Claire McCarthy. Picture by Kaustav Saikia

The Waiting City has brought Australian director Claire McCarthy to Calcutta, a city she visited and fell in love with six years ago. t2 caught up with the movie maker for a chat on the film and Calcutta…

An Australian couple who come to Calcutta to adopt a child. What made you zero in on a subject like this for The Waiting City?

Well, a few things actually. I did come and work here in the city a couple of years ago, shooting a documentary with my younger sister at The Missionaries of Charity. There I met many couples trying to adopt children, did quite a bit of research on the subject and then when I went back home to Sydney I came to know about a friend of mine who was looking to adopt. It’s almost a western middle-class trait that is almost a phenomenon at the moment. There are women today who are delaying having children until they are in their late-30s or so and then they realise they can’t have babies when they choose to. So I thought it was an interesting subject in terms of what we choose to do with our lives and then life wrests control of it from our hands. On a personal level, as a woman I found myself drawn to a subject like this. Then the film is also about bridging cultural divides because adoption is now everywhere in the world.

How different was shooting The Waiting City from filming Sisters, the documentary that brought you to Calcutta six years ago?

The documentary that I shot was on the streets of Calcutta, it was about the Missionaries of Charity. It was a very small film in terms of scale. The Waiting City is obviously much bigger. It is a fiction film although there are some documentary techniques that I have used here. There are real people and real locations. But essentially it is a film that is much more dramatic and poetic. It is meant to entertain a particular kind of audience. Also, I was involved with every aspect of the documentary — from shooting it to editing it and so on. Here, I have a whole team working on The Waiting City. The film also represents what I am — I am more of a drama director than a documentary director.

Isabel Lucas: “Pure magic”Picture by Rashbehari Das

The Waiting City is the first Australian film to be shot entirely in India. What made you choose Calcutta?

My experiences with the subject of adoption happened in Calcutta when I came with my sister in 2002. The documentary took a couple of years to make and I kept coming back to Calcutta and I became familiar with the place. So it was natural that I would base my film in the city. I have been to Calcutta a couple of times after that, and so it is a city that I know pretty well now. The stories that I tell have to come from a personal space and have to be things that I am familiar with. But essentially The Waiting City is not really an adoption story. It is actually a love story and there is an adoption thread that runs through the film. It’s not an essay on how to adopt and what are the advantages and the pitfalls of doing so. It will hopefully encourage people to think about the topic, rather than try and tutor them.

How has the experience of shooting in places like Barrackpore, Behala, Sealdah station, north Calcutta house, streets… been like?

It’s been great shooting in Calcutta so far. It’s been quite an intense experience. Fantastic, though. We’ve met a lot of wonderful people and the film has seen the collaboration of technicians from Australia as well as those from the city and some who have come down from Mumbai. It’s actually like the UN with so many people from different parts of the world collaborating on this project (laughs).

The city has a lot to offer in terms of culture and interesting shooting spots and Calcutta is integral to the journey of the two Australians. The change in their points of view, their perceptions, their relationship are fashioned by their journey through the city. I wanted to show the different dimensions of the city in my film. There has been this tradition of Calcutta as an ancient city rich in culture and art and at the same time it has been an integral part of the political and social history of India. It is also a cosmopolitan city that is seeing a lot of development. So essentially I am trying to capture the three dimensional nature of the city.

There has been a lot of interest around the film with huge crowds gathering wherever we have been shooting. But they have all been very supportive and accommodating, many of them are a part of the film too. I think that’s one thing about Bengalis, they are very warm and friendly. No complaints at all!

How much of a role does the Calcutta landscape have in the script?

Nothing of the film has been shot in Australia. It’s been shot entirely on location in Calcutta. So the city is actually a character in the film, a protagonist and in some ways an antagonist too. It throws up a lot of questions and offers poetic solutions to problems. The city lends a certain poetic realism to the film. It is actually the storyteller within the film.

What are the pluses and minuses for a foreign film crew shooting in Calcutta?

I don’t think there are any minuses, to be honest. The art and culture of the city and the mindset of the people is very supportive towards creative work. I don’t think we should basically call this a foreign team, because it has so many local technicians. The entire crew is a family here and that is the reason we have adjusted so well to the place and that people have accepted us so easily. The city is very international, very cosmopolitan and therefore very encouraging to creative projects like this.

While shooting, have there been any issues in terms of infrastructure or the weather?

Well, we chose to shoot at the end of the year knowing that it would be much cooler now, although we hadn’t bargained for the humidity (laughs). However, we were worried while shooting Durga Puja scenes with the Red Cameras, which are high-end digital cameras, because they tend to overheat easily. The infrastructure is always going to be difficult when it is dictated by time and money, but in the face of pressures, I think we have coped pretty well.

What does an actor like Radha Mitchell, who has worked with the likes of Woody Allen and Tony Scott, bring to The Waiting City?

Radha is incredibly intelligent, luminous. The relationship we have is very trusting and she brings a lot to the film. She was always my first choice for the role of the Australian wife who comes to India with her husband to adopt a child. I always knew that she had a special bond with India and would be able to understand the culture and do justice to the role. She is perfect for the emotional journey that her character goes through. It’s been wonderful to collaborate with her.

What made you decide on Joel Edgerton and Isabel Lucas for the other roles?

Joel is an amazing actor with a beautiful voice. His character sings in the film. And for me it was wonderful to see how the emotional complexity of his role came through not only by way of his performance but also his voice. I don’t think anyone would have carried off the role so well. Isabel is pure magic. A beautiful young actress and a rising star. She brings different shades to the film. I have always had my mind on Isabel and there was no doubt that I wanted to cast her. She is going to be very big very soon. I have to sign her up for my next project (laughs)!

What does having an Academy Award winner like make-up person Paul Pattison and Oscar nominees like Paul Brincat and Veronika Jenet mean for this project?

It increases the integrity of the film. It brings expertise, it brings credibility. It gives the film a lot of momentum. I didn’t expect so many eminent people to be part of this project, but I guess I got very lucky. Paul (Pattison) and Salty (Paul Brincat) and Veronika are wonderful people, besides being experts in their field. It’s quite daunting actually to have an Academy Award winner in our midst, but it’s wonderful to have them on board. We operate on the same wavelength and at the end of the day, they are as excited about The Waiting City as I am.