Mainak Bhaumik

Mainak Bhaumik, who shot to fame with Aamra, tagged as “Tolly’s first sex comedy”, is taking a peek into the bedrooms of some urban couples in his next film, Bedroom. A t2 chat with the director-editor...

It sounds like there’s going to be a lot of action in the bedroom in Bedroom...

Whoever goes to watch Bedroom with that kind of a mentality will be disappointed! Unlike what the title suggests, there aren’t really any explicit, bold scenes in the film. I am calling it Bedroom because I feel you actually get to know a person in their bedroom. The masks come off and the fireworks start in the bedroom. When I say bedroom, I refer to a person’s most private space. So it’s basically looking at the personal and private spaces of some people from the urban jungle we see in this movie. And like in Aamra, the characters in Bedroom too talk a lot about sex. They are not having sex and are failing miserably at it and that’s what makes the film, I guess, thematically bold.

Bedroom seems similar to Aamra in several ways...

Not really. Bedroom is very dark and morbid. Aamra was cute; it was a fun film. In Bedroom I am showing Calcutta as a noisy, polluted, ruthless city where everyone is leading a turbulent life but has a smile on their faces. There’s a lot of spite in everyone but they hide it. I am dealing with characters in their late twenties and they are much more complex, unlike in Aamra where the characters were less complicated and more sorted out. Besides, while making Aamra I had a different perspective of Calcutta. I was in New York for 17 years. But now after living in this city for a couple of years, I look at it differently. It’s cruel and very dark. When I made Aamra (released in 2006), Calcutta perhaps wasn’t what it is now.

Abir Chatterjee and Paoli Dam	Parno Mittra and Rahul	Rudranil Ghosh and Ushasie

What is Bedroom all about?

It’s about three couples. One of them is Abir (Chatterjee) and Paoli (Dam). Paoli is a bored and irritable housewife; Abir has lost his job but hides it from his wife. He pretends to go to office everyday but whiles away time in coffee shops. Rudra (Rudranil Ghosh) and Ushasie are the second couple. Rudra is an actor; Ushasie is a journalist. They meet during an interview and start bonding. Both are commitment-phobic. Parno (Mittra) and Rahul play a live-in couple. Parno is a fashion photographer, while Rahul is a failure. He dreams of directing Raktakarabi on stage some day but ends up doing nothing. Parno runs the household. Besides, there’s Tanusree, who plays a prostitute looking for a break in Tollywood, and Anubrata Basu, who plays a toy boy. Parno uses him, promising him a career in modelling.... Dag Media is producing Bedroom and we start shooting in June.

Are the characters based on people you know?

Yes, all of them are based on my friends. The other day a friend of mine came down from the US. He told me about his divorce and he talked about it so casually that I was shocked! I have seen some of my friends suffering from commitment phobia and how love goes out of the window after marriage and a baby. All this is there in Bedroom.

How did you go about choosing the actors?

I chose Abir because he is beautifully juggling acting and a corporate job in real life. So, he fits the bill of a guy who wants to climb up the social ladder but ends up losing his job. I liked Paoli a lot in Kalbela. Her eyes speak a lot. Rudra’s character is more or less based on him. I have seen him rise from a nobody to an actor to reckon with. Ushasie has been a journalist herself. People have seen Parno as the sweet girl so far; here she is bitchy and unscrupulous. Despite being in a relationship, she doesn’t hesitate to sleep with other men. And Rahul is a very good actor.

You’ve finished shooting Ami vs Tumi, which too is a relationship story...

Yes. It is in the post-production stage. It’s about a couple, played by Rahul and Priyanka, and the day-to-day problems they face post-marriage. I had written Ami vs Tumi four years back, even before Aamra. But I didn’t know who to cast. The two characters needed a certain kind of ease with each other, a certain body language which I didn’t see in any actor here. Then I met Priyanka and Rahul, and there was this organic physical and mental comfort level between them and I had finally got my cast.