movies turned me into a kid in a sweet shop, in much the same way bookshops or music shops or even art galleries do. They are like a treasure trove of creation.

In typical fashion, the guy dubbing my DVDs had come to this chap and he had made a copy of my movie too. But at this point, more circulation for my movie can surely do no harm.

I suspect I’m going to build up a movie library of my own faster than I thought I would.