How does it feel spending a day on the sets of the latest Ramesh Aravind’s directorial venture, Accident? I decided to find out one wintry morning by driving all the way to Prakruti, a house off Kanakpura Road and found a crew of 80 members already stationed at the spot. This is what I noticed during the day-long stay at the film set.
“I was lucky that my first directorial debut did well!”
As always, I won us over by Ramesh Aravind’s simplicity, talent and an unwavering focus on the job at hand. He excelled in acting and direction at the same time. Not only was he ensuring that his lead actress Rekha was at ease with everything that was going on, he also ensured he was capturing the right moment on the camera film. I saw him editing on the move. “Let us re-shoot again,” he says to his cameraman. “But this time, I don’t flip too many TV channels, just two should do, otherwise it gets annoying to the viewer.” The best comment came from the house owner’s mother. “Half the crew is outside, which makes it so much better. Only those required for the shoot are inside the house,” she was overheard saying.
During lunch break, I caught up with Ramesh. His candid and studied comments shed some light on the life of a film director. “I was lucky that my first directorial debut Rama Shama Bhama did very well,” he says matter-of-factly. “It’s important for you to succeed in the very first attempt in this industry. Otherwise, you will be nowhere.”
“Accident is based on real incidents”
The story of Accident materialised in Ramesh’s head one-and-a-half year’s ago and is based on real life incidents. “It’s about three disjointed incidents… one police encounter death, one Aaj Tak scoop and one open railway crossing. It’s a thriller all the way and it’s family viewing.”
So what school of direction does Ramesh belong to? While he has no idea of that, he says he has been influenced by the likes of Mani Ratnam, K Balachander and Kamal Hassan. “When I was acting under Kamal’s direction, I have learnt so much from him. Many of his films may not have done well, but his direction has always been excellent.”
This 42-year-old actor who has been in the industry for over 20 years has his eye on the future. “I will continue to make movies for a family audience, but yes I will try different genres,” he says. “My next film is based on a treasure hunt story similar to Mackenna’s Gold.”
But he has one statutory warning to anyone wanting to direct a film. “Unless you believe in the story, don’t do it. It’s not worth the effort you put in,” he says.
So how does he find direction? “It’s definitely much more challenging, taxing, enjoyable and creative at the same time.” He doesn’t stop there. “The job of a director is to make the artistes comfortable. If they are not comfortable in what they are doing and saying, it shows on the screen. As a director, every creative decision is also an economic decision. Essentially, direction is about showcasing your creativity amidst chaos. This requires tremendous energy levels, a great amount of consistency and the ability to lead a team.”
Rekha’s parents were initially opposed to her film career
She was largely confined to her room in-between shots and during the lunch break. She was only concerned about the impromptu pictures I took of her. “This picture looks like I am angry with Ramesh, so please delete it,” she requests. I comply and move on. When I tell her about her first shy in modelling circa 2000, she smiles. “I just did modelling for a couple of months before getting into the film industry. Those were the days.” Today, she isn’t looking back. After doing her 12th standard, she had thought of vying for the Miss India crown, but destiny had other ideas. “Initially, my parents weren’t keen on my film career. But now since things have worked out well for me, they are happy.” Her work plate is full right now. She is doing three Kannada films, one Telugu and one Tamil film.
Temperature rises on the sets
There were some frayed tempers on the sets when my camera flash went off during the shoot. It had both Ramesh Aravind and Rekha hugging and playing with each other at the dining table, when I goofed up. The shot had to be picturised again, and this time around, no flash bulb went off and the film crew moved on to shoot the next scene, this time in the living room. The scene: Ramesh Aravind is surfing channels while his wife Rekha is lying on his lap. When he switches to a sports channel and exclaims, “Cricket”, Rekha turns around to watch it too. Again, I made news. After the scene was shot, cameraman Bhaskar barks, “Who touched my elbow?” When he realised who it was, his temper didn’t die down. “Atleast you could have moved away without touching me!” Thankfully, this scene didn’t need to be re-shot. Later, during the lunch break, when we apologise, he says, “Don’t worry. I blurted out in the heat of the moment.”
Veg food greets the crew
The house is deserted as everyone, barring the lead actors stay inside the house. All the others move to the basement. Vegetable food (rice, roti, vegetables, salads, dal) is brought from the nearby Nandhini. Ramesh Aravind sits with the owner’s family and has a hearty dinner that lasts half an hour, interspersed with a lot of informal chatter on everything under the sun.
About 15% of the script undergoes changes during filming
I spent some time with the film’s dialogue writer Rajendra Karanth. A full-time banker and part-time writer and theatreperson, his expertise is largely on stage. “I write Kannada plays… two of them have been made into films. A third is to happen soon,” he says. “I also wrote the dialogues for Rama Shama Bhama.” So how much of his dialogues is retained? “Only 15% gets changed because the actor or director has a better line or if the actor isn’t comfortable saying it.”
Incidentally, Rajendra Karanth has also written the script for the Kannada remake of the Hindi film, Bheja Fry. “I wrote the script in three days,” he says. “Though the storyline is the same, the dialogues are completely mine. There is no literal translation.”
And what’s the film called? “Mr Gargasa and it stars Jaggesh’s brother Komal as the idiot while Anant Nag plays the role of a dinner party organiser!”
Accident is slated for a January release.
(This piece of mine has appeared in the film magazine, South Movie Scenes)
