F.i.g.h.t C.l.u.b

“घर को ढूंढें पागल सा, मूर्ख दीवाना है
जहाँ रुके वहीँ घर हो जावे, ठौर-ठिकाना है
नाथ तुंग के कभी प्रयाग-ऐ-रूद्र होइयां
अन्दर झाँका, बुद्ध होइयां”

It all started with the idea to see what Canon 7D was capable of. I could have tested it in Mumbai but when you are from a place like Uttarakhand, what better than to explore your own home.

Thereafter started the ideation, scribblings and conversations. And all through the shooting, that is how we worked. There was no bound script and no story in a traditional sense. There were notes I jotten down, every now and then on my phone. There were fairly clear character sketches in our minds. And there was the idea to explore, much like the characters do – two friends, one revisiting the hills he belongs to and other experiencing a whole new world.

I had been following Mihir’s DSLR work for a while. He is one of the few people doing a great job with it, at least in India, so he was quite an obvious choice for cinematographer. Our friend and my co-writer on many projects, Puneet Krishna, decided to co-produce. Because most of the film relied on improvising, I cast trained actors from FTII – Gaurav Dwivedi and Shubham.

A small crew of five, we took off from Mumbai, with a seven-day plan in hand. Little did we anticipate a glitch, that too right in the beginning; an unexpected train delay made us lose one whole day. The schedule had to be worked around to shoot as much as possible all through, right from the banks of Ganga to up in the Himalayas. What we overlooked this time was that trekking up the steep four kilometre Himalayan strech, to reach Tunganath – the final destination of our road movie, wouldn’t be a piece of cake (had it been so, we wouldn’t have enjoyed as much!). Shooting on low budget, with limited time-frame and that too while traveling, can lead to innumerable permutations and combinations of situations which have to be incorporated in the film, no matter what. Sometimes the actors can surprise you for good and on some occasions one has to live with whatever has been captured. Limitation can be a beauty.

This film, as and when it gets made, is the idea we began with – exploration.

I wish I could edit the film sooner, but in between jobs that get the daily bread and a whole lot of footage essentially shot without a screenplay, editing is a long process.

(p.s. If this teaser interests you, do get in touch with us. We are still looking for people to help us with music, sound design, vfx etc. The final cut would be around 60-70 minutes. The following teaser has been edited on Tibetan bowl music)

(ps 1 – The first four lines in Hindi are by Puneet Krishna)

For production stills click here.

All feedback is welcome!

– Sumit Purohit