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| Prosenjit in Iceland |
Namit Bajoria (inset) is excited and nervous. “I am proud of what I have produced. We took a risk. If you don’t take risks, then actually you are at risk,” says the producer of the Rs 5-crore film Hanuman.Com, starring Prosenjit as village schoolteacher Anjani Putra, which has released at 50 theatres in Bengal. A t2 chat with the director of kitchen appliance company Kutchina who’s keen to make a mark in Tollywood with his production house Cinenine.
You must have got a lot riding on Hanuman.Com...
I wish Hanuman.Com had been my first film. My last three films — Anjan Dutt’s Madly Bangalee, Birsa Dasgupta’s Jaani Dekha Hobe and Suman Moitra’s Dashami — taught me a lot of things. They taught me how to market a film, how to promote it and get the film to the right audience. Producing a good film is very difficult... you have to get the right combination, but still I feel producing is a little easier than marketing or getting your film to the right audience. I have also learnt that you should take risks in life, it pays off.
What was your first reaction when director Gaurav Pandey told you that he wanted to shoot Hanuman.Com in Iceland?
Initially, I was excited, but then I asked him why he had come to me since I was not a seasoned producer. Gaurav said that he had to shoot in a place that felt like it’s the end of the world. When we reached Iceland (for a recce), we realised it’s actually the end of the world. We needed a place where a person becomes helpless. It’s like going to Mars.
What sort of problems did you face in Iceland?
We were uncertain about so many things. First of all, we were not sure whether the shoot in Iceland would take place or not. It was so risky, I was uncertain, apprehensive. When we contacted our travel agent, he didn’t know the route. It was so windy there. Communicating with the locals was a problem. Then we had to think of how to take so many people to the locations. There was no restaurant in sight. A family ran the hotel the crew was staying in. So we had to convince them to bring in more people so that they could prepare food for the crew. We shot for 14 days in August last year and the good thing was we got 21 hours of sunlight!
Why did you take all these risks?
If you have to establish yourself in the Bengali market where there is a lot of competition, you’ll have to do something different. You have to take a risk to establish yourself and make the audience believe that whatever comes out of the production house Cinenine will be good.... Hanuman.Com will premiere in Singapore on December 8, and release there on December 12. The Bengali film has to go out of Bengal.
What is it like to work with Prosenjit?
Prosenjit has been a friend, philosopher and guide. He was there to help me at every step, whether it involved marketing or promotions. I have learnt so many things from him.
