"NAAD": Lights, Camera, Action!!

20th August 2011, the day i will remember as the Ratanpol Day!! It was not the first time i was facing the camera but certainly it was bigger, better, stranger, tougher, and most importantly it was funnier than i could ever imagine in my life. Movies captivate us, enthral us, and motivate us. Movie making has always been one of the most creative jobs and me along with few of my really creative and innovative friends have had some real great fun on this day.

We participated in the event "Ahmedabad Film Project" sponsored by some creative agencies and companies in association with Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation. Well, the associated government body was a great help especially for fetching up permission on various occasions and most importantly explaining the ever-eager and kindest crowd who fantasize looking at the camera. We were supposed to make the entire movie within 48 hours after the announcement of the common topic for all 86 teams participating in an event but with a different approach for selected genre by each of the team. Out of five genres namely, Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Romance, and Mystery, We opted to go for Mystery praying to the magical gods of Guy Ritchie and Quentin Tarantino.

We could say, we did not had any script, rather i should say a proper and prescribed script like the usual movie story. It was a big mess that conjured 6 of the team member's mind talking and discussing about the story plot for 8 long hours without any break except the smoking joints between the group of two. The shooting day started without alarm clocks signal at 730 hours at Cemetery near Jamalpur, and then at jam-packed Relief Road at 9 am. The first shoot near the gate of Ratanpol featured almost every shopkeepers and Pedestrians trying to come in the camera frame and every person asking "tame sena mate shooting kari rahya chho?? (What are you shooting for)".

Thanks to a cop who looked at our badges and helped in clearing the crowd to avoid the undesirable disturbance. Being a team of 10 people, wherein none other than the theater artist (lead actor), and model (lead actress) professional actors, it was funny to act and it got little difficult as well as funnier while giving the shot in the middle of such a crowd that anybody would give 100 excuses to even drive through that way in the morning cause of indescribable traffic and crowd. Indeed people were supportive and they actually helped us in making ways out clear soon and let us act and shoot conveniently. We shot one scene in the vintage house of the "POL" having a wooden roof, and in that particular scene we needed a chair and a table. Unfortunately, I and another member played the role of table and chair respectively without giving credential to the first human furniture. It was paining as the actor was taking re-takes just to add more to our miseries and funny element to the job.

I realized the concentration and the efforts our filmy stars and members might be putting in outdoor shooting. We being infants and amateur to the film world got such recognition in the area, just imagine the reactions of our die-hard fans when any renowned actor/actress might be shooting outdoor! It is a tough job, not a piece of cake and you have to be very active and effective in giving each and every scene cause nobody can judge which scene will be appreciated by the audience.

However, I think a new group has emerged and has started dwelling and hopefully we will be making more movies together based on different subjects and genres. Also, I just wish that our movie does well to fit in the criteria set by the jury members and comes out with great results. All the best to the movie "ANURUPTA (Co-incidence)".

Happy Independence Day!!

Today is the day when every one of us recites “Jai Hind” and “Bharat Mata ki Jai”. Off course the day is very special, it’s 15^th August, the day when our folks and leaders finally snatched the freedom from the imperial colonisation of British. What is being termed as the strongest and the longest freedom struggle across the world finally came to we Indians on this day.

Today is 64^th Independence Day and as I look back only a year now that is 63^rd Independence Day in 2010, the year had been quite like a roller coaster. The population of 1.8 billion are conjuring the victory of Indian cricket team as the world number one team in Test later on went on to lift the world cup 2011 in April. Mary Kom won her 6^th world boxing championship, the Ace Shuttler Saina Nehwal went on to win commonwealth and then injury struck her that led her ranking slip to 6^th position. Indian National sport Hockey failed to inspire both the crowd and the governing authorities and now they persist with diminishing existence. This year, Indian football team yet again failed to surpass the rounds to place themselves in the qualifiers for the World Cup 2014. Our boxer, Vijender Singh continued the good show and good hope for the next year Olympic at London. And 2 days before the eve of Independence Day, Indian Cricket team surrendered the number one ranking to England on the home soil of the Cricket; nothing can get worse than this!   

Terrorist activities today give no perplexed state as we have learned to live or rather we are now habituating to survive with it. Corruption is at peak, Commonwealth Games in Delhi in October 2010, or 2G spectrum, we the people have no official records what has been stolen on the name of taxes! Political gimmick is refraining from development and we just cannot find a handful of cabinets that are un-corrupt. Each day a new rule is being imposed or being made by us, but we are resilient by force. I remember a line from the movie “Rang De Basanti”- ab bhi jiska khoon na khaula, khoon nahi woh pani hai, jo desh ke kaam na aaye, woh bekar jawaani hai”. Currently, India is the youngest country, not in terms of heritage and culture (which is the oldest) but in terms of having the largest population of youth. I being an individual, just moving ahead with a tag of “desh ka bhavishya- future of the country”, but what have I contributed to the nation? That is the question, which I believe most of the youth would be hiding themselves to answer.

Just become a human today, or at least an Indian today forgetting the religion you follow, caste you belong to, community you refer to, and creed you believe in. Be Indian today and spread the much needed communal harmony. 

Few things need to be change, and what are those things? We have to decide, we can decide either to let what is happening, that we say is not acceptable but we do without remittance and resistance, or to become the change to make a better future, However, the day is indeed special, please do not spend it in a cafe sitting with friends, but plan out to make a useful contribution to the nation. Happy Independence to everyone!!