so far so good

so yeah, im on idlebrain.com,totaltollywood.com and cinefolks.com.
i couldnt have asked for more right now. the feedback coming has been very encouraging and its only made my desire stronger....the desire to get this film a legitimate release.

everyone around me thinks thats as far-fetched as reaching the moon. i see their point, and i am a very practical guy. but something tells me, this film will be watched. watched by the general public. yeah. i dont know...its like an instinct almost...

the hurdles and problems ahead are so fairly obvious, yet, i can picture this film playing in a hall.
is this what happens to every film-maker on his first film?

while my writing on the blog has decreased over the days, i urge new readers coming to check archives. they will get you a good idea of how all of this came into being...

interesting times.

as i write, a little more than 500 unique views of my trailer has been made. thank god for technology and the internet. there would have been no other way on earth for me to bring my film forward to the public.

also, i have been lucky in that some websites have decided to support me on this, and have kindly accepted to carry links to the trailer.
one such is www.telugucinema.com, who is carrying an article on c.o.f today.

while all this is wonderful, its also overwhelming, because i understand i am answerable some way or the other to people. i am prepared for it.
meanwhile, i think i'll just take some time and savour these moments.

A TECHNICALLY BETTER QUALITY TRAILER

Hi,
I didnt anticipate such a reduction in sound and picture quality on the web. But it cant be helped it seems. So i have tried to upload one more with a marked difference in technical quality.
Let me know..

meanwhile i have been overwhelmed with the response so far and demands for more cuts. i am working on it...meanwhile I realise its time to update my blog...

yohan
p.s follow this link to the better quality trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4m4xNSix_sw

WORLD TRAILER PREMIERE OF 'CONFESSIONS'

OK IT'S OUT AND I'M SHAKING..... CHECK OUT MY TRAILER,CURRENTLY PLAYING ON 'YOU TUBE'.
P.S ITS MEANT TO LOOK AND SOUND THE WAY IT IS!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EC-qh9jcwas#

Rajnesh Domalpalli's, 'Vanaja'

Hyderabad based NRI Rajnesh Domalpalli’s debut film Vanaja won Best First Feature Award 2007 (Golden Bear) at Berlin Film Festival this year. This award consists of a Golden Bear prize and a cash prize of 50,000 euros (shared by producer and director). Vanaja film deals with a 14 year old poor girl who wants to become a classical dancer. This film also deals with sex abuse. Rajnesh wrote this script as a part of his thesis submission in Columbia University in the year 2001. -courtesy:idlebrain.com

HOW WONDERFUL AND INCREDIBLE IS THAT.

THIS IS AN ABSOLUTE FIRST, NOT JUST FOR TELUGU CINEMA BUT INDIAN CINEMA AS WELL.

I HADNT EVER HEARD OF THIS GUY UNTIL TODAY....

I CANNOT BELIEVE ITS NOT FRONT PAGE NEWS ANYWHERE...LEAVE ALONE ANY SORT OF BUZZ ABOUT HIM HERE...

ANYWAYS...HERE'S THREE CHEERS AND HATS OFF TO RAJNESH DOMALPALLI. do we have an auteur on our hands??

go to vanajathefilm.com and check him out on

imdb.com>>> http://imdb.com/title/tt0832971/

a truthful confession

this was the most emotional trying day in a long time for me. and not because of anything sad. but because i had to face a lot of self assesment situations and give a lot of long overdue sentiments. shit i hate my phrasing sometimes. i cant seem to help the jibberish.lets move to the next paragraph. (did someone say 'technology at the speed of though'?) ok i'll shut up and move to the next para..

this was the most emotionally trying days for me in a long time.

i talked about my film at length for the first time with my dear friend siraj, and in the process, understood myself and my film better. ironical did you say? well no, my humble adivise, and i'm not sri sri ravi sankar or deepak chopra....but try and talk about your...oh shit my mom just came upstairs to say that she has never in her life seen me behave the way i just did....sigh....fuck i'm digressing (is that even the right spelling?). let me try again...

this was an interesting day for me today. its been 2 whole days of absolutely no editing, for no fault of mine. it just so happens the studio is busy, because some big ass lady politician wants to promote telangana videos sitting her ass in chennai. and what am i, when it comes to priority...nothing. (did i tell you, 'confessions of a politician' is my next film, i'm not even kidding, it'll have a huge budget and shit).

anyways.... so 2 days of no editing. bad. because i feel like i have let my baby daughter stranded in a creche. and i miss her. i want to see her as soon as possible. my heart aches to see those familiar visuals and silly dialougue floating across the screen and into my heart, bringing a flutter of familiar feeling. the most bestest feeling of all...the feeling of feeling familiar and at home with your creation. that bond.so much like family,friends and loves.

anyways, i am digressing again.

i was chatting with siraj over drinks tonight, about wonderful stuff like the world and how we see it and where we want to time travel etc. and we finally settled on gentler turf, like my film confessions of a film-maker.

confessions, i was saying to him....is also a synonym for truth.

now that strangely was a revelation to me because i hadnt thought of it like that until one peg down. the truth people. my film is about the truth. its not packaged like all sensible and illogical films are....packaged with drama,emotion,heroics,flashy camera and edits,soaring music,mushy moments,skimpy women......my film has none of that...and therefore i beg you not to judge it by those barometers.

not only does my film not have all of the above, its all so deeply personal and cathartic, that it will take a lot of patience and balance of mind to truly appreciate what my film is about....now please i dont mean to be mean or insulting by saying that....all i'm saying is....

my film is only about the truth, as i see it and as it is. cut and dry. simple and straight. so plain, so simple, so truthful. i pre-decided when i started out, that what i was making was more than just a film in the conventional sense.....simply put...its something similar to what jerry maguire might have documented in that movie...remember the intial scene in the movie....when in a burst of inspiration he writes something like a vision statement....and then gets fired the next day....well i bet what he wrote might have had a lot to say....but it still got him fired because people didnt like it.

i think my film is like that...its so boringly,simplingly truthful....it WILL NOT APPEAL to anyone. and if it does....well thats a small miracle.

we arent used to being told about things which are truthful, not revlotionary mind you...we dont see cinema, where truth is the genre...its always, like say movies about jfk or gandhi...supposed truth which is packaged....its also a truth which is motivational....

my film is a truth which is, pretty much what you get...imagine this...i think my audience is the priest who sits to listen to a confessional....its as plain and simple as that...how you react or judge it is upto you....

but i ask you this....dont judge the truth...you can either accept it or reject it.....dont judge it...

i have to say this....and i will say it just once on this blog....my film shouldnt be judged, because if i wanted it to be judged then i would have made it differently.....but if you simply want a testimonial of someone about his life in the movies....then you'll see the point....otherwise you will plainly reject it....

my film doesnt want to move mountains, let alone humans...its only wants to act as a testimony to someones feelings...thats it, thats my film...

progressive interpretation

been busy with the final edit the past couple of days. its been a tough but good experience so far. basically what i am doing is shaping the film, for possibly the one last time. so i pretty much have to decide for myself everytime i move onto another scene, that the one before is as good as it can possibly get and thats enough, more importantly, the audience will perfectly understand what i'm saying etc.
so really its tough making those decisions, cus you have to be really brave to expect people to get what it is that your'e saying....oh well enough about that...

anyone keenly looking forward to this film, well i have to first warn you...its pretty abstract this film, my definition of that is that, its a film that will let you make up your mind about it, rather than the other way round...
another thing, its totally unconventional, in that...it doesnt have a traditional form of presentation like any movie...
imagine your'e watching a series of, hopefully interesting interviews that a cameraman has with the film-maker....thats it....technically its no better than blair witch or anything.....

but it has a lot to say.....

final edit

ever since the final dub was done, i've been waiting for the final edit to start. its taken a while for the studio to be available. i finally start today evening.
thats it, its make or break from here, over the next few days i have to do whatever it takes to get this film out with its true potential......

i want to do that and thats it....after that, it will be a few public screenings....which will hopefully motivate me to..

a. go to the press with this
b. apply to festivals
c. try and get a release made, either theatrically or otherwise....

however if the all round reviews are terrible then i am going to kerala.

2nd show

some films must never be judged. you see, films have a more important reason other than mere entertainment, that reason is "to set the record straight".a testament to the times, almost like a news story, its just that, sometimes you simply have to know, you are the better having known it, there cannot be any questions like artistic merit, entertainment value, box office value etc etc.

surprised i'm saying that? i've actually never understood the business angle of films. did shakespeare write his plays keeping the audience in mind. or did the audience just become his mind?

look, i agree that when you put your money into something, especially something which means a lot to you and could to millions around you,be careful, but then dont get too expectant about rolling in cash, if your'e smart, you might just make whatever you invested. thats enough isn't it?

did da vince, michaelangelo,rembrandt,mozart,beethoven create their art keeping the potential money they'd make? well maybe they did later, but not when they started out...

because when they started out all they wanted to do was to experience the joy of creation. i think since men will never have the pleasure of bearing a child, you will find them more obsessed about building blocks,bridges and movies. instinctively a man knows he's not blessed with the fortune of a woman...the fortune that she has of being a creator....

anyways, i think i am digressing or maybe i'm not. anurag kashyaps 'black friday' is not worthy of a review. and by not worthy i mean...it simply shouldnt be reviewed.
how can you review a piece of film-making which is simply about putting the record straight...you cannot and should not judge it...because its not a film that wants to either entertain you nor enligthen you...it simply wants to put the record striaght with you...

and that it does with supreme success. the genre of films that 'black friday' belongs to is fast fading, actually its extinct...his effort will create a revival of sorts. for me personally, i saw bits and pieces of my own film in anurag's. ofcourse it has none of its strengths, technically or otherwise...but it reflects very closely with the soul of my film....
i take a lot of strength, confidence and motivation from that...if your'e reading anurag, thanks...

and, please i'm not being boastful...
i'm simply setting the record straight...

no dhamaka

man, the severs been giving me trouble. the dubbing work of the film is done. there is some additional photography left for me to do, before i begin editing again...

and..cant get myself to write anything much today...too tired

just in case

sorry about the lack of updates, servers been shitty my end...will have a new dhamaka post up in the next hour or so....until then.

another shitty day, until black friday

i had big hopes today. they didnt materialise. now it seems like i have to do this myself (sorry for being vague).
but yeah, tomorrow, from tomorrow i need to work extra hard to get this film made. i dont know what i have made. i think this film is so personal, that it might not work for anyone else, simply cus i didnt make it for anyone else.
and just the thought that someone will criticise even one frame of my film, makes my blood boil.
i'm crazy man. i think the americans have it easy, they either go to a therapist, a counsellor, or maybe a friend or family member.....
we indians find doing any of that too difficult....well i wont generalise, but i think india as a culture promotes self angst because its anti 'us' messing 'other' peoples heads with 'our' problem(dis-jointed sentences=fucked head)
...how many of you have grown up being yelled at for crying!!! lol....alright. well this is the case with me atleast...

fuck i'm digressing, this a confession of a film-maker website and film-makers are not people.
they are heartless,gutless,selfish,horse-blinded,lunatics.

....and the worst of them make the best film-makers.

and anurag is one of them,here's to anurag kashyap and his film 'black friday'. the most courageous film-maker in modern indian cinema history and my definition of a film-maker.
his film finally opens this week....

still climbing

its been almost a week of no work and all thought. ever since i showed the film to sekhar on the 23rd, all i've managed to do is absolutely nothing.

while the edit studio needed a break from me and i from it, cus before i re-edit anymore, i really need to distance myself from the film,so i can tackle it again with an open mind,the real downer has been the constant non-availability and non-communication of my sound engineer.

after calling continously for over 2 days he finally wakes upto me...god i dont know why some people are created the way they are...i just needed an explanation as to when i could re-start my dub...

anyways, i am finally getting underway in about 5 hours time. unable to sleep...i have so much still to do with the film, and while i am a one man army here, its getting to be a bit tiresome having to do all the thinking,working,planning,cajoling,motivating,inspiring etc etc yourself.

i have only me for company, and while i have been used to that for several years now, i could do with a clone of myself right now. :)

many a mile to go still.

ciao

hmm.

ok so i showed the film to sekhar kammula today. i will reveal what he said when i hold a screening for a few members of the general public later this month or first week of february.

now moving on, i have a mountain to climb with the sound editing/mixing/dubbing of this film. its becoming more crucial than i thought it would be. actually at first i assumed it would be a piece of cake and that last thing i would need to stress about. but looks like this film is going to make me work harder before i get it ready for release.
anyways. my lead actor just dropped in, so i will turn in for today...

ciao

blues

i really dont know what the future of this movie is going to be. until now its been only me and my cast and crew who have been watching it and appreciating it. maybe we are all biased cus we worked hard on it. maybe its not exactly a worthy effort.

well i am going to show it to some members of the general public tomorrow. a sort of screening. what i really need most right now is a a big dose of motivation and inspiration, that will help me see this movie through to some logical end. technically the film is mostly ready...except for sound mix, which should take a week or so...so i am pretty much done..

now i have to figure out what to do with it.

new flavours

its been a while since a post. i did write one yesterday, but lost it cus there was a server problem.
anyways. i was writing to say that i think the film is now moving into a new direction. the dubbing of the film started yesterday. sigh.
i have to now start planning an itinerary of film festivals, big and small that i must start registering my film for...
readers/friends, whenever you guys have the time, look through the web for me and let me know which major or minor festivals are coming up this year, i'd like to send c.o.f to atleast 5 major and 5 minor festivals. i might register for cannes one of these days....
hmm....in a bit of a limbo right now...to many thoughts to process at the same time..
will keep you posted on the dub which is giving the film a new exciting flavour and the edit which continues, till, i dont know, till i guess i realise the film is finished. a continous edit is something like, you know not knowing when to stop painting or not knowing when your painting is done...am waiting for something in me to say, "yeah,your film is ready".

ciao

setting expectations

so the rough cut of the film is out. just the rough cut.which means, i know how the film will eventually turn out, since i have the framework in front of me.
what do i think? i think i have made a meaningful film. and i think, unless the sun rotates around the earth, people will see and understand that it was an honest attempt made my someone who wanted to talk about his relationship with films...

q.will i be called the next spielberg,shyamalan or locally sekhar kammula or nagesh kukunoor? ans: no.
q.will this film be taken seriously? ans: i will work hard to get it its due notice.
q.is this is a great film? ans:no.well,maybe i am being modest,who knows right? :)
q.is this a good film? ans: yes.
q.is this an honest film? absolutely!
q.is this film flawless? ans: if there are flaws then i made it so everyone can see them.
q.what can we expect? ans: no lawrence of arabia or titanic. not a hyderabad blues or dollar dreams.

i think i made a film, and no one will notice. now that might be good (which means its flawless) or bad (which means...a headache of convincing people)
i am very proud this is my first film and i hope i live upto its principles. period.

i've still got miles to go...pro'lly until feb sometime before it can be ready to be seen by an audience.
q.as for a commercial release?ans: if only i was a millionaire. (fingers crossed :)

i dont know what everyone expects?...

q.but if your expecting a conventional film with lighting,beautiful camera work,visuals and breathtaking editing!
ans:sorry you will be dissapointed badly.
but,
q.if you want a very honest,very bold, very small and very ambitious film.
ans:you wont be dissapointed. i promise.

ciao
yohan.

victory in sight

a
ok so i had a great time at the edit yesterday evening. one of those sessions you know, where you have no idea where you are heading with the scene, and you are totally frustrated and clueless about how to proceed and you give in to fate and hope that what you wrote and felt will somehow miraculously fall in place and to watch those moments, as everything you did looks mediocre and amateurish and all you can do is wait and watch and watch and cringe and sink into your seat...yeah it started out like that alright....until finally, like a bolt of lightining, except it felt like bolts of lightning all coming at you, in slow motion and also at the speed of sound....
everything falls into place...
and i left the room satisfied...knowing i have a film...

i still have miles to go with this film and i will be brought down to earth sooner or later. but i have decided to revel in this moment for now...

sigh..

ok, my film is now over 1 hour long, and i have about 15-20 min of footage to edit yet. i wasnt sure at the beginning whether it would last a feature length but it has. all of this is a rough cut, which will be trimmed down after dubbing...
what do i think about it? well i have lost all objectivity. how would i describe the film? i'll call it a love story, between a guy and his movies. yeah. what genre? well, drama-docu-noirish-cinema verite-guerilla style=confessions of a film-maker.
visually? well its moody? very moody? one thing this guy doesnt have in his life is colour. at the same time i didnt want this to be a conventional arty black and white film, so you will find a rainbow although a mellow one, of moody tones.
what else? except that, later this week someone will be asked to review my film, with all its "rough-cut stage-unpolished-work in progress" glory.
and the music? i've used tracks that suit every mood and moment. ofcourse they are also my favs, like bryan adams,john denver,lucky ali,a.r rahman etc. yeah, all these musical geniuses have kindly let me 'use' their work.

what will people think when they see the film?
a: this guy has to be crazy to make a film about his relationship with cinema. but we like him for it.
or
b: this guy is plain crazy, to expect us to take all this seriously.

ciao, am off for a noon session of editing.

vajrotsavam aricle on idlebrain

It is a reason to celebrate, alright. For, alive and kicking well, even after 75 years, is no mean task. Ask any septuagenarian around and see how difficult it is to maintain all the faculties in tact at 75. And it is showing no signs of letting up even in, either near or distant future. When H.M.Reddy made the first telugu talkie "Bhakta Prahlada" in 1931, he would have never envisioned that the seeds he had sown 75 years ago would amount to this gigantic formation, which looks after the well-being of thousands and thousands of families.Entertainment has truly grown into an industry, in all senses of the word. Right from the main players running the show - producers, directors and actors, down to the fringe players running the auxiliary and the ancillary industries, telugu film industry ranks next to none in terms of job creation, job opportunities, and to a certain extent job guarantee and to a large extent job satisfaction. Hundreds of movies every year, expansion of the markets to every nook and corner to where the bright sun can lay its eyes upon, sky-rocketing of the salaries, particularly if one is touched by the golden hand of the Celluloid God, the industry seems to have better growth prospects than any other hottest trend currently ruling the roost. And for nay-sayers who worry about saturation and overkill, the industry hasn't yet scratched the surface on untapped segments like content distribution over a variety of media - DVD, streaming, satellite, branding the movies, tie-ins with other industries, like toys, and many such. It seems as though that the industry has it all - a glorious past, an exciting present and a promising future. What more can any industry ask for? And it certainly calls for setting aside 8-9 crores to congratulate each other about the crowning achievement. It is time to regale and rejoice....Or is it? Didn't every success story start this way? A humble beginning that started off with good intentions and noble ideas, not to forget great minds carefully guiding even greater talent. The strong foundations slowly allowing fault lines to creep through, either due to excessiveness or through sheer negligence. The fault lines causing enough cracks in the final behemoth, collapsing the entire structure and taking down along with it dreams, hopes and aspirations of thousands, if not millions, for the simple reason that nobody accounted for the fault lines in the first place. Is telugu industry currently heading in the direction of a great demise?Content is the most contentious issue plaguing the industry. After successfully segregating the markets (for its own selfish reasons and to mask its own incompetence) into youth, family, ladies, class, mass and many such, the question remained what content endears to each of those segments? If it is a youth movie, should it be a run of the mill love story, or an action-laced, sentiment-laden story that sings paeans about the power of the youth? If a family oriented movie, does it have to be a tear-jerker, heaping one trouble over another and dragging the family through every cinematic barb wire possible? Back in the day when movies around stories and not stars, there was never this problem of scripting by numbers. Stories made stars and not the other way around. If a story demanded that ANR play second fiddle, as a bumbling slow-witted detective, coming right on the heels of the stupendous success of "Devadasu", the actor had no problem suiting up for Detective Raju in "Missamma". There was no image issue nor there were starry demands on the rewriting of the role. Similarly, if the story called for the husband to develop an inferiority complex towards his talented wife baring his dark side, NTR would gladly take up the role without apprehensions about his "image" for "guDiganTalu".From that situation to the current deplorable condition, where stars foolishly assume that they can make/break the movie, that everything in the movie needs to revolve around their character and that their sensibilities are certainly much better than the other wise, thinking heading helming the production, is definitely progress in the reverse direction, particularly when it comes to the content.

If the so called stars (they in fact should be called planets (grahaalu, not taaralu), for, they cannot shine on their own) are pulling the structure down with their egotistical wrecking balls from the outside, the system is getting eaten inside out, through a serious lack of infrastructure that fosters and promotes the nucleus of the industry - the content. For an industry that boasts about hundreds of crores of throughput every year, how many film schools are established in the state, how many acting schools have taken root, especially when there is a serious dearth of good actors, how many script-writing courses are initiated either in the mainstream educational system or on the outside, through workshops and seminars? Is this how the industry protects its most vital and valuable resource - the intellectual property - from being frittered away into ignominy? In the last seven decades of telugu cinema, if one were to chart the original output in numbers by the decade, it would be clearly evident that the industry has flat-lined in the last couple of decades and that it has been surviving solely on the hardwork of other industries, either for technological innovation or innovative narration - Hollywood, Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam and to a certain extent Kannada.
Take any of the industries above, each one has a strong theatrical or a literary foundation that serves as a constant source of good input to the respective industries. Unfortunately with the telugu industry, there neither is a concerted patronage to the art on stage, nor there is any genuine interest in the printed word. Having successfully dried up both those creative wells in the constant glare of bright blinding arc lights, telugu industry is found gasping for good material to quench its thirst. Every year, come the national awards time, when all the important awards (script, direction, movie) seem to adorn the mantles of the neighbors, telugu industry suddenly wakes up in a fit ("aarambha Sooratvamu") and criticizes everyone, but itself, for its current sad state. Is there any practical situation to end the current imbroglio?
Yes, there is. And as always, like in matters relating to charity, it has to come from people with deep pockets - the prestigious production houses - Suresh, Usha Kiron, Vyjayanthi, Annapoorna et al. Set up a separate wing that deals exclusively with innovative intelligent movies that do not need great budgets. In fact, discourage any project that costs more than a crore just for the content and the presentation. The crores and crores that are thrown at risky projects involving top stars and item numbers, are enough seed money to spawn a new silent revolution, which would further the cause of telugu cinema. Even if one movie strikes the right chord with the audience, the impetus and the momentum generated are enough to kick start 10 other movies of such kind. May be they would not pull enough crowds on the first day for the first shows, but history has shown time and again, that good movies seldom fail. When the current audience is currently split among TV serials, game shows, internet etc and their interest has been splintered by the divisive policy of the industry, that such and such is a mass movie and such and such is a ladies fare, the time is right and ripe for good movies to make a comeback and reclaim their spot on the top, one, they have been forced to relinquish a few decades ago.
Content is what that has been keeping the industry ticking. Content is what that makes the industry work. When the whole industry can come together to celebrate the 75th year of its inception with such fervour, it certainly can do more than that, when its own survival and its own existence is on the line. It is never too late to wake up, take stock, and start working immediately on a survival strategy. Otherwise, by the time centennial celebrations come around, telugu film industry would be taken in the same breath as the might Mughal Empire, the golden reign of Krishna Devaraya, and the exciting age of stage dramas.