My debut Film as an Actor

Deepawali holidays are time u spend with family.

When I reached home, the next morning I got a call from my old frnd Sunil ( I call him gabar). He wanted me to act in his elder brothers' film. Without giving it much thought i reached the location. It was about 120 km away from my place, in some jungles (forgot the name), in the borders of Jharkhand and Orissa. The group consists of some 15 to 20 people including the cast and the crew. We stayed in a relatives' place, had traditional local dinner and then left for the shoot into the woods. Oh I forgot to mention, its a horror flick...

we had this generators, huge reflectors..and a cart to carry them...and a sumo to carry us! Shooting lasted till 3 in the morning. Next day was the day to enjoy the beauty of woods, by this I mean the actual real ( poti kiya open air me)...n took bath in the pond..aah! wat an xperiance...n then again shot few scenes.

The shooting took longer than expected...20 people, alone in jungle, without any connection to the outer world, shooting in the dark, mosquitoes, chances of snake bites, fear of bear and elephants attack.. But luckily nothing happend. Finally the shoot got over, all left to take back was the experience of an actor ( played the role of lead actor's friend) and knowledge about camera angles.

In one shot had to jump in the river, at the middle of the night... That something i will always remember because it was freezing there when i did the scene.

Few snapshots

For d Sake of One GOD

This was for the entry for spectrum's short film fest' 08.

With my friends Siddhartha and Pranjal, we always end up discussing about religions. Its always a healthy one, discussing about pros and cons, truth and false, myth and truth and a lot more.

Like d coin, religion also does have 2 sides.

Taking interest, started reading about it. But the confusion still lasted... To place myself on a rigid foundation, visited places like jama masjid, vaishnodevi, gurudwara, lotus temple (also known as temple of bahai religion) n to a buddhist monestry(in madekeri,a place near bengaluru) . Still the question existed. If all religion teaches us about LOVE and PEACE, then why do we keep fighting for the same among ourselves?

I made this movie and named it after a book which I had read a few days back (gifted by my friend, Thomas Krugler from Germany). Siddhartha did the lyrics part of it and I did the composing and singing. Taking pictures and videos from the historic Gujarat riots as well as from the street plays with the theme "communal harmony",compiled it into one and made it. I won the 1st prize though it was a tie with a student from jamia islamia university.

But still the question reamins unanswered.. Do they fight for religion or does the religion makes them fight... Till today I am in search of the TRUTH...

FOR THE SAKE OF ONE GOD

Genre: Documentry

Music : Prem Samuel

Lyrics: Siddhartha Tiwari

tHe dAy k@us DiEd

October 25, 2007

"hE waS tHE cLosesT FriEnD oF mIne
LoveD 2 b DiFf..waS vEry CooL.. short TempeRd... eAsilY AttrActED 2wArds chIcKS......
But hiS suDDen D****............hAs......"

This is for u My Friend......U ll be always in our heart......like u said........."i M mE"

hey guys it was jst a joke...n kaus is still alive...n now d story behind it...

can still recall the day, i was in 3rd sem...few months ago the amphi was full of appericiation... Got this habit of exploring windows movie maker.. my roommate kept on bugging me to make a movie on him... i took his laptop, collected all d pics he had, dragged & dropped in media player n published it. Again had put the same in other software, name i cannot recall... Finally after seeing it , Kaus was very happy... The story doesn't end here... still was up some prank!!! sat and edited a new version of the same video... but this time " jinda kaus ko swargwasi kaus bana diya"...

no sooner was the video was uploaded, call started coming from places like mumbai, banglore and even from assam....

later in feb 2008... a friend of mine called up saying (almost after a year), that she saw someone who resembled kaus.... she had actually fallen for the thing.. of kaus being no more.. even Ritambhara called up from kolkata..
till date whenever kaus is ill, we tease him saying the videos gonna come true...

In Loving Memory of Kaus
Genre: Fiction
Music: Here without you- 3 doors down
Length: 3:51 min

Colors of Spectrum : Uth Quotient 2007

Someday in February 2007

Spectrum's second day... after dancing like crazy in the prom nite...i was caught by shanu sir, he wanted me to participate in a movie making competition the next day... the theme was about spectrum...

Hemant, Shanu, Rahul n me were given parts to work on.. Hemant went to his room to get the photographs which he had clicked in past 2 days...After knowing about the script , i came up with the lyrics of the song, which later became the the background score for the same. Rahul had taken up some videos from the past 2 days, which was later edited.. editing and all lasted for a real long time...we didnt sleep... morning 9 was the submission...

After d choreography competetion, the same movie was screened for some 370 to 400 people including people from DU colleges at Amphi Theatre, NIFT New Delhi around 5:00 PM.

We were awarded a 1st prize for the same... and thus happend the colors of spectrum....

COLORS OF SPECTRUM

Genre: Documentary

Length: 2:01 minutes

Editing by: Shanu Prasad
Music: Prem Samuel

Cinematography: Hemant and Rahul

Getting Started

They say, "Dilwalon ki delhi".... But the moment i walked in here, felt as if i am the only one with open arms to hug... hug myself... but sooner or later met my senior Shanu Prasad with a hearty open arms... books were never my piece of cake... rather i was much more intrested in cultural activities..

Later in 2007 Spectrum happened (college's annual event).. Shanu, Rahul, Hemant and me together came up with a short documentary on fest...

This is something i consider as my call for films...

Same fest introduced me to people like Akbar and Azam Quadri.. who were supposingly directing the play.. These were the people who made me aware more about the existence of acting...

Months later, met Akbar and Azam.. but the difference this time was that i met them in a workshop group called " antraal" rather than in a college play!!!

Conversation this time was more like a stepping stone... path towards learning how to act on, delivering dailouges etc.

The time came to prove myself... to prove that my learning was something worth valuing!!!

We performed a stage act (theatre) in PSR Open air theatre, JNU Campus called ""jis lahore nai vekhya woh jamia nai". After the sucess of the play, we performed again a series of street play for an ngo called OXFAM India. The play was about "global warming"...the play didnot restricted itself on the streets but rather moved on to places like colleges, malls and even in delhi haat...

This is how a new life was born in me, an actor, a filmmaker... was born.. and that's how started psdprem films....