Spirit of Varanasi

Unni Mohan (friend designer visionary) call me up and wonder what I am doing. I am relaxed on a balcony in Pondicherry skeptical about the feature film I am making. He wonders if I am free to shoot a promo teaser for a scale model of the ‘Varanasi naav’.

A scale model floating with the floating lamps of varanasi will be a good visual I suggest him. This can be shot in Kochin. A few days of talks and discussions and I go to meet Unni and his Boss Jeevan .

Samudra is a pioneer in boat making industry in the south. Unni took me into the hull of a fishing boat as big as a bus or twice. I have fever. I take a train from trivandrum and get down at Cherthala and go to Samudra office in Kochi. Jeevan explains his requirement and I have my storyboard ready which is approved. I made it in the train on my way to Kochi.

The last time they ever made a video was some 15 years back or so with Rajiv Ravi as the filmmaker.  Now I need to be careful.

Boarding the Varanasi train from Mumbai I had a lot of expectations. An assistant was supposed to join me in Varanasi. He didn’t. 

The best part of the project was waiting for the morning and evening light. I would wake up at 5.30amand wait for the light and made a light intensity chart. This is usually prepared by me since I use daylight in most videos.  The chart is accompanied by photographs and two days observation. Rains usually change this plan. I have a back up led light and a big mirrors to reflect sun.  The sun was faithful and didn’t trash my footages.

Technically, The video was shot on Canon Full frame Dslr with an old cineprime Nikon 50mm lens and also a wide angle  35mm Helios lens. Both lenses are older than me. This would give a painting like look and also a clumsy careless retro look. (the color fade out look with low contrast I wanted for the place).

Design Objective--The final visualized video should give feel of Varanasi and should introduce the souvenir boat.  It should also introduce samudra.

Packaging- he most important contribution to the whole package was done by Ajmal Hasbulla the music director who took the visuals to a whole new level.

Sound design was done by Sam Santosh.

Met Rishab Dwivedi in Varanasi ( friend painter artist human )

The advertisment paid some of  my bills and there is bliss too.

Samudra Shipyard cochin famous in the ship building sector in south india is working with the Sankat Mochan Foundation at Varanasi.
As a tribute to the Hon`ble Prime Minister's Clean Ganga Drive, Samudra Shipyard have decided to contribute a portion of sales proceeds to the Swatch Ganga Abhiyaan.

direction camera edit

Krishand

Music Direction

Ajmal Hasbulla

Sound Design and Mixing

Sam Santosh

Vocals

Sarath Baby

Associate Editor

Girish Atuvalaipil

Production Controller

Rakhil Akkali

Colorist

Hari Prime

Associate Cinematographer
Shyamin Gireesh

Associate Editor
Rakesh Cherumadam

Creative Contribution

Jishnu Krishnan

copyright

jeevan Sreedharan

Girish Atuvalaipil

copyright suppor

Ajith Kesavan Haridas

Special Than

ks

Anami Lodge assi ghat

Niranjan Boatwala

Banras Travels

Akhil Vinayak

Dheerej M

G Radhakrishnan Nair

Rishabh Dwivedi

ShantanuYennemadi

Anmol Dharmadhikari

www.mapofindia.com

Koteswar Rao

and 

UNNI MOhan

storyboard scribble page 1

storyboard scribble page 2

storyboard scribble page 3

storyboard scribble page 4 - final image

screenshot color CC for look and feel

 

Ghoda 22 basic chaos

An Experiment called Ghoda 22

When I started working on Ghoda all the characters were clear in my head. These are characters from my feature film (in the making  - Mullu Murudu Moorkhan pambu). I wanted to experiment and play with the characters. But more important than that I wanted to hold conversations that will all lead to something. Some directors put conversations which don’t lead anywhere but they become so interesting that they stand out and fascinate audiences everywhere. However in ghoda everything had to lead somewhere. Two people in car will not talk about their favorite movie or how they scored the best stash in town. They will talk about things that will decide their fate.

The second and most important aspect of the film was that it should be silly. Not ridiculously silly but silly however. People buying a gun like they buy a sari or dupata. Bargaining firearms like it is fish. How the perpetual violent underworld is not as violent as the family life. How every man is an island but how every island makes a pattern. How silly to watch something which should still make sense but won’t linger once the film is over. How it should cinema and not cinema.

The third experiment was controlling pace of the film through performance rather than relying on an editor. This is the net result of reading “In the blink of an Eye” where performance alone is the key to storytelling and every visual and every audible detail only adds to these performances. It is not a dance where people keep thinking about how the filmmaker achieved this piece but rather they should be grooved in the essence of the scene. Another aspect that I wanted to push was that the scene will not end when the audience expects it to end. There will always be a 2 minute more of conversation and that too relevant conversation.

Ranjan Raj as chotu the driver

Ranjan Raj as chotu the driver

Rahul Rajagopal swimming accross Tsunami island malvan

Ram Menon improvising on the mood and emotion of his character

Script reading 

MOnika as Sandhya

Amol Pathare as Mudali

Ram Menon

Sushant Shetty

Monika Sharma and Ranjan Ran out of character

The wide shot suggestion by Rahul Rajagopal works kickass

The early morning crew Guru Charan, Girish and actor jamshed

There is a religious side to the film too which I would like to say a ‘balanced violence’. The gun is being fetched by muslim gun seller. (How sterotype of me). The gun seller sells it to his boss who is a tamilian hindu sri ram sena man. His assistant is a myopic moral policing hindu hoodloom. The lady who buys the gun is na a whereas the person who helps her buy it is a hindu who is referred to as a non-believer in one of the scenes. The other thought put in the movie is that no one should notice these religions and if they do I have failed.

My basic chaos in not believing in any philosophy but curios to everything happening around will reflect in all my work which eventually makes it lacking in a singularity of philosophy. I am yet to overcome this.


 


  

Three colors blue

Three Colors: Blue (French: Trois couleurs: Bleu, Polish: Trzy kolory. Niebieski) is a 1993 French drama film written, produced, and directed by the acclaimed Polish director Krzysztof Kieślowski.

Watched the film and made a sketch (speed) .. Process given below. 

Don't know how else to express words about the film.

Over 

To hell with surprises.

Salman Khan died in car accident on the wall mounted t.V  and the lady on Versace perfume hoarding went into an orgasm face. An Air India jet hauled at the doorway  as the Merry Xmas song kept repeating on the speakers.


''How are you feeling ?" an sms popped on my cell phone. I chose not to respond. I wanted to say, "I am batman...."

A passing airliner made a pattern on the window. The silhouette of a cleaning staff against the bright window with an airliner beyond made a perfect Hollywood frame.
He mopped the floor in the slow rhythm of a music composer nonchalant about the hullabaloo of the passengers, the planes and the monophonic Merry Xmas.

"Where are you ? " another sms. I want to reply that I am flying back home. I wish I could record a John Denver 'leaving on a jet plane' and reply the message. i chose to ignore again because if I did i would spoil the surprise.

  Vigorously I took out a novel from my bag to read but I  knew I cant focus. The music in the lobby changed to an epic movie theme. The cleaner had vanished as I looked up. Salman Khan is a ghost now.

Once on the streets of Muhammad Ali Road a kid tried to sell me 'Attar'. A strong smelling homemade perfume. I brought it then since it was cheap. I suddenly remembered the scent. Out of the blue a random street scent filled the lobby.

"Please respond" i got another message on my cell phone.

The monotonous lady made an announcement unclear yet crisp. A Marathi woman kissed her child right in front of me. A tamilian blasted his wife on the phone. Another airplane made a pattern on the window.

"I am coming home :-) :-)" i responded to the message, switched off my cell phone.

To hell with surprises.

Timestamps

Kaash flowers in the valley of marayur

At 1.30 prof. Sudesh Balan asks me to clean up, shower and shave. He says my Jury is by a big shot.

At 2.00 pm I get to know that Amol Palekar (actor, Director) is a member of my short film Jury panel in IDC. I knew he was big however I was not embarrassed to about the bad audio or sounds.

the title design by Shubangi Jhadhav

At 2.30pm I am watching porn “Private casting – by Pierrie Woodman” sipping black tea and lazy to take a shower.

Around  3.00 , waiting at the autostand only to realise that I don’t have enough money in my wallet 

for the auto rickshaw.

By  3.35pm Jury walks into the auditorium with respected professors, my throat was infected and I had batman voice and moreover I didn't want to speak. If the film can’t speak for itself then there is no point...

                                Me responding to Amol plaekar, Sandhya Gokhale, Phani tetali, 

                             

At 4.10 the film ends.

After 4.10pm

Amol palekar feels that I have not been able to successfully communicate my theme. He feels there are no ups and downs. He didnt understand the purpose or the genre.

Phani Tetali my internal guide liked my effort but was expecting more since he read my report. Gave a lot  of confidence at certain levels.

My Guide Sudesh Sir smiled and said that the film was good in parts.
Sandhya Gokhale commented on the meaning of the frames the length, purpose .

At  4.20 pm I had pressed the mute button. Now I am immune to critique, comments, feedbacks or compliments.

At 4.30 pm People are trying to console me. I figure out that something had gone wrong. Amol Palekar rephrased my story (though he did it point out mistakes), Sandhya Gokale remember the frames (though she did it to ask about the purpose), Phani sir saw my effort and I was able to connect to certain people in the crowd.

At 4.45 pm I get a huge response from my Juniors and batchmates that the film was good. (?)

At 5.30 pm I am at 4.10pm. 

At 7.30pm I am still at 4.10pm.

At 9.30pm I see prof. G.V.Sreekumar sirs update on FB that he liked the film.

At 10.30 pm I make black tea and start reading Calcutta Chromosome.

At around 1.00 in the night I am still in love with my film. 

CHerumarangal from krishand rk on Vimeo.