Lessons from a week

The week long session with the Direction students of the Indian Film and Television Institute of India in Meerut ended on Friday.

I was rather physically exhausted by the end of the week, and feeling a bit drained in my mind too. But the students were more than excited, they were like energised by the last few days. When we finished, one of them came running to the car, no not to say bye but to say what will happen to us now, you can’t go. I had to speak like Arnold and say I will be back.

The management had much the same attitude- you can’t leave until you finalise when you’re coming next. I was paid promptly, quite unlike the reputation that private institutions enjoy.

So let me try and understand why all this was happening. OK, I was an alien out there- quite literally coming from another planet in terms of knowledge and exposure. But at another level, I was my parent’s son, repeating what they had done in other contexts- help students understand new concepts in my line of work.

I actually taught in the most un-classroom like situation- with only five students and bad accoustics, I opted to have all of us sit together in an informal sort of circle, with seating altering when we were screening something. This sort of eased my life- didn’t have to stand or speak loudly. To the students an easy conversational manner made them understand subjects a bit more easily. I guess that was important as I mostly ended up teaching/ talking about areas that we hadn’t planned on having in class. But once you see a knowledge gap, you have to help to fill it! Or at least that’s the position I take.

The basics of the course was anyway laid out in my course structure and notes. I was using the classes to help the students understand the concepts laid out in those notes.

Then came the highlight of the course, for the students- the filmmaking. On the last two days, they wrote, directed and edited little sketches on one outdoor and one indoor location. I realised how much of a revision it had been for me, to go back to my roots in classical filmmaking, not merely the just-do-it style we practised in Kenya. I kind of feel refreshed with my filmmaking basics once again.

Will I do it again- for a while yes, but I yearn for filmmaking far too quickly, so maybe have to work out ways to integrate it all in my working life.

The Art Direction classes: mid way thru

I suppose it was in the fitness of things that one of the Direction students did not have an email ID. In my case it simply meant that I couldn’t send him notes via email, but for his own sake- I mean here was a young man who was studying in English for a course in Film Direction and yet had no access to the internet.

In a way that’s the way its been these past two days, discovering how little this tiny bunch of Film Director aspirants actually knew, whether due to the teaching or due to their own interests. Finally I had to just say OK, if they do not know this, its fine, lets fill in that gap too.

So I’ve ended up watching bits and pieces of movies with the guys, telling them as much the skills of the scriptwriters and directors as of  art directors and production design. But the important concern, from my perspective was that they must have a ‘take-home’ value after every class, learn some little bit that they did not know before.

Once I narrowed my perspective to the levels of the students, things kind of started moving in the class- I could talk of whatever, but they understood it all, as I assumed nothing, just sought to explain things from a very rudimentary level.

I did stumble at times because the classes are in Hindi, even the DVD copies they brought had been dubbed into Hindi or Urdu (and I did not even know you could get ‘Titantic’ and ‘Avatar’ dubbed in Urdu). They will give the final exams in English, most of the terminology used is also in English, but I explain in Hindi. Our discussion too are in Hindi, though at times I stumble and go into English there too. I keep wondering how they’ll answer questions in the exams, but it appears that this is the way it is in North India- for medicine, law, all other subjects- you teach in English, but text books and exams are in English.

Amongst the movies we saw, ‘Vicky Donor’ was obviously the audience choice- when the principles they had been learning were discovered to be applicable there too, the guys understood it all. In ‘Titanic’ or ‘Day After Tomorrow’ it had been a bit remote. They’d understood ‘Mother India’ all right, but it just felt old fashioned to them- though a fantastically written and directed movie.

Now lets see how the class proceeds from here. 

The place in Rohtak

The first thing that strikes you about that four-in-one place (film institute, school of architecture, fine arts and theatre) is the sheer ambition of the place. Of course the synergies of these things are known to any half way serious artist, but to actually set up a place like that in a place without a history in the arts is ambition itself.

I can’t claim to know much about the place’s history (of at least the past few years that it has been in existence), but to have thought of such a place and then to actually get that fabulous building designed and now built. This in itself constitutes an achievement.

Now to sustain it needs a vision, a vision of culture, of the place of the arts in modern day human society and how such a place will actually go about integrating itself to life and society around. Bharat Bhawan in Bhopal was set up by people with a background in literature in Hindi, which gave them a direct link into people’s lives. Can the Rohtak place do the same?

Realistically, the people running the place will have no option but to do something very drastically new. Otherwise you run the danger of FTII-NFDC-IFFI brigade of just becoming a club of irrelevance. Popular culture has developed its own cinema of independence when the distributors and cinema halls wanted smaller movies. No one really needs governments for that.

I would have stayed away from such a place given my misplaced aversion to academics ( born out of FTII I think), but my friends are pushing me to try out something new,to possibly help this ambitious place survive and maybe thrive. After all visions are simply commonly held beliefs and if we can help to bring that to this institution, why not.

So lets see, I might be involved if they want me in! I’m an unknown, middle aged and a person without a history of one discipline- not the most attractive of customers for a government run institution.

Working on a course

Am invited/asked/ barged-in-through-the-door into the local film school.

Had recommended to them the topics that I’d like to handle in their directing syllabus. So we had a meeting, which included the sole current faculty member, who of course claimed that he’d covered this and that and everything. And I’m given the topics that no one wishes to tackle, not their regular faculty nor their guest faculty.

And so I’m to talk about Art Direction, the work of an Art Director,  for a full five days. I’m OK about beginning at the bottom of things and believe in Alec Guinness’s famous words ‘there are no small roles, only small actors’.

So off I go to work, searching the internet for definitions and notes. And ransacking my own experience of working with Art Directors.

Finally start putting it all down on paper, and slowly but steadily it emerges-  twelve page outline of the course, including practical sessions.

Send off the course outline to my wife and a friend, encouraging responses.

Then comes the matter of pulling it all off! Easier said than done as the course is to be done in Hindi, using only big popular Hindi films as the reference points. Still, I have a while to digest the course and then take off from there.

Lets see how it goes, I’m going about it with my usual diligence.

Sending off scripts

It was one of those unusual weeks where suddenly I had to send off two scripts.

One was scheduled, a competition thing where I had hung on till the last minute to actually begin writing. Classical procrastination story where I had done the preparation for writing, but just never got around to doing it. Always found something else to do!

Finally buckled down to writing, finished off the draft in about a week, printed it after some adventure and shipped it out.

Then I pulled out an old project, one whose  collapse earlier had rocked my marriage quite a bit. I just knew I had to do a bit of re-writing to the script, did it, re-formatted lots of it. Almost on cue the person asked if I could send him the new draft, which I did having completed my new draft the night before.

Lots of dreams attached to the project, it is a potential life-changer still.

Then looking back I realised both these were Kenya based stories, maybe the final ones I’ll be writing about the country. It sort of cleared my mind to chase ideas in India finally, which I guess I’ll do now.

But is Kenya really out of my system? No, one can never really put out the past entirely. It may fade a bit, one’s memories may grow out of touch with the reality there, but it’s pretty much indelibly there.

As was Meerut/ India when we were based in Kenya, I couldn’t just hit a delete button and erase it all from my being.

I guess that’s what I’m now trying to do, to reconcile different parts of my life into a coherent whole.

Finishing a script

An outline got into the next stage of a competition/workshop. Was given three weeks to send the script, which of course I did not have!

So for the last week or so I was looking at reasons to avoid writing- too scared that what I was going to write would turn out to be nonsense.

Finally bit the bullet as they say in English, buckled down to writing. Then the story revealed itself, modifying itself as we went along. Gathering its own momentum, much like ice or butter melting, or ghee on a warm fluffy chapati-to use an Indian image.

Finally finished it last night, feels quite good. at least to me on a first read.

A very different movie from the one I had set out to make, but at the same time a well worked out one. A sort of ‘universe in a grain of sand’ movie, where in a short easy story you see a whole range of emotions and the universe.

Otherwise, the usual end of script emotions- elation and fatigue –are very much there. Plus the overall feeling of an empty mind.

At least the script is done and shipping in time!

On location scouting

A friend came along, after promising to visit for a long time, to my hometown. He’s producing a TV Series based on some short stories of Munshi Premchand, who is one of the ‘big’ writers in Hindi.

I had no clue of what he wanted and his perspective on the subject. But we kind of felt our way along, starting with bungalows of the army, a army club and moving onto older Islamic buildings scattered over Meerut. In between cropped up my granny’s place, the good old ‘59 The Mall’. That created a bit of a sensation as one of my uncle’s thought it was some house breakers- but overall it helped to make them understand what I do for a living.

Then came the afternoon’s secret, uncovering a bit of local history that had been unknown to me and to most of the others around too. Must check with my local historians how much of it is true.

Finally we came to the classic Indian situations- government offices kept in ramshackle shape in old buildings. But the buildings and their shapes and walls stay in tact- perfect for period re-creation.

Once again the great difference between cinematic space and ‘real’ space became clearly stated, with the trained eyes of technicians trained in cinema ‘seeing’ aspects in a ‘real’ situation and how they would get depicted on screen. I guess I am beginning to realise where the small time film schools are faltering- they don’t have the people to teach what constitutes an image of ‘reality in cinema, how cinematic reality is an illusion constructed from so many bits and pieces of various elements. This is not something you are going to grasp on your own or work your way into through experience.

Location scouting is the beginning of the image building, the foundation on which cinematic images are created.

That was the magic lesson yesterday.

Teaching ‘Sholay’

I suppose it must have been done before, considering that Sholay was released in 1975,  has several texts written about the movie and my overall lack of awareness about the happenings of the film education world.

But I took a shot at ‘teaching’ Sholay yesterday the local Indian Film and Television Institute of India. We screened the 204 minute long ‘Director’s Cut’ of Sholay to the freshman’s class in Film Direction. Its an interesting version that even I hadn’t seen before. The Jaya flashback and Amitabh’s funeral pyre added a lot more to the movie.

It’s a classic, so in a short while the students were pretty much enveloped by the movie. We took a short break at the film’s interval point, where I told them about the uniqueness of the Indian convention of the interval.

We completed the screening, broke for lunch and then resumed to discuss the movie in detail.

I sort of had a free-wheeling class- it overlapped conventional notions of film appreciation, scriptwriting and directing. Hopefully giving an insight to the students about the creative processes, the thinking and the decision making that went into the making of the movie. Rather than confine myself by subject, I simply let the discussion  ‘flow’ into the direction of the students’ curiosity, helping them understand how movies work.

It ended up being an interesting session as we discovered newer nuances of the movie as they came up in the course of the discussion. I think we all ended up learning a bit more than we bargained for.

Remembered Eisenstein at the end who used to say ‘I can’t teach but you can learn’.

A Screening in New Delhi

Finally, the dates for the Tiger Paw Sports Film Festival dawned.

The screening already built up up a bit of a buzz within the festival due to the presence of Aasif Karim, who is the main protagonist of my documentary.

Then my long-lost school friends turned up, including two colonels from the Indian Army. So we were kind of getting set for the screening.

I drove to Delhi, found the venue easily, thought it was a good sign.

The screening began with a near full house, and the audience sat quietly, very occasional laughs and twitters(as in mini-laughs not internet service). I paced outside the auditorium for the entire two hours, much too nervous to sit with the audience.

When the two Colonels walked out, I thought this was it-more would follow. But they had to reach an official function and apologised for not being able to stay.

Then I went into the auditorium and saw how much of a hold the documentary had on the audience. It felt good to move people with your creation.

Finally the documentary ended, big rounds of applause followed.

A panel discussion followed, moderated by TV Personality-Arup Mitra, featuring Aasif Karim, Saba Karim (former India player and current selector), and myself. I clarified on my intention in doing the documentary, the three generational time-span and details of work.

Best comment for both Aasif and myself was when we were asked why such documentaries were not made in India. And here we thought were the rustics from Nairobi coming to the India Shining, land of great cricket and a greater passion for cricket.  It sort of made our day.

Luckily the panel discussion ended before the AC on the stage could turn us into ice-cream!

Getting reactions, doing a bit of press interviews made us realise that we had actually done something. Showing a documentary about cricket, in India, with other Indian documentaries as the benchmark, to stand out meant a lot.

A Screening in Delhi

Finally, the dates for the Tiger Paw Sports Film Festival dawned.

The screening already built up up a bit of a buzz within the festival due to the presence of Aasif Karim, who is the main protagonist of my documentary.

Then my long-lost school friends turned up, including two colonels from the Indian Army. So we were kind of getting set for the screening.

I drove to Delhi, found the venue easily, thought it was a good sign.

The screening began with a near full house, and the audience sat quietly, very occasional laughs and twitters(as in mini-laughs not internet service). I paced outside the auditorium for the entire two hours, much too nervous to sit with the audience.

When the two Colonels walked out, I thought this was it-more would follow. But they had to reach an official function and apologised for not being able to stay.

Then I went into the auditorium and saw how much of a hold the documentary had on the audience. It felt good to move people with your creation.

Finally the documentary ended, big rounds of applause followed.

A panel discussion followed, moderated by TV Personality-Arup Mitra, featuring Aasif Karim, Saba Karim (former India player and current selector), and myself. I clarified on my intention in doing the documentary, the three generational time-span and details of work.

Best comment for both Aasif and myself was when we were asked why such documentaries were not made in India. And here we thought were the rustics from Nairobi coming to the India Shining, land of great cricket and a greater passion for cricket.  It sort of made our day.

Luckily the panel discussion ended before the AC on the stage could turn us into ice-cream!

Getting reactions, doing a bit of press interviews made us realise that we had actually done something. Showing a documentary about cricket, in India, with other Indian documentaries as the benchmark, to stand out meant a lot.