Nagesh Kukunoor

Nagesh Kukunoor is a chemical engineer who chucked lucrative jobs and a cushy life style not once, but twice to follow his passion-film making. Today he is recognized as a stellar overseas Indian filmmaker of critically acclaimed unconventional films.

In an exclusive interview with Little India’s Kavita Chhibber, the writer and director of Iqbal and Dor, discusses his unusual film journey.

You are a chemical engineer. How did filmmaking come into the picture?

I remember that dad was totally into Hollywood movies and would cycle 20 km away to this theater that showed Hollywood films and I grew up hearing about films like Rebel without a Cause and so on. What he watched we imbibed.

From the 5th grade till the 10th grade I distinctly remember enacting out whatever I remembered from a film complete with dialogues, sound effects, frame by frame before the class in this free period that we had. When I went to college, in those 4 years of studying chemical engineering, I also averaged about 5 films per week.

I think one of the defining moments in my life was when I came out of the theater after having watched Raiders of the Lost Ark. I thought that was the greatest film to be ever made, and said to myself..if such magic can be created on screen then I want to be a part of it.

That led to borrowing one of those bulky VHS video cameras that we had in the 80s from an affluent friend and my cousin and I co scripted this really horrible murder mystery in which I acted as well. We got halfway through when we had a routine power outage. With the light went my nerve and enthusiasm. I did look at the footage later and I was so embarrassed that I erased it – something I regret to this day. So there were those times but I really never had the nerve to do anything about it.

Then you came to the USA to study at Georgia Tech. How did you pursue the film dream?

By watching a lot of films! I have every single ticket stub from every film I saw in the US since 1988. Georgia Tech was really an engineering school in the 80s. There wasn’t any film related department.

In the 2-3 years that I did courses and workshops, I learnt that I loved being on the set, I could recognize pieces of equipment and that I had the ability to both act and simultaneously direct the scene I was enacting in my mind. But the one thing that one NEVER learns in film school is that real life is very different and you are working in an unpredictable environment. you have to take decision on the fly that are not part of your meticulously written script.

You chucked your job, went to Hyderabad, realized you didn’t have enough money, came back, made the money and then went back. How crazy is that? And what did mom and dad say?

I think if I can take any bragging rights it was when I chucked my job a second time. What was ironic was that I landed my dream job. It meant a lot of money, travel all over the world and thousands in stock options! To give all that up and go back required a lot of nerve, but I had to gather whatever knowledge I had, and money I had and give it a shot before I lost the courage to do it. 

Mom and dad were taken aback but soon they realized I was serious and then they also felt that may they should let me get it out of my system. Of course I was petrified and I would lie alone at night wondering if I was doing the right thing. But I have always believed in being tunnel visioned about whatever I do. I feel that multitasking is doing two things poorly, and to this day that is how I work and live.  My father taught me one thing – once you make your decision then have the balls to stand by it.

Interestingly when I did make Hyderabad Blues, I followed the lesson of writing about things I knew so the movie is based on experiences I had and others whom I knew.

You made Bollywood Calling and Teen Deewarein after that. Bollywood Calling was a comedy spoofing the Bombay film industry and Teen Deewarein a dark film about three criminals awaiting death and a journalist in a dysfunctional marriage walking into their lives. Naseeruddin Shah was dazzling in all his wicked charm.

I have always had a paranoid fear of being put in a slot. Before the sun sets I want to make at least one film in every genre. Teen Deewarein was my message to the audience and producers that I am not just a director who makes light comedic movies.

A lot of the incidents that happened in Bollywood Calling happened to me in my journey as a film maker.
Bollywood Calling also highlighted the fact that I couldn’t control everything and decisions had to be made quickly. I prefer to stick to the script very tightly and don’t like to make changes or allow others to make changes, because one sentence can be spoken in 10 different ways and each way can change the entire outcome of the scene or the following line. But here was the scene where I had been working with this guy who is the film producer in the movie for over two days and he was so over the top each time, not really delivering what I needed from him. So I fired him. I didn’t know what to do when suddenly in the shower it hit me and I quickly wrote a scene in which the superstar Manu Kapoor gets mad at the producer and fires him, and Om Puri becomes the director.

What can I say about Naseer. I didn’t deviate from the script but what Naseer does is bring his brilliance with him when he believes in a role as he did in the role of Ishaan. I wanted Naseer to give to the character that wicked charm he possesses in real life and it became the core of that character. It was at the editing table that I realized how outstanding he was and how he had with subtle nuances added so much to the performance.

They say sequels are never as good as the original and yet you went and made Hyderabd Blues 2.

I have always wanted to believe in making films according to my own sensibilities. There was a year long gap before Bollywood Calling and Teen Deewarein was released. In that time I started thinking of what Varun and Ashwini would be doing six years later. I was told that sequels don’t do well at the box office and I responded that there has never been a true sequel made in Hindi cinema and this was really the first one.

I have never talked about this much, but while I was waiting to see the fate of my two films, I just wanted to go back to where I was when I made Hyderabad Blues. I wanted to prove a point to myself, and so I took all the money I had earned till then and poured it into HB 2, but they were right – it didn’t work. But it doesn’t matter if the movie didn’t work, I just wanted to reassure myself that I was going to work according to my sensibilities and on my terms.

When I made Iqbal, I was told a film on cricket will flop, when it became a hit and I made Dor I was again told a story about two women meant film suicide, because again conventionally, women oriented films normally don’t do well at the box office. Then Dor became a hit.

Several film directors tell me that they learnt about film making at the editing table. Also how long do you take to write your scripts?

Well for me a lot of my film making lessons happened at the writing stage and then on the sets, where every decision planned or improvised can change the entire outcome of the film.

All I saw at the editing table was how the film came together. I think like writing, filmmaking is very intuitive. I think of my script as a Bible. I do not change anything. I also follow the American structure very closely and when I break it, I know why I’m doing so. I also do not write scenes out of context. I never say oh let me write that scene first and I will come back to this one later. It’s both my blessing and my curse. I have broken the rule with mixed results.

I give myself 30 days to write a script. If I can’t finish the first draft and feel good about it in 30 days I shelve it. I might or might not come back to it years later. Iqbal was written in six days, Hyderabad Blues in seven, Dor in 8-9 days, just to give you an example.

 What stands out in all your films is that they are different from each other and have either a happy ending or a glimmer of redemption and hope at the end.

I believe in happy endings. I haven’t changed that stance since I entered the industry. I want that at the end of the two hours you must leave with a good vibe or euphoria that people felt when they saw Iqbal. I had people come up to me and tell me that they had a fresh lease on life when they saw Iqbal.

Nagesh Kukunoor with film director Aditya Bhattacharya

The women in your films are strong.  Is that from being surrounded by strong women or just something you understood along the way? Or is it not such a big deal?

What really amuses me is that when we talk about a woman’s strength we make it a novelty, while a man’s strength is taken in a very matter-of-fact way. The truth is that there are weak and strong women, just as there are weak and strong men. So much has gone into projecting a woman as an inferior second sex in every corner of the world that often when they try to show strong women on screen they become the slogan shouting, larger than life caricatures. I understand that the film makers are catering to the lowest common denominator, which includes a huge section of society where women truly are second class  citizens, but I think for me the strength in a woman is as much a fact of life as strength in a man.

In my films I choose to make the woman strong in the hope that it will become a non issue. Personally I have enjoyed seeing the strength of a woman because it comes with a tremendous amount of vulnerability.

Do you think you came in at the right time? That Bollywood is ready for change?

I don’t buy this concept of right time. It’s silly when people  call you a trendsetter, when a film that isn’t like their usual products does well.

I have been making the kind of films I wanted to make since 1997. There really hasn’t been any hugely drastic change, though I see that some films are now without songs, or an odd small budget film emerges and does well. But on the whole it’s the usual song and dance and melodrama that Bollywood knows best that is produced.

Today, there is a lot of money available for film makers. It gives me hope that this will result in opportunities for many to make good films, and something new and innovative may come out of it.

What have you personally taken away from Iqbal and Dor?

Even that in the worst places, even in the worst situations in life, you can find hope, and joy.

I have always viewed myself as an underdog and in the deaf and mute Iqbal I saw a lot of myself. The success of Dor and Iqbal renewed my faith and gave me hope that I can continue to believe in supporting things and making films that supposedly don’t work – because if you believe, nothing is impossible.