|
By Our Correspondent Š2004 Bollyvista.com |
Nagesh Kukunoor would have been labeled a maverick filmmaker had his much-acclaimed 'Hyderabad Blues' not fared well. A chemical engineer turned filmmaker; Nagesh belongs to the relatively younger brigade of directors for whom cinema is a passion. Nagesh has always chosen to make movies about real people doing mundane stuff. He picks up ideas and themes by observing people.
With his subsequent ventures, Nagesh was unable to fully live up to the splash and hype he managed to create at the time of 'Hyderabad Blues'. Yet he is a big draw with the media at least because he consistently attempts to craft something real and different.
After 'Hyderabad Blues', the Atlanta-based Andhrite's next film was 'Bollywood Calling', starring Om Puri and Perizaad Zorabian. It was about an out-of-work B-grade American movie star who gets a culture shock on seeing the Indian film industry, especially when he is pitted against an ageing but legendary movie star, played by Navin Nischol. The film bombed. Before that, he released 'Rockford', an out-and-out entertainer and comedy, for the masses and yet without the usual commercial grime. It was a peep into teenage psychology with a dusky schoolteacher (Nandita Das) thrown in for good measure.
Nagesh Kukunoor's 'Teen Deewarein' with Jackie Shroff, Naseeruddin Shah and Juhi Chawla, which released last year, bagged a fair share of award nominations and glowing reviews, but did not fare well at the box office. The film, which had a lot of English in it, according to Nagesh, was never intended to be a commercial film.
Nagesh's sequel to 'Hyderabad Blues' has just released. Here, he returns to his beloved middle class India and grapples with its idiosyncrasies. His next film will be about death. It's a film where you know that the lead actor is going to die in the first 10 minutes. And he promises that it'll not be a cutesy film, but not too grim either. So let's wait and watch! |
SEARCH
