One day he gives a ride to an affluent young executive who has the same phone. They talk, make a connection, and the executive takes Shanu's number. On their second meeting, Shanu pushes this familiarity too far, and suffers for overstepping invisible social barriers. This 15-minute film, called Shanu Taxi, would essentially be a slice of Mumbai life, filmed entirely at night on its orange streets.
So, I sat at my desk with the intention of revising the script - to be ready to make it whenever the time came. When I finished reading the script, I realised that the time was now. There was a little money in the bank and my boss was away to LA on work. He would remain there for at least two weeks. I was helping him develop a big film. When he came back, there'd be hardly time to breathe.
A friend of mine called Akshay had done the same thing a year ago. He'd written a short script about a Parsi lady who falls in love at the age of 70. I remember getting a call from him. "Vasant, I'm making my film. Will you edit it when it's shot?" I had the equipment at home. Sure, I'd edit it.
Akshay's film was honest, sensitive and was made for a whopping Rs 4,000. International film festivals screened it, Pooja Bhatt screened it for the media and even invited Akshay to bring his other writing over and discuss what they could do in the future. By the evening, I was sitting with Akshay discussing the things I needed to do.
What are you doing when you make a film? Essentially, you are staging an imitation of life for a camera. Unlike theatre (and bigger budgeted films), this staging is done in an uncontrolled environment. The stages for my film were a chawl in Sion, an apartment on Pali Hill in Bandra and the open, police-infested roads of Mumbai. I mention the police for a reason. Staging an imitation of life doesn't come cheap - Rs 5,000 for permissions from the police, another 5,000 for permissions from the Municipal Corporation and another 5,000 for permission from the Transport Office.
These three figures combined were more or less the budget of my shoot! All I had was a small digital video camera. There was no bulky equipment that would come in anyone's way. Damn the permissions! I would have to wage a guerrilla war to catch this imitation of life for my camera.
What else do you need? In the little time I've worked in this business, one thing is blatantly obvious about the craft - it is a highly collaborative process. This, for me, is also one of the most attractive aspects of this craft. I spent a lot of hollow, wasteful time worrying about how I'd shoot it, how I'd edit it, how I'd get the sound right, how I'd find my actors. I only made progress when it dawned upon me that one can find individuals with these particular skills.
The right people for the job exist and the people who can help you find them also exist. Previously, when I have directed even shorter material, my friends have obliged me by acting or working for free. This is always the easiest solution, and this time I decided to veer as far from it as possible, unless a friend really possessed the required skills take the film somewhere beyond the amateur into the realms of the professional.
The next big worry was the price of these individuals. Twenty days before I took the first shot, I made the rounds - plying each branch of the moderately large tree that was my nexus of human relationships in this city. Perhaps it was luck, but I found there weren't more than three degrees of separation between me and the right people for the job. And their price? I discovered that talented people are always looking to do good work, and are willing to negotiate their price when they come across it. I was armed with my script and my pitch, and the combination convinced most of these people that this would be good work.
The essence of my pitch was quite simple - each time I narrated the story, I infused as much feeling into it as I could muster. This was made easier by the fact that I myself was highly convinced by it. I felt that this story didn't lead anyone on - it was telling itself for what it was. It was not trying to show off its uniqueness, set itself apart or move with a current trend. It stood there, recognisable and waiting to be made, itching to be depicted.
These things gave me the energy to narrate it up to 10 times a day. At the end of the narration, I'd mention that there was no money involved apart from food and conveyance during shoot. Most people who I approached agreed to give it a shot. The ones who didn't put me onto others who did. One actor, a senior gentlemen who is a known face in television with lots of experience told me, "There comes a time in each of our careers when we need a support. This is such a time for you. I will support you."
As I mentioned, making a film is staging an imitation of life for a camera. If you have a clear vision and wish it to come through in your film, then the imitation has to be accurate. This means getting the correct paraphernalia together to pull off your specific imitation. My film was about a taxi driver. This meant acquiring a taxi for three nights of shoot and a cabbie uniform.
The other things I needed came bundled with my locations - the chawl that I needed for a scene in the driver's home had in it most of the things you'd expect to find in the character's home. Even the uniforms weren't that difficult to find - I live in Mumbai, a city that manufactures imitations of life faster than Vijay Mallya bottles beer. All this stuff is available on demand, cheaply too. But the taxi?
There are 60,000 taxicabs in this city. Some are on lease to their drivers, some are owned by them. The ones who don't own their cabs wear khaki uniforms. The ones who do wear white. Around six months ago, about the same time when I wrote the film, I underwent some ayurvedic therapy for an injured back. The treatment centre was a 10-minute drive from where I lived, and I took a cab there each morning before work.
One taxi driver, one who wore white, started waiting for me each morning when he saw the regularity of my trips. His taxi was upholstered in velvet, with a mirrored ceiling and blinking chandelier for good measure. I decided that this was to be my taxi. Rakesh Joshi, the driver, a sturdy UP-ite in his 30s, who had once been deported from Thailand and Singapore for working there without a permit, heartily agreed to the enterprise. We set a fixed price for the three nights of shoot. Once I had the taxi, I knew I had the film.
(Vasant works as a creative assistant to a film director in Mumbai)first published:April 15, 2006, 11:02 ISTlast updated:April 15, 2006, 11:02 IST
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On my 26th birthday, I woke up an hour earlier than usual and sat at my desk, having decided the previous night that this year I would make a film. I had written a script a few months ago - the story of a young Muslim taxi driver called Shanu who discovers a mobile phone left behind in his cab. When he returns it to the owner, the owner gifts him the phone. Resisting the temptation to sell it, Shanu activates the phone, and begins to look at it as a portal to better things.
One day he gives a ride to an affluent young executive who has the same phone. They talk, make a connection, and the executive takes Shanu's number. On their second meeting, Shanu pushes this familiarity too far, and suffers for overstepping invisible social barriers. This 15-minute film, called Shanu Taxi, would essentially be a slice of Mumbai life, filmed entirely at night on its orange streets.
So, I sat at my desk with the intention of revising the script - to be ready to make it whenever the time came. When I finished reading the script, I realised that the time was now. There was a little money in the bank and my boss was away to LA on work. He would remain there for at least two weeks. I was helping him develop a big film. When he came back, there'd be hardly time to breathe.
A friend of mine called Akshay had done the same thing a year ago. He'd written a short script about a Parsi lady who falls in love at the age of 70. I remember getting a call from him. "Vasant, I'm making my film. Will you edit it when it's shot?" I had the equipment at home. Sure, I'd edit it.
Akshay's film was honest, sensitive and was made for a whopping Rs 4,000. International film festivals screened it, Pooja Bhatt screened it for the media and even invited Akshay to bring his other writing over and discuss what they could do in the future. By the evening, I was sitting with Akshay discussing the things I needed to do.
What are you doing when you make a film? Essentially, you are staging an imitation of life for a camera. Unlike theatre (and bigger budgeted films), this staging is done in an uncontrolled environment. The stages for my film were a chawl in Sion, an apartment on Pali Hill in Bandra and the open, police-infested roads of Mumbai. I mention the police for a reason. Staging an imitation of life doesn't come cheap - Rs 5,000 for permissions from the police, another 5,000 for permissions from the Municipal Corporation and another 5,000 for permission from the Transport Office.
These three figures combined were more or less the budget of my shoot! All I had was a small digital video camera. There was no bulky equipment that would come in anyone's way. Damn the permissions! I would have to wage a guerrilla war to catch this imitation of life for my camera.
What else do you need? In the little time I've worked in this business, one thing is blatantly obvious about the craft - it is a highly collaborative process. This, for me, is also one of the most attractive aspects of this craft. I spent a lot of hollow, wasteful time worrying about how I'd shoot it, how I'd edit it, how I'd get the sound right, how I'd find my actors. I only made progress when it dawned upon me that one can find individuals with these particular skills.
The right people for the job exist and the people who can help you find them also exist. Previously, when I have directed even shorter material, my friends have obliged me by acting or working for free. This is always the easiest solution, and this time I decided to veer as far from it as possible, unless a friend really possessed the required skills take the film somewhere beyond the amateur into the realms of the professional.
The next big worry was the price of these individuals. Twenty days before I took the first shot, I made the rounds - plying each branch of the moderately large tree that was my nexus of human relationships in this city. Perhaps it was luck, but I found there weren't more than three degrees of separation between me and the right people for the job. And their price? I discovered that talented people are always looking to do good work, and are willing to negotiate their price when they come across it. I was armed with my script and my pitch, and the combination convinced most of these people that this would be good work.
The essence of my pitch was quite simple - each time I narrated the story, I infused as much feeling into it as I could muster. This was made easier by the fact that I myself was highly convinced by it. I felt that this story didn't lead anyone on - it was telling itself for what it was. It was not trying to show off its uniqueness, set itself apart or move with a current trend. It stood there, recognisable and waiting to be made, itching to be depicted.
These things gave me the energy to narrate it up to 10 times a day. At the end of the narration, I'd mention that there was no money involved apart from food and conveyance during shoot. Most people who I approached agreed to give it a shot. The ones who didn't put me onto others who did. One actor, a senior gentlemen who is a known face in television with lots of experience told me, "There comes a time in each of our careers when we need a support. This is such a time for you. I will support you."
As I mentioned, making a film is staging an imitation of life for a camera. If you have a clear vision and wish it to come through in your film, then the imitation has to be accurate. This means getting the correct paraphernalia together to pull off your specific imitation. My film was about a taxi driver. This meant acquiring a taxi for three nights of shoot and a cabbie uniform.
The other things I needed came bundled with my locations - the chawl that I needed for a scene in the driver's home had in it most of the things you'd expect to find in the character's home. Even the uniforms weren't that difficult to find - I live in Mumbai, a city that manufactures imitations of life faster than Vijay Mallya bottles beer. All this stuff is available on demand, cheaply too. But the taxi?
There are 60,000 taxicabs in this city. Some are on lease to their drivers, some are owned by them. The ones who don't own their cabs wear khaki uniforms. The ones who do wear white. Around six months ago, about the same time when I wrote the film, I underwent some ayurvedic therapy for an injured back. The treatment centre was a 10-minute drive from where I lived, and I took a cab there each morning before work.
One taxi driver, one who wore white, started waiting for me each morning when he saw the regularity of my trips. His taxi was upholstered in velvet, with a mirrored ceiling and blinking chandelier for good measure. I decided that this was to be my taxi. Rakesh Joshi, the driver, a sturdy UP-ite in his 30s, who had once been deported from Thailand and Singapore for working there without a permit, heartily agreed to the enterprise. We set a fixed price for the three nights of shoot. Once I had the taxi, I knew I had the film.
(Vasant works as a creative assistant to a film director in Mumbai)
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