Cinema is one of the primary modes of entertainment for a large section of people and we do appreciate good movies but we are often oblivious to the tremendous hard work that goes into making them. Newcomers in the film industry may or may not succeed in making a mark but their struggles cannot be denied, be it an actor, filmmaker or any other artist in the industry.
A renowned short filmmaker in the Malayalam industry recently talked about the obstacles he had to face while pitching a film to producers.
Vishnu Udayan, who has won awards from over the world, including the SIIMA short films award for his work, has on his Facebook account, shared the link to his blog where he has been critical of the system where producers and big production houses have not even listened to his narration and turned him down because he wanted to work with a lesser known budding actress.
https://www.facebook.com/94vishnu/posts/10159009367244952
He has named his write-up ‘Fascism in cinema’ and has questioned the tendency to not look beyond the commercial and business aspects of a film. Vishnu spoke about how he even shot a few scenes with the new actress to show the producers that she was apt for the role but they still did not even hear him out.
He firmly believes that the backbone of a film is its story, screenplay and director but he was repeatedly asked to change the actress. He also said, “I’ve heard a lot of stories of newcomer directors who went on sets and just became a tool for calling action and cut”.
Many empathised with Vishnu Udayan on his post and encouraged him to keep trying but what caught the attention of people was a reply by fellow filmmaker Alphonse Puthren.
Alphonse commented, “Try another producer. Before I did Neram, I had seen nearly 24 producers for another script. For Neram, I met at least 30 producers. Then Premam was accepted by Anwar Rasheed. Then tried so many actors for Paattu. Then that got delayed because of COVID. Then Gold Happened. So, keep digging till you get Gold. Don’t complain to anyone. No one is listening. Just keep digging in the right way. You will get gold or petrol or even diamonds.”
