The First Indo Mauritius Film Co -production..Part 2

 "...revive the project" !
The year was 1988.  Jaya Bachchan was now heading CFSI . As mentioned in my earlier post she was a Chairperson in a hurry. When I presented the Indo-Mauritius  project  to her, the first reaction was "Mukesh , take the first flight to Mauritius along with A K Bir ( National Awardee Camera man) and Madan Bawaria (the late director of the Jaya Bhaduri's  FTII diploma film "Suman") and revive the project".

A K Bir

Crew Members

 .....dream was taking shape:
After 4 years my idea, my dream was taking shape. As advised by Mrs Bachchan I was back  in Mauritius (and now with a bang), along with A K Bir and Madan Bawaria. We  finalised the locales for shooting. Local talent was also tapped and all preproduction arrangements were taken care of.

...........entire unit along with ...boarded the Air Mauritius flight:
 The entire unit along with Artiste viz. Paintal, M K Raina, Savita Bajaj, technical crew with Director Madan Bavaria, Cinematographer A K Bir,  Sound Recordist  Arunodaya Sharma, all equipment, raw stock boarded the Air Mauritius flight  in April 1989.  The Mauritians could not believe that an idea of co production from their Art and and Culture minister Mr Parsuramen  is finally taking shape.

 A. Parsuramen Director UNESCO India

( Incidentally Mr Parsuramen, who was heading the UNESCO in the Indian Sub continent, read the blog and got reconnected with me. I am reproducing his comments" Mukesh....Once again many thanks for reconnecting. I visited the Blog with my wife and we were so happy and impressed to see our photo lighting of lamp in 1984! You did a great job! I look forward to meeting you in the near future. Let us keep in touch.....Parsuramen )

Pink Pigeon

......never felt that we were away from home:
 Coming back to Mauritius, we stayed on the island for nearly 50 days. The  hospitality of the Mauritian people was world class. We never felt that we were away from home. In fact Paintal invited his entire family to show them the beauty -that Mauritius was.  For M K Raina ( from National School of Drama) it was a memorable trip. He played the role of a scientist who came from India  and helped the locals to breed the Pink Pigeon in captivity with the help of African dove. Incidentally the pink pigeon is one of the rarest and once one of the most threatened birds in the world.

A K Bir, Arunodaya Sharma & M K Raina

Later on Sharang Dev also joined the unit. He came to Mauritius to  understand more about the local folk music. He was the Music director of the film .

Sharang Dev & Arunodaya Sharma

............the shooting was over:
Finally the shooting was over and the crew returned to India to start the post  production work.
The film was titled "Ankur Maina aur Kabootar".

  ...........won the  National award:
It was censored in the year 1989  and won the  National Award for the Best children's film. The award was received by Mr Bijoy Madhou (co producer Mauritius)  and myself (co producer India)  from late President of India Dr Venkatraman.

    MY IDEA .... passed through three periods:-                                                      
  Today when I look back, I realize that MY IDEA to do a  co production with the Govt of  Mauritius  passed through three periods:
1.It cant be done!
2. It probably can be done, but its not worth doing.!!
3. I knew it was a good idea all along!!!

.
Moral of the story: An idea that is developed and put into action is more important than an idea that exits only as an idea...

1. Good post Mukesh. I was wondering what is the source of 3 of your photos in which I am seen too. Take care.

   Reply
2. 
   Comments received from Alok Bajpai Via Hotmail
   
   Very interesting & inspirational especially in todays context wherin the ideas are mostly rejected or kept on the back burner. M sure the satisfaction level after completing the project and getting recognition at the top most level must have been a very exhilarating !!
   
   Regards
   
   Alok

   Reply
3. 
   nice to knw that such things... even i didnt have idea about these facts ..nice to read out ur blog.
   
   http://www.offermyoffer.com/vouchers/detail/yes-car-insurance.co.uk/24237

First Indo Mauritius Film Co -production ...Part 1

Mrs Parsuramen, Parsuramen ,Indian High Commissioner, Mukesh Sharma (1984)

The year was 1984 . Children Film Society, India (CFSI), received  the directive from Min Of I and B to organize a children film festival in Mauritius. I was deputed for the job. This was my maiden trip abroad. At that time Air India was operating some flights to Mauritius. I reached  Port Louis, the capital, with a set of 5 Children  films and set the ball rolling for the first ever Ocean film festival at Mauritius. At the airport I found an interesting slogan coined by the Ministry of Tourism " Why is it difficult to find Mauritius on the world map?... Simply because its out of this world."  Yes that was absolutely true, the beautiful island of Mauritius, was just out of this world .

........Mauritius is out of this world

 After a formal inauguration by Mr Parsuramen  the Hon'ble Min.of Art and Culture -Mauritius, I was invited for an official dinner, hosted by the Minister. During the course of the discussion, the minister came up with the idea of a co-production of a Children's film with CFSI.

Hon'ble Mr A Parsuramen

                                                      

Min. Parsuramen and Mukesh Sharma

                                    
The proposal was good but Mauritius had no film industry, what will be their contribution? Moreover Mr Parsuramen the minister also erstwhile  Director of UNESCO In India , was keen to finalize the project and announce the same to the press and media , prior to my return to India. I had very little time and very few options.
But somehow I was determined to do something, to prepare a blue print, before I leave the shores of  Mauritius. I am at my best when I am racing against time.

Shores of Mauritius

Knowing that the island nation had no infrastructure vis a vis film production, I divided the areas of co-production  on the basis of strength and weakness of each party. Mauritius Film Development corporation would take care of the boarding, lodging, air travel of the film crew from India and back. These were their strong points. In addition, the story idea of the film would be taken  from Mauritius. In order to have the local flavor, I decided to cast some theater artistes from Mauritius.                                                                              

A Multi ethnic Society- Mauritius

    CFSI on its part would take care of the equipment , technicians,  lead actors, raw stock, post production etc. The film would be shot at one stretch in Mauritius.
The total cost of the project worked out to a tune of Rupees 20 lakhs ( two million Indian Rupees)  As per my planning both the parties were sharing more or less equal budget burden.
The toughest part of the entire exercise was to select a local story idea for the film. I remember staying awake the whole night and going through various story books, written by some of the famous authors of Indian origin. Finally before dawn I zeroed down on the story OPERATION PINK PIGEON, written by Ramesh Ramdoyal.  The plot was about saving the Pink Pigeon and  breeding them in captivity (which the birds don't do) as they  were on the verge of extinction like the Dodo.

As dead as a DODO....

   The next morning I handed over my project report along with the Story Operation Pink pigeon  to the Minister, Mr Parsuramen. He was thrilled and complimented me for my efforts, on such a short notice.

A poster of Souten

Hurriedly a press conference was organized and lo and behold I was the cynosure of the entire press.  It was a miracle for the local people. Bollywood coming to  Mauritius, as they were going to be a part of the history.

 The only film which was shot  prior to the planning of this co production was  Sawan Kumar Tak's Souten, starring Rajesh Khanna, Tina Munim (now Tina Ambani)  and Padmini Kolahapuri. But the local Artistes were not involved.
I remember Mr Parsuramen organising a grand farewell party upon my return. He presented to me a coffee table book (about 5 kg in weight) on Mauritius. I was lucky to get one as it was presented to the heads of states only.
Back in India, I was keen to start the work on co production. But the whole thing got entangled in Red tape.  Moreover  CFSI was a headless organisation without any Chairman after Dr V Shantaram. So nothing moved. The people of Mauritius were waiting for the film unit to arrive.
The Indo Mauritius  co- production file was gathering dust.....There was dead silence on the project.................and then..
Meanwhile can you guess how much time it took, before the project Operation Pink Pigeon finally took off??
One year , Two years.. Three years..or more..

Let's keep the suspense intact.
In my next post I will reveal all.

Mukesh

Once again many thanks for reconnecting. I visited the Blog with my wife and we were so happy and impressed to see our photo lighting of lamp in 1984!

You did a great job! I look forward to meeting you in the near future.

Let us keep in touch.

Warm regards,.

Parsuramen

Reply

The Comments were received from Phil Cooke via Hot mail

Mukesh:

Love, love, love, your blog. It's really helped me get up to speed on the history of India TV. Brilliant stuff. I'm scheduled to come back this summer and I hope we can get together again. I'm so impressed with your exploits and your network of professional relationships. Keep it coming….. :-)

phil cooke
creative disruptor | brand whisperer
Cooke Pictures
Burbank, CA 818-303-2424
TWC Films
Santa Monica, CA 310-392-7333

HOW NOT TO MAKE A FILM....PART 3

            

 Tom Alter's absence reversed roles and Mukesh Sharma donned the grease

 In my last post I had mentioned how I managed to complete the shooting of the film Anokha  Aspatall at Kanpur in 35 days. I was very much within the time schedule, thanks to my backward planning.
The rough cut was viewed by the Chairperson CFSI and her team.

Jaya Bachchan ..... committed chairperson of CFSI 

After viewing the rough cut, Mrs Jaya Bachchan and others  looked at each other. There was a silence. And then madam spoke. ''Your rough was different from the story line..But there is  a vast  improvement in the overall  presentation of the script. However you need to re-edit  the film so that flash forward becomes flash back. Also with some more outdoor shooting, you can do away with the claustrophobia that film suffers from. Some portions of the film only require new voice dubbing, since the characters are in long shot. In a nutshell if your graph was A to Z, you may now open the film with Z  i.e flash back. Accordingly you can re arrange the  story line as per the new suggested script". Thus spake the chairman of CFSI.  On my face was the simple expression of being CLULESS and the voice of Mrs Bachchan "So you understood Mukesh . Please ensure the dead line of 31st March is adhered to, as the film has to be censored on or before that date".  "Yes ma'am It will be done".was my instant reply. She left and I regrouped my  team members. We had only a month left to complete the film.
Like my school friend Mr Naresh Upadhaya who helped me in my production work, another  team member Mr Rajesh Aggarwal, (who was from the 1965 Editor batch of FTII Pune) was instrumental in bailing me out, with his editing skills and creative inputs.

Rajesh Aggarwal

Naresh Upadhaya.......  Mr Reliable...

Here I would like to mention another CFSI  colleague of mine Rudolf Samson or Eddie. Besides me he was also a full time staff of CFSI and worked as an assistant. Though technically his boss, I learned quite a lot about film making from Eddie. His father  Samson was an old time Bollywood leading man and worked in B grade movies. I write this with a very heavy heart that Eddie died of Cancer couple of years ago.
  The revised rough was ready in 2 days as we worked day and night. Once we knew, what we need to  re-shoot we were back at Kanpur.

Veteran Shammiji with Padmini the Elephant...

 As usual the first hurdle was the non availability of  the elephant, as she was transferred to Dudhwa  National Park, which is about 80 kms from the place of shoot. Since the elephant could not be transported, she started her grand elephant walk from the wild life sanctuary and reached Kanpur in 3 to 4 days. The second shock was the green cover or foliage which was missing due to the onset of Spring in Northern India. This would upset the continuity of the film. We started searching for some green patch to finish our work and I found one. The patch was like a Mirage in the desert.Somehow we completed our shooting and were back in Mumbai in the first week of March 1989.

Sound Studio....working backwards

By the 2nd week of March 89 we were ready with the revised rough cut and were all set for BG music, effects recording, voice dubbing and mixing or re recording. It is at this juncture that  I asked Rajesh Aggarwal (the Editor Colleague), to visit Sunny Sound Studio and organize the post production work. As written in my earlier post, we had booked the Sunny Studio and paid the advance for the Rerecording etc without even having shot a single frame.

The Gentleman...

 When Mr Rajesh Aggarwal reached the studio, he saw  Dharmendra (the He man of Bollywood)  holding the Studio diary and finalizing  the dates for the dubbing of his film. Unfortunately he was looking for the same chunk of last 10 days of March 89, which we had booked and paid for. Some how Rajesh Aggrawal  managed to gather courage and spoke to Dharam Paji. "Sir we had booked the studio 3 months ago prior to the commencement of shooting. We had already applied for censor certificate.  Some how, in spites of the odds, we have managed to keep our date with destiny. Now if you take the studio, Mrs Jaya Bachchan will not be able to keep her promise to the nation. We are supposed to complete it before 31st March 1989. " Though it was Dharmaji's studio he could have overlooked our commitment and gone ahead, yet he was more then a gentleman. He shifted his base to Madras(Chennai) for his post production work and saved the day for us.

Anokha Aspatal was premiered in cinema at Mauritius 

The pearl in Indian ocean

Need less to mention the film Anokha Aspatal was censored on 31st March1989. As promised, Mrs Jaya  Bachchan brought the final print with her as her personal baggage to Port Louis.  I could not see the final print in India as  I was sent on duty to Mauritius, to start shooting of the Indo Mauritius co production "Operation Pink Pigeon" (or Ankur maina aur Kabootar). This film too won the National Award. But that's another story..

Hope you  enjoyed reading... the making of Anokha Aspatal....
Wishing you all a very happy 2019....

HOW NOT TO MAKE A FILM....PART 2

The great elephant walk...

  SHOOTING AT KANPUR ZOO-ALLEN FOREST
Finally  the entire ging -bang left from Mumbai to Kanpur for shooting . There were many firsts in the making of Anokha Aspatal. It was Saroj Mukherjee the story writer's first film. Alok Upadhaya , FTII (chief assistant to KK Mahajan, Ace Cinematographer), was for the first time independently handling the Cinematography for a feature film. Sharang Dev, son of Pandit Jasraj, it was his maiden effort as a composer. For me it was my directorial debut . One mistake and all our careers  would bite the dust even before it could take off.
DEVIATION FROM THE SCRIPT..

No Kid-ding

During my location hunting  visit in Aug '88  with Mohan Hari ( the director who left the project mid way), we had finalized  a lion cub and some more wild animals for shooting at Kanpur Zoo- Allen forest . How ever, now after 5 months when we reached the locale, to our dismay we found that the lion cub was no more a cute cuddly animal. It had grown and was now not suitable for our  shooting. Accordingly the same was replaced by a kid (young one of a goat).
ERA OF MULTI TASKING.....

Balancing  Nature....

 That was the beginning of deviation from the script. The dialogue  had to be rewritten . Fortunately being a multi tasking person, I could write the Hindi dialogues of the film  on a regular basis at the location during shooting, due to the ongoing changes in the script. This was in addition to my being the production controller of the film as well as the creative director. Not to mention the fact that I was the lone representative from Children's Film Society, India(CFSI), the rest of the  production crew was on contract for the project. In fact keeping a track of the raw stock, equipment's, exposed film, bank account operations etc.was suppose to be my main job assignment.

Posing for the camera..

 A FRIEND IN NEED....
In midst of all this, the creativity was bound to take a back seat. To ensure that I do not compromise with the creative aspect of the film , I decided to rely on an old school friend of mine to look after the  production matters. More soever I had to ensure that bills/receipts etc were properly collated and accounts maintained since we were dealing with public funds. This was his first assignment as a production manager  (he worked for a PSU and had taken leave to help me) . He too had his shortcomings in production matters which I had to help him overcome. But getting a loyal worker and thereby ensuring that there was no misappropriation of funds was a great relief for me.

The cub that gave us the nightmare..

 EVERY DAY IS NOT SUNDAY.....
 In one line, the story of the film was about an old women , who stays in the forest with his grandson and wild animals come on their own for treatment.Getting untrained animals from the zoo  for shooting was a nightmare. Some how we managed to take work from them without deviating from the screenplay. But every day is not a Sunday.  Once it so happened that we had to shoot with a lion cub. The cub was tranquilized by a specialist veterinary doctor. After the shot was over the lion cub was kept inside a small artificial pit and was under observation as it was still under the influence of the drug.We were required to take some more shots once the cub was fully conscious. A production boy was asked to keep a watch. But destiny had other plans.
THE CUB THAT GAVE US NIGHTMARE.....

No animal was hurt during the shooting..

 We were on the other side of the zoo planning for another shot. Suddenly a crew member came running to us shouting that the lion cub has run out of the pit and was freely roaming in the zoo.People were running helter skelter. There was chaos and commotion all around. Some how after a lot of chase the cub was taken captive by the zoo authorities, who were quite upset at the way we mishandled the entire operation. I was summoned to meet the Zoo warden of Allen forest. I knew my Shooting Days were numbered.. He wanted us to pack and leave. But the sincerity of  purpose, my commitment and  work ethics, made him change his mind and I was given one more chance.

The cub that ran out of the pit...

TOM ALTERED THE SCRIPT....

Replacing Tom Alter at the 11th hour

Meanwhile the script was again altered as the lion cub was no more a part of the Shooting .We continued with our work for some more days when another blow came through a telegram that Tom Alter will not be able to join us for shooting as he had grief in the family.  His shooting was scheduled for the next day.Tom was suppose to play the role 

of a poacher in the film. That very night I drove down from Kanpur  to Lucknow and went straight to my parents house, picked up overcoats, hats  etc and returned by midnight to the location. Next morning I donned the grease and became Mr Smith the poacher from Rangoon , and was ready to face the camera.

THE THREE  I,s IN CRISIS....

My principle in life is, where I spend Money I don't spend Time and vice versa. However in the case of Anokha Aspatal I was  both short of Time as well as Money. And this forced me to be Innovative , Ingenious and Imaginative. The three "I's" which continue to be with me till date and compensate me during creative emergencies/ crisis..

The poacher's den...

                                                                    

 BOLT FROM THE BLUE .............                                                                 

Around mid Feb1989, we managed to complete the35 days of shooting schedule and returned to Mumbai. I was keen to see the rushes.In those days it was not instant to see the camera results. Labs would take time to process the films.By and large the film rushes were good. I was keen to see my portion of  shooting. It came as a shock to see that light  was bleeding  all around in our night scenes.The cameraman had no answer. Instead of finding faults I decided to promote the defected portion as a special effect in the scene.But in my heart I was keen to reshoot the scene. Will I get a chance to do? How will Mrs Jaya Bachchan react?

Lights bleeding or so called Special effect...

PREMIER IN MAURITIUS....
Mean while, upon my return Mrs  Bachchan told me that she has decided to hold the premier of  the film at Mauritius and the date has been fixed for 7th April1989.  Another deadline . Now I had to again rework my backward planning as 7th April  on the calender was smiling at me..
PREVIEW OF ROUGH CUT
I started the editing of the rough cut which was ready by the end of Feb 89. It was seen by Mrs Bachchan, Pushpa Bharti (wife of Dharmvir Bharti, former editor of Dharmyug), and Vishnu Mathur (FTII graduate) along with my post production team.

Paintal giving a dry bath to the elephant...

 What Happened when Mrs Jaya Bachchan and others saw the rough cut?
Was it a rough ride or was it a smooth sailing for me?
What were the reaction of  the experts when they saw the so called Special Effect portion in the rough cut?
Let me  answer all the above in my next post :- How not to make a film part 3 . Watch Out.!!!.

HOW NOT TO MAKE A FILM - PART 1

International recognition or not, never make a film the way Anokha Aspatal was made

HOW NOT TO MAKE A FILM.....

How to make a film, ask Subhash Ghai and he will tell you.. How not to make a film , (the way I made), you can learn from this Post.

The year was 1988. Jaya Bachchan was appointed as the Chairman of Children's film Society,India.

 She had taken over the reigns from Mr Amol Palekar, who had resigned from CFSI along with the board members due to bureaucratic hurdles. Mrs Bachchan was a Chairman in a hurry. She wanted to ensure production of at least one film from CFSI by March 31st 1989.

Anokha aspatal was screened at the Frankfurt International Film Festival

 HUNT FOR THE DIRECTOR.....

The hunt for the director began and Mr Mohan Hari (an FTII graduate) was chosen to direct the film Anokha Aspatal .The story of the film was written by Saroj Mukherjee . It was about an old woman who lives in the forest and animals come on their own for treatment.

Being the producer of the film, on behalf of CFSI, I went with Mohan Hari in the month of Oct 1988 for location hunting at Kanpur. We chose Allen Forest(a zoo) as our shooting location, since we could get all the animals for filming and the surroundings of it were more like a forest then a zoo.

Shammi and Master Ankur

CHILD OF CIRCUMSTANCES....

The shooting was planned for the month of December '88, since Mrs Jaya Bachchan had promised to the Parliament that CFSI will produce a new film by 31st March 1989.

Man proposes and God disposes. Mr Mohan Hari the director of the film had other plans. He took a parallel assignment with Films Division and left for Orissa for shooting.

 Mrs bachchan was quite upset with the unprofessional behavior of Mr Mohan Hari and lo and behold, a director was born.  I became the child of circumstances by default.

WORKING BACKWARDS.....

It was the beginning of November '88, when I finally embarked on the production. Keeping 31st March 1989 as the censor date, I decided to do backward planning.
That means before censoring of the film I must have the the final print by 28th March. If that's the case the Color corrections, Rerecording , Sound Effects, had to be ready by the 3rd / 4th week of March '89. The final rough cut of the film with Voice dubbing, should be with ready within the first week of March'89.

December,January and February were planned for Shooting and Editing of the 1st rough cut. The month of November was allotted to do the entire Pre-production, Screenplay, Dialogues etc.

First Film  of  Sharang Dev as Music Composer ...

 THEATER BOOKED WITHOUT SHOOTING A FRAME....

Sunny Sound theater at Juhu was booked for 10 days in the 3rd week of March, with out shooting a single frame of Anokha Aspatal and advance was paid. Application with censor board was also filed. All this was done even before shooting a frame of the film.

A four to five pages of the story idea was to be converted into a script. Sandeep Pendse the writer from Pune was the Screenplay writer. Alok Upadhaya was the cinematographer. Sharang Dev was the Music Director and I was the director .... All of us were first timers.
In addition to Directing the film I was also the Producer of Anokha Aspatal on behalf of CFSI . And that's were my problems were compounded... With Shammi Aunty( She expired recently) , Paintel  the Child artistes and animals; managing production, maintaining accounts, writing Hindi dialogues, my platter was full. The icing on the platter(pun intended) was the news item in the Times of India, dated 23/2/1989 titled"Jaya bachchan playing favorites"

One of the Best Chairperson of CFSI ...

Was I successful in my Back ward planning of things?
What happened during shooting at the Zoo in Kanpur?
 Did the film got censored on 31st March 1989? ....
Why the twin job of both Producer and Director was not conducive to do a creative job ?
 Look out for Part 2  How Not to Make a Film.... in the next post.....