A deleted scene from the movie Pancharangi. First time on the internet.

This was a scene that was deleted from the movie. In this scene Keshavananda Swami (mitra) would do the punarjama process on Bharath(Dignat), in the scene Bharath would fake the experience and the swami feels humiliated. This scene comes right before the scene where the blind man and panchakshari are peeing into the sea.

Watch this space for more info on deleted scenes. More pictures and videos will be posted here.

In september 2009 we released Manasaare. We anticipated the success of Manasaare to an extent. The movie was praised a lot and I was in cloud nine, I personally feel that manasaare had a lot of wonderful moments, it was very cinematic, and the journey of making the film was very exciting to me, the constant changes in the screenplay, the philosophy blended with humor etc etc made me feel alive. Post manasaare I was constantly thinking of how to recreate that experience again. But it was not as easy as it appeared. We went on a promotional tour around Karnataka, I remember going to a theatre in a remote town and we were meeting the audience there, I was looking at the people and I was feeling like I cheated them. These people were very innocent, they see the movie at a very surface level and they must be touched emotionally and not intellectually. Manasaare had an over dose of intellectuality. After meeting the audience outside Bangalore who in fact are the majority of our audience, I felt that we should tone down our scripts, that our next movie should be more entertaining than thought provoking. It is with this hangover that Yogaraj and I started working on our new film.

We must have written about 20 movie scripts before we stumbled upon Pancharangi. I almost started slipping into depression. Everyday we’d find mistakes and loop holes with what we’d have discussed the day before. This led us into circles. I almost gave up and decided that I was not meant to be in movie making. Its not a simple thing to come with 20 different thoughts and keep rejecting them. We were in this limbo state for 3 months. And suddenly one small coffee discussion changed everything. Jayant Kaikini had come over to our office and we were telling him about how we were suffering to write. He being a writer himself, he understood our plight pretty well. For a long time there was silence and then he said that he felt manasaare was enjoyed by so many people because there were so many characters in it. Then he unintentionally used the word ‘community’. He said that for a viewer it is a very enjoyable experience when they see a lot of people on screen, they will then connect to different shades of different characters and feel complete. He said – ‘there must a sense of community in the story and on screen’. Yog and I were so mind fucked, we simply nodded and said whatever and left for the day. But he had planted that thing in my head. All night I was thinking of all my favourite movies and I realized that Jayant was 100 percent true. Most of these great movies have very well defined characters. That was the first thing I decided – we must make a movie with characters, who will give that sense of community to the audience. Next day morning I conveyed all of this to yog and he agreed. But the question was, what is our story to put this community in? It almost felt like we had comeback into the cycle again, going nowhere!

Few days passed. Usually we write a story and then cast actors. My new idea was to work the other way around! I made a list of characters and actors we like working with. Then I started thinking what can bring all these people together. The first thought was marriage! But then we have seen way too many movies that deal with marriage. I was more and more convinced that the reason for the characters to come together was not going to be very important. Yog said that if the reason is not strong then there would be no story. I was almost going to drop the idea in the bin when we suddenly had a weird thought – LETS EXPERIMENT. Then we discussed the whole thing again and again, and finally decided that we were going to construct a small story but a detailed screenplay around these characters. What followed for the next few weeks was constructing a screenplay with 16 characters. If you observe this method, our exercise was not to construct a story but to derive one in the process! But philosophy about life, about mundane happenings, etc doesn’t leave us so easily. So the thought of simply making an entertaining film was getting slowly corrupted with some philosophy about life.

When we finally constructed a shooting script we had about 150 mins of screenplay, but where was the story? At this point there were two teams within our minds. One day I’d feel that this was the biggest mistake and on the other day Yog would feel that. We both would convince each other off it. The whole movie was shot in this state of confusion. Either of us would be sad and worried most of the time wondering if we were making a disaster. The only saving grace was that the actors were enjoying acting the scenes out, that was giving us hope. We completed the shooting pretty fast. We had shot about 100 mins of content in Mangalore and had about 30mins more content to shoot in Bangalore. We came back and were working on the shooting schedule. Yog in his impatience, sat with the editor and edited a version of what we shot in Mangalore. And this is the point in the making of this film where drastic decisions were taken.

We all sat and watched the 100 mins version of the film. Jayant and his son were there to see the first cut and give us a feedback. Both enjoyed the film, they laughed and laughed. We were wondering why they were laughing, I am not kidding when I say how unsure we were of what we had done. Then we told them that 30 more mins of the film was yet to be shot. One question from Jayant, his son and our editor was – WHY DO YOU NEED THOSE 30 MORE MINS? We kept arguing that the 30 more mins is what was going to add some story elements to the whole film. All 3 left saying that they were happy with what they saw and they didn’t want to see anything more. We put a hold on all shooting schedules. We were back in the office with the script and with arguments. Had we narrated a story in 100 mins? We didnt know. We did lot of reworks on the sceenplay again. And we figured that we had made a film with a very thin story but very strong characters going through a lot events, and that was enough to entertain. Should we leave it at that? What if the audience feels that the movie is incomplete? Should we invest another 50-60 lak and shoot the rest of the script? These were these confusions that were hounding us for many days. Finally we decided to go with our instinct, to give the audience what we were all enjoying rather than giving them a formula storyline. We decided to take the risk. We shot the 4 songs and few scenes that tied up the loose ends, all this added up making the movie of 128mins duration. That day onwards Yogaraj and Subramanya hardly slept, and I was making elope plans, making resumes to hide in some BPO job. It would be a huge blow on our personal and professional lives if the audience didn’t accept our experiment. Till we got the first copy of the film, we were constantly thinking about what we had done. The premiere show happened and I saw audience enjoying, but I was not convinced, I had my doubts, I wanted to see how the innocent audience with little expectations and some with no expectations, would see the movie. I am extremely satisfied with the result.

Now coming to the point of why I am writing this post, why it is titled the way it is. The one thing that we have been hearing constantly is that the movie is good but it lacks a story. But I think you find the movie good only because it is lacking that story. And the truth is that there is ofcourse a story – Its a story of a boy with skewed philosophies of life and a girl with very simple way of life, they both happened to meet in a event, they both rub off each other, in the process they are attracted to each other, but the boy’s messy mind creates a problem, the girl offers him a solution. Who says this cant be a story? Why must a story have very big big things happening in it? As long as there is a character journey, a conflict and a solution; there is nothing to complain about. Isn’t it? I am not justifying my work, I dont need to. If it was a mistake then I’d gladly learn from it. I am just asking you all to open up your mind and see the movie without the desire of wanting a ‘mainstream’ story. Its not needed, at least not in THIS movie. If we had shot those 30 mins and put it in the movie, the same audience would have said – ‘same old story with Blah Blah in it’ – ‘Second half is boring’ – ‘Boy loves girl, loses her and come back for her’ etc etc. We would have simply got reactions like this and it would not even have got the kind of positive reactions it is getting now.

Please enjoy the movie, ponder over the thoughts it provokes, simply laugh and move on with your life. Don’t hunt for a regular story and ruin your experience. We were not trying to make the movie of the century or a master piece – we don’t know how to make that. We were trying to make you laugh, to make you feel happy and to put a small thought about how we all live. That was it. We are getting that, everybody who has seen the movie is giving us these 3 things. When the movie is not intending to tell you a story, why are you complaining about not hearing one?

But that is human mind – To want what is not given. Lifeu Ishtene

by Pawan Kumar – Story and Screenplay writer for the Movie Pancharangi.

An Acting workshop by Theatre practitioner and Filmmaker Pawan kumar.  Since 2006 Pawan has been involved in various film projects as an Actor, Director and writer. His latest projects include writing story and screenplay for renowned feature film director Yogaraj Bhat. Pawan has not only penned the movies Manasaare and Pancharangi but has also acted in them. Having drawn his performing skills from the theatre, he has discovered acting techniques for the camera as well as stage. This workshop would be an open forum where these techniques would be experimented with the participants. A series of acting exercises and games makes this workshop a fun filled experience with enough to take back.

For details contact Sowmya on 9916542428 or write to sowmyjag@gmail.com

An Acting workshop by Theatre practitioner and Filmmaker Pawan kumar. Know more about him and his work on www.pawantheactor.com.

Since 2006 Pawan has been involved in various film projects as an Actor, Director and writer. His latest projects include writing story and screenplay for renowned feature film director Yogaraj Bhat. Pawan has not only penned the movies Manasaare and Pancharangi but has also acted in them. Having drawn his performing skills from the theatre, he has discovered acting techniques for the camera as well as stage. This workshop would be an open forum where these techniques would be experimented with the participants. A series of acting exercises and games makes this workshop a fun filled experience with enough to take back.

Visit www.pawantheactor.com to know more about his earlier workshops.

For details contact Sowmya on 9916542428 or write to sowmyjag@gmail.com

We had 12 participants. On the first day we explored theatre, and films on the next day. I hope that the participants took back enough with them. Personally I seem to gain and grow every time I conduct these workshops. Interacting and answering questions opens up my mind in many ways and sometimes some questions help me clear my thoughts and beliefs too. I just hope that I didn’t brag too much about some of my works!!! It was a very enriching experience. I hope to do more of these workshops in the following months and make a team of short film makers.

The workshop aims at introducing theatre and films to enthusiasts. The workshop is pretty basic in nature and is aimed at beginners. If you are someone who has always found the words theatre and/or films interesting and have been wondering how to start, what exactly happens at a professional level etc etc. This workshop could give you a whole lot of answers. A 2 day workshop conducted by Pawan Kumar. Pawan Kumar is a theatre practitioner and a film maker. His latest film credit includes Screenplay and Acting for the successful movie of 2009 – Manasaare directed by Yogaraj Bhat. He is currently writing the story and screenplay for Yogaraj Bhat’s new movie Pancharangi. He is someone who moved up in his career by doing a whole lot of projects in both theatre and films. And in this journey he has been able to develop unique methodologies in both the areas. His workshop ‘theatre@24frames’ aims at sharing these methodologies.

The workshop is open to participants above 18 and will be conducted in English. It would roughly touch upon the topics of Acting, Direction and Writing for theatre and films. The participants of this workshop will be considered for advanced workshops in the future and also to collaborate with Pawan on his short film projects. To register or for more details, please contact – 9916542428 or write to sowmyjag@gmail.com. Very limited intake. Please forward the mail to your friends. Thank you

The hype about the movie made me see it. And I was scared. Am glad there are my parents in the house, I wouldn’t survive the darkness and theunexplained sounds of the night for few more days otherwise. Many might not actually share the same opinion but it was really scary for me. It took me a second viewing to look at it as a film. During the first viewing it looked like everything shown was real. And its after the second viewing that I was able to appreciate the film as a maker. I think the director has great sense of story telling. That is all that a filmmaker needs to know – To simply tell a story well.

How he made the film, the films budget, other trivia etc etc can be found on the net. I wont repeat that here. I want to talk about the usage of digital medium. All of us new filmmakers often think that we must make a film using digital medium, but then somewhere while working on it, we give up. It is because the story we are trying to tell cant be told in a digital format, and by digital format I mean our handycams etc. Highend digital format will give output similar to film these days. The director of Paranormal activity wrote the script in a way that it would need a handy cam. Even if he had all the money he would have done it with a handy cam. And that is why when we are seeing the movie, we dont complain about the flat lighting, the lack of DOF, colors, focus etc etc. I have seen many normal stories narrated using digital formats, but while seeing them you always feel that these films needed to be shot on film and was done this way because of lack of budgets. The storytelling didn’t ask for low end digital output. But that is reality, After saying all this I might still end up doing the same mistake soon.

The script. Very well thought over. He makes us build stories in our head. When we are seeing the movie we are not really thinking of the characters as much as we think about our own sleep time. Its freaky. Imagine your wife/husband standing next to you and looking at you for hours while you are asleep. Doors opening and closing. He just made a movie to use it a s a platform to make us write stories in our own heads. So the movie is unique to each viewer. We all imagine our own rooms, the people in our house, the doors and windows etc.

After the second viewing I have a doubt if the claims are true. That it was all made by a few people using just one camera etc. There is a scene of one of the nights where we can see a shadow on the door. From whatever I know of filming, that effect is very tough to achieve, isn’t it? Its a wide shot and there is very low light and still a full size shadow!!!! How!? I guess a lot more has been done. But I hope I am wrong and the filmmaker is actually brilliant enough to have got it all by himself.

Excellent low budget film. New filmmakers with big blocks in the head about writing should see it. And do something and make 150 million USD by spending only 15k USD.

Its late now. I am wondering how I will make it to the room and sleep. I have to switch the light off here and then walk in the dark for about 5 mts and then jump into the bed. What if I bump into someone invisible!!!

I had fun trying to play around the eclipse time. I looked in every corner of my house to find some kind of a filter to view the sun but just couldn’t get hold of anything. I have a feeling my mom had hidden them for reasons we all know. Its very paapa paapa to see the eclipse apparently. So I saw most of it on TV and later me an my work mates got out to the streets and tried various shadow based viewings. It was nice, tried clicking some pics too.

Eclipse reminds me of 2 things, one is a poem that I wrote when I was in my 9th grade. A poem about the solar eclipse, and it is because of that I know so much about the eclipse stuff. The second being the shoot of my first fiction short film, we started shooting on the day of the eclipse and in fact got a stopblock capture of the eclipse too. And the movie never got completed, a believer would blame it on the eclipse but I proudly say that it was because of my lack of knowledge of film making. But thanks to this project I learnt so much that I’d never make those mistakes again ever in my life. You can see the infamous eclipse shot here in this video Beginnings and Endings

I am the memory that you’d never want to forget,

I am the wink that makes your frown a smile,

I am the tide that makes your life alive,

I am the halo your soul is searching for,

I am the voice your ears seek,

I am the poem you can never write,

I am me.

Who are you?

I am the present you will not remember,

I am the one you will feel like winking at,

I am the drowning boat being one with the tide,

I am the sin that keeps your soul away from searching,

I am the silence that surrounds your voice,

I am the poet who was never born,

You are someone I love,

Who am I?

I was also one of the idiots who auditioned for a small little tiny role in the film, however I am glad I dint get through. (I never get through auditions). After watching the movie I figured what part I had auditioned for, they were such small parts that it would not have added to my experience in any greater way then what manasaare did. Interacting with Raju is something I would want to do, but I guess i’d rather do it as a screenplay writer than as a struggling actor.

I am not all gaga about the movie. Its a very smart script. The makers knew what would make the audience have a good time, and what would make them send more people to the theatre to watch. They just did that. And there is nothing wrong, as long as the content makes sense and entertains. I have been very impressed with Raju since Munnabhai. I like the way huge boring cliche scenes are packaged into small funny scenes. Its an art and I have tried to do that in Manasaare and also in the current script. Many a times I think of his movies and correct my own. However I am sure he is a die hard fan of Patch Adams and Amelie, both the movies inspire me a lot.

Another beautiful part of the film was the way they packaged the cliche beaten to death kind of scenes. They were required in the movie, specially when you are making an Indian Film, there are a few scenes that you HAVE to have. Raju managed to put them in a very interesting way, Eg. The entire black and white treatment for Sharman’s family. And many a times when he spoke, the background score was deliberately of the old style. Raju managed to laugh at himself, and that would make us laugh more, thereby seeing the scene without hate but still taking in the content. There were many like that in the entire film.

The idea of non linear narration also added to the pace of the film, and adding a narrators voice makes it easier. When one writes a film in a non linear format with a narrator, he is making the story telling job a lot easier. A lot of content can be packed in tight and nice in a smaller period of time. The movie is so enjoyable for that reason. Imagine the movie in the linear format and you will see it wont be so much fun.

I dont want to brag about my own work, but I want to proudly say that Manasaare could be a nice Hindi film. I hope it gets done in Hindi sometime and a larger audience gets to see it.

Whats with my life? ALL IS WELL