A movie made "Just Like That"

So, my fifth movie is releasing tomorrow. It was supposed to be my first music video titled \”Joanah\” that should have been releasing tomorrow, November 13th. But due to financial shortage, I had to delay the project. I came back from my 3 months intense Direction training at ICE, Balaji Telefilms on Oct 15th . After that I was bored and totally clueless on what to do. I had my exams in November but until then what should I do? I didnt know. I tried my luck with few directors to asst them, but nothing work out. It was on one of those days I met up with Ananthu and Christy. We spoke about short films, stories and decided to go ahead with Ananthu\’s directorial debut venture. I came back home and decided to watch the projects I did during my course. I realized most of the projects don\’t look good. I saw the very first film I made during my course and also my first short film two years back. Ironically I found my first short film better than the film I made at the institute. This kinda made me sit and think. My diploma movie at the institute wasn\’t great either and received negative comments. The passionate film maker in me broke down on the institute stairs. These thoughts ran through my mind. I also remembered what Shailesh sir told me when I broke down, \”If you think good, good will happen. If you think bad, bad will happen. Never cry, you are a filmmaker\”. That was the start of everything. I called up Christy and told him an incident which I wanted to take during the course but couldn\’t because my co-directors didn\’t like the story. Now I am independent and therefore I was going to take it. Christy liked the story and said \”Lets do it\”. After a little bit hassle for the heroine hunt, my beloved asst director, Surya and myself set out at morning 9:30 to search for the location. We found the location at 10:30, called the crew and started shooting. We didn\’t have any tripod. We didn\’t have lights. All natural. Rain hurled down as a villain but Christy and myself weren\’t born to backoff! On this occassion, I extend my sincere gratitude to our Associate Cinematographer, Akhil C Jose who is also a brilliant director and has few films to his credit. He also didn\’t complain about the rain and was ready to shoot. Not only him, but also none in the location complained. I also thank the citizens of Thiruvananthapuram who were rushing on their two wheelers on the rain, for stopping and co operating with us.  First person whom I should thank for this project is Christy Sebastian. I have always desired to work with him but it never happened. He is not the kind of cinematographer whom you see on the sets with a serious stern face. He jokes around, lighting the mood and helping me to explain the mood to the cast. But once I call \”Camera\”, he turns into a professional. I remember his fear to take a particular shot. I badly wanted that shot but he was hesitating. I kept on saying \”I need that shot\” and finally he took it without complaining. That, my friends, was pure professionalism! When it comes to Editing, Christy is a sensible editor. After seeing different kind of editors in the past 3 months, I was comfortable with Christy. Thanks to the rain shoot, I was down with fever and Christy did the editing all alone. He took a video of the film every night and sent me seeking my opinion. Thank you Mr. Christy Sebastian, without whom this project wouldn\’t have had happen.  Secondly, I want to thank Reshma George and her mom. We had a tough time getting a heroine for the film. Despite being in this city for the past 20-21 years, neither Christy nor me knew anyone who will act. It was all of a sudden I remembered Reshma who told me once that she is willing to act. I called her and asked. She said she will confirm by night. She said an okay! The project was on. We were in a situation where we are all set to shoot, but there wasn\’t a heroine!  Reshma was our savior. I thank her mom too from the bottom of my heart. I still feel sorry and guilty because I couldn\’t get aunty any chair to sit during the shoot. But never did she complain and she was taking care of our stuffs on the road. Thank you Aunty! I owe you. Up next, I want to thank two people. Both of them deserve the same amount of gratitude. Alphabetically saying, Ananthu D Kurup & Sreeji Sreekumar. I told Ananthu \”you are the hero\” and he agreed. Sreeji Sreekumar, the man behind the stupendous posters of all my movies. He complains that I make him work a lot but he never picks up seriousness between us. The down to earth, too friendly, too decent man gets wild when he sees photoshop. Hehe. I wanted the tiff file of the logo but he couldnt give due to his PC\’s awesome situation. But as soon as he got his PC fixed he called me and mailed me the tiff. Thank you both! 🙂 I was short of an assistant for this project. My ever loving Associate, Vigil is in Ernakulam. The hard working Nihal is in Ernakulam. The complaining Akhil is in Chennai. Who is left in Trivandrum? Two of them whom I know were busy with exams. I dialled Surya\’s number and told him we have a shoot. He bunked his college and came to help us. Akhil C Jose came to Trivandrum for his short film\’s post production works but he worked as an associate to Christy without any complaint. Thank you both. Thank you for blocking the traffic for us. My usual music director was not in town and he was busy with his job. So, that was the next problem. I called up Cherin and asked him to do the bgm because I have seen him playing keyboard. But he turned me down and suggested me Nithin Sabu Jonson. I called Nithin and he was willing to do. I didn\’t tell him that the whole short film is musical and give him a heart attack straight away. But slowly when he understood, I am glad, he didn\’t complaint! In all my past 4 short films, I have done the sound designing with a professional from the industry. This time I wanted to Cherin to do it. Cherin took up the job and came out with brilliant final mix track.  So, my friends that is the story behind \”Just Like That\”. I want to make few things clear here about the movie.  1. \”Just Like That\” is hardly 3 minutes! So please don\’t expect a long short film. Its very tiny. 2. There are no lights or tripod or any equipments used. All shots are hand held with natural light and natural rain. 3. The short film has no dialogues.  4. There aren\’t any messages from the short film.  5. There aren\’t any professionals in the cast or crew but we have tried to bring out a professional output. We all are learning and aspiring movie makers. It would be a huge sin from my side if I don\’t thank three of my mentors and four of my friends. As a film maker I have learned a lot from my three faculities in my institute. Mr. Shailesh Rana, Mr. Khalid Khan and Mr. Arijit Pal. I thank from the bottom of my heart to all these three sirs.

I want to extend a special thanks to Kritika Goyal, Fahim Safar, Arpit Soni & Krishna chechi. Whenever I was low in confidence, Kritika stood right behind me as a pillar. An excellent director herself, she always chipped in valuable suggestions. She even told me to change the story ;). Arpit, the most brilliant actor I have seen in the institute and also in my age ground, is a hyper active bubble which bursts at the right time on whatsapp groups. He always tell me \”Vishnu bro, dont take tension. Everything will go good. You be cool bro\”. The young superstar, Fahim Safar, found time in between his exams to call me and ask almost everyday to know how the movie is going. He actually suggested me a different climax but we were unable to do it. Finally Krishna chechi, my love, for whom I gave this story and asked her to make it but she couldn\’t make it. She messages once in 2-3 days asking me how is the movie going. Today she told me \”Ananthu is looking handsome in the poster!\” Hehe. Thank you to all four!

I thank all my Facebook friends and my college friends from Chennai.

So here we present, \”Just Like That\”. Keep us in your prayers. Do revert with HONEST FEEDBACKS. We are open to criticisms but we also request not to do purposefull degrading as film making is NOT AN EASY JOB.

Thank you. God Bless! 🙂