Showing posts with label Pan Nalin interview. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Pan Nalin interview. Show all posts
Everyone was eating, drinking and enjoying; 20 mins later, terror struck-Pan Nalin on Paris attacks
8:36 AM
Filmmaker Pan Nalin reached Paris a day before the 13/11 attack; he had a close shave during 26/11
Roshmila Bhattacharya (MUMBAI MIRROR; November 16, 2015)
On November 12 inter
nationally acclaimed director Pan Nalin reached Paris. A day later, on
Friday the 13th, terror attacks rocked the city and shocked the world. “Since it was a pleasant night, I decided to walk home instead of
taking the subway. I passed the crossing of the Boulevard Richard-Lenoir
and Boulevard Voltaire close to the Le Bataclan. There was a concert of
the American band, Eagles of Death Metal, and the hall was packed. The
streets were teeming with people. Usually by November, winter sets. This
year it's delayed so at roadside cafes the tables were still out.
Everyone was eating, drinking and enjoying... 20 minutes later, terror
struck!“ recounts the filmmaker speaking to Mirror from Paris, having
just returned from a walk through the ravaged city.
Bataclan where over a 100 were killed was still cordoned off and Nalin has no way of knowing if the friendly bouncers whose faces are familiar even if he doesn't know their names, are safe. Some friends of friends who were at the concert were amongst the first to flee, even as they were running out, people were falling. A friend's boyfriend is dead.
“Bataclan can hold up to 20,000 people and is sound proof. A bomb could explode inside and you wouldn't have a clue. On Friday, many assumed that the gunshots were fireworks and part of the show. But the death count goes up every day,“ sighs Nalin who that evening reached home safely and immersed himself in work. “It was my Angry Indian Goddesses producer, Gaurav Dhingra, who called to ask if I was safe and told me about the crazy gunmen shooting people on the streets,“ he says.
Switching on the TV, he was shocked to see familiar cafes, like the Petit Cambodge Restaurant, under siege. He still doesn't know if the family which runs it is safe. “The police are only releasing the names of casualties to immediate family after they provide identification. I stayed up all night calling those I know. All are safe but shaken,“ he says.
For Nalin it was surreal to watch on TV a friendly football match between France and Germany being played at Stadia De France even as the President, Francois Hollande, was air-lifted from there so he could declare a state of Emergency. There were also shots of gunmen driving down the street, randomly shooting at passers-by, targeting places which like the Taj Mahal Hotel and the Trident are 'symbols' in Paris, bringing back memories of the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai.
In 2008 too, Nalin had a close shave. He was to meet a French couple who wanted to invest in films at the Trident for dinner. But the common friend who was to introduce them was stuck in Goa. So late afternoon, he told Michelle to keep the meeting for another day. That night, the couple, along with an Australian friend, were gunned down. “It could have been me too,“ he points out.
Paris, over the weekend, has been eerily silent, like a graveyard, with mourners crying, lighting candles, leaving notes and flowers. After two close brushes with terror, Nalin whose film, Angry Indian Goddesses, was screened at the 17th MAMI Mumbai Film Festival, partnered by Mumbai Mirror, admits he's interested in exploring this subject too. “If we sensationalise the issue, we dilute the truth. So rather than judge, I'd like to search for the root causes which turns a Kasab or the Kauachi brothers, Said and Cherif (the Charlie Hebdo attackers) into killers,“ says Nalin, horrified to hear Donald Trump on US TV running down Paris for its strict gun laws. “He said so many wouldn't have died in Bataclan if even 10 had been armed. According to a Russian dealer there are 15 million firearms on our planet, one for every 12 people, and at every weapon conference the discussion is about how to equip the remaining 11. Instead of bombarding Syria, we should think of rehabilitating five to 10 year olds because the terror they are exposed to today can make them strike terror tomorrow. It's sad the kind of world we are creating. My concern is the youth and what the future holds for them. Like poverty, we could become numb to violence. And that's a scary thought!“
Bataclan where over a 100 were killed was still cordoned off and Nalin has no way of knowing if the friendly bouncers whose faces are familiar even if he doesn't know their names, are safe. Some friends of friends who were at the concert were amongst the first to flee, even as they were running out, people were falling. A friend's boyfriend is dead.
“Bataclan can hold up to 20,000 people and is sound proof. A bomb could explode inside and you wouldn't have a clue. On Friday, many assumed that the gunshots were fireworks and part of the show. But the death count goes up every day,“ sighs Nalin who that evening reached home safely and immersed himself in work. “It was my Angry Indian Goddesses producer, Gaurav Dhingra, who called to ask if I was safe and told me about the crazy gunmen shooting people on the streets,“ he says.
Switching on the TV, he was shocked to see familiar cafes, like the Petit Cambodge Restaurant, under siege. He still doesn't know if the family which runs it is safe. “The police are only releasing the names of casualties to immediate family after they provide identification. I stayed up all night calling those I know. All are safe but shaken,“ he says.
For Nalin it was surreal to watch on TV a friendly football match between France and Germany being played at Stadia De France even as the President, Francois Hollande, was air-lifted from there so he could declare a state of Emergency. There were also shots of gunmen driving down the street, randomly shooting at passers-by, targeting places which like the Taj Mahal Hotel and the Trident are 'symbols' in Paris, bringing back memories of the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai.
In 2008 too, Nalin had a close shave. He was to meet a French couple who wanted to invest in films at the Trident for dinner. But the common friend who was to introduce them was stuck in Goa. So late afternoon, he told Michelle to keep the meeting for another day. That night, the couple, along with an Australian friend, were gunned down. “It could have been me too,“ he points out.
Paris, over the weekend, has been eerily silent, like a graveyard, with mourners crying, lighting candles, leaving notes and flowers. After two close brushes with terror, Nalin whose film, Angry Indian Goddesses, was screened at the 17th MAMI Mumbai Film Festival, partnered by Mumbai Mirror, admits he's interested in exploring this subject too. “If we sensationalise the issue, we dilute the truth. So rather than judge, I'd like to search for the root causes which turns a Kasab or the Kauachi brothers, Said and Cherif (the Charlie Hebdo attackers) into killers,“ says Nalin, horrified to hear Donald Trump on US TV running down Paris for its strict gun laws. “He said so many wouldn't have died in Bataclan if even 10 had been armed. According to a Russian dealer there are 15 million firearms on our planet, one for every 12 people, and at every weapon conference the discussion is about how to equip the remaining 11. Instead of bombarding Syria, we should think of rehabilitating five to 10 year olds because the terror they are exposed to today can make them strike terror tomorrow. It's sad the kind of world we are creating. My concern is the youth and what the future holds for them. Like poverty, we could become numb to violence. And that's a scary thought!“
My next film is on insane Indian Gods-Pan Nalin
3:17 PM
Pan Nalin's film, 'Angry Indian Goddesses', was the toast of TIFF
Roshmila Bhattacharya (MUMBAI MIRROR; September 25, 2015)
Pan Nalin, whose first Hindi film, Angry Indian Goddesses bagged the first runner-up prize for the Grolsch People's Choice Award at the recently concluded Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), couldn't be happier. Even though they lost to Room by a really narrow margin, the director of internationally acclaimed films like Samsara and Valley of Flowers admits that it was a big high to make an impact in a jungle of 300 movies featuring big Hollywood names like Johnny Depp, Kate Winslet, Sandra Bullock and George Clooney on the red carpet, with a small-budget, India-rooted subject. It's a first for an Indian film in a category which has been dominated by American and British film wins.
"We went to Toronto with no expectations, just happy to be selected as a special presentation. We'd planned for five to six interviews, we ended up giving 120 to mainstream media. On the streets, people were calling out to the 'angry young goddesses', and that included my co-writer, casting director and associate Dilip Shankar and me," laughs Nalin, who went on to explain the concept of ardhangini (half man half woman) to his North American counterparts. "The most overwhelming reaction came from an American guy who walked out of a screening, asked me if he could give me a hug, quipped that he wished he could have left his d*** in the theatre and just walked away. I was so deeply touched."
The director recalls how he was the only guy in a class of nine girls at National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad. Over the years, he's heard actresses ruing the fact that few made films that revolved around women. So then Dilip and he, with like-minded actresses like Tannishtha Chatterjee and Kalki Koechlin, decided to make one. And while brainstorming zeroed in on a female buddy film since that was a subject not explored on screen before despite there having been great films on bromance like Dil Chahta Hai, Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara, 3 Idiots and Delhi Belly to name a few.
The film was a revelation from the auditions itself when Nalin discovered that while actors were all about bodies and dialogue delivery, actresses had so much more to offer. "We auditioned 800 girls, 200 by Dilip and me personally. And we discovered that most of them could sing, dance, speak five languages fluently, swim and even ride. Rajshri Deshpande, one of the seven goddesses, has learnt Kathakali in Kerala and done three months of mountaineering in the Himalayas. Indian women are full of shakti and talent," he raves.
The film was shot in Goa because research threw up the fact that it is one of the safest destinations in India where women in groups can be left alone to party. And it's a bachelorette party that these goddesses meet for at Sarah-Jane Dias's Portuguese-styled family home. She's quit the world of advertising to return to her roots and pursue photography. She invites her friends over, among them a CEO from Bangalore, a struggling singer from Mumbai and a trophy wife from Delhi, to open a Pandora's box of surprises.
"The research also threw up that while Indian women are sexually harassed and oppressed, our country also had the longest-ruling woman Prime Minister in Indira Gandhi, several MPs and MLAs in Parliament, the maximum number of CEOs, the highest number of female activists, the first all-woman commercial flight and the first paramilitary women's force. "But despite this, I realised 10 minutes into a conversation with any woman, whether she was in Mumbai, Bangalore, Gurgaon, Delhi or Ahmedabad, that they are all angry about something. And I also realised that goddesses take on a ferocious avatar to create change, a new world order, so the title," smiles Nalin.
Encouraged by the appreciation at TIFF and the curious interest it has sparked back home, he is planning a pan-India release in November soon after the festivals of the goddesses. "This is the first time I'm making a film in Hindi and I want it playing in every neighbourhood theatre here. I want to prove to distributors and exhibitors that you don't need big stars to pull an audience, goddesses are enough. The film has already been acquired by all the Middle-Eastern countries and that's a high. I want women there to see our goddesses at play," he asserts.
Nalin's next film in English, the first Indo-New Zealand co-production, Beyond the Known World, is in post-production currently, and he is ready to kickstart his second Hindi film after this one releases. Quiz him on what it's about and he quips, tongue-in-cheek, "It's about insane Indian Gods and might just feature dozens of men."
Even today, a women-centric film is called Mardaani… as in ‘like a man’-Pan Nalin & Gaurav Dhingra
8:16 AM
What does it take to create Indian content for the world? Filmmaker pair Pan Nalin and Gaurav Dhingra spill the secret
Ananya Ghosh (MID-DAY; September 6, 2015)
Pan Nalin — the versatile brain behind Wagale Ki Duniya — meets us at the Versova office he shares with co-founder of Jungle Book Entertainment, Gaurav Dhingra. Their first venture, was the 2013 documentary Faith Connections inspired by the Maha Kumbh Mela held in allahabad. In 2014, they joined hands with Canadian producer Fred Fuchs for the television series, Greeks, which follows the 326 BC Indian invasion of Alexander. Still under development, the budget for season one is around $ 30-40 million. For now, however, nalin and Dhingra are excited about a project closer home — their first full- length Bollywood film, Angry Indian Goddesses, which will premiere at TIFF in 12 days. Excerpts from an interview:
How did your paths cross?
Dhingra: Having worked in the production department for Rang De Basanti and as line producer for Delhi 6, I met Pan in 2006 on the sets of The Valley of Flowers, where I was production manager. After the film, we went our separate ways only to reconnect again. That is when we realised that we have similar visions when it comes to filmmaking.
What’s keeping you busy?
Dhingra: We are working on Beyond the Known World, a film co-produced by the New Zealand High Commission; an English TV series with Fuchs based on Alexander the Great’s India invasion. And, among other things, we have developed content for Saadat Hasan Manto’s Toba Tek Singh and an Indo-Chinese martial arts film.
Why choose television?
Nalin: The production quality of television in the UK and US is far better than even Hollywood films. Many mainstream scriptwriters are writing for television as it gives them more scope. Also, people are looking towards the East for stories and there are hardly any tales from India in the market. We pitched a few ideas and Greeks got selected. It is a fictional account based on real incidents. We have done a lot of research to make sure that the content is not just good, but great.
Speaking of content, was it tricky filming Faith Connections, considering the Kumbh Mela is well documented?
Nalin: (laughs) The Kumbh is not just about a mass gathering, the holy dip, and the abundant photo-ops. It is about real stories of real people — all bound by faith… religious or otherwise. From a mother who has lost her child in true ’80s Bollywood style, to a pantshirt baba, to a 10-year-old who either wants to become a sadhu or join the mafia, the characters we found intrigued us to no end. Eventually, I had to call in more crew and equipment. We just wanted to tell the stories of a few people we found interesting.
How did you manage to hold on to your camera?
Nalin: There were police and security guards at every inch. But, they had areas earmarked for the media and that caused us some problem, as we wanted to shoot certain people and not politicians taking holy dips. In order to roam around freely with our equipment, we had to convince authorities of our purpose and get relevant permissions. We had eight people in three separate teams following the characters we thought would have a story, and we’d often lose them in the crowd.
Gaurav: Even the basic amenities, which for us included battery chargers for our cameras, were hard to find. We had to keep local ‘runners’ who would run back and forth from where we were shooting to a place where we had kept a generator to get the batteries charged.
What prompted Angry Indian Goddesses?
Dhingra: Women-centric stories are seldom told in the right manner. Even today, a film is called Mardaani… as in ‘like a man’. In Gulaab Gang, women kick and fight like men. Why can’t women be women and still have their own film? We wanted to make a film where they are in their own space. Our girls are no Jhansi Ki Ranis, just girls… albeit a bit angry.
Nalin: While auditioning, we realised that women can be b** chy about one another, and yet stick together like glue. Their ‘buddyness’ is different from the let’s-forget-the-world-and-have-beer friendship that guys share.
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