Making of Door Bell
October 28, 2010
(I’ve wanted to write about it for long but never got a chance. Now that Facebooked has happened and I should write about that as well, I think it is high time I write about my first experience of being in a movie before it erases out of my memory! This one is gonna be a long one as well, as I have realized that I cannot write short posts! 
)
This post technically deserves to be called “Experience of a lifetime”, the title of my first post as it WAS a once-in-lifetime experience. I mean I always wanted to make movies, be there and do this and that, but the whole experience of learning and also unlearning stuff was amazing.
The beginning, the spook and the shock
So this is how everything fell into place. We have a movie-making team in office; they call us for auditions, in fact select most of us from the auditions and form us into teams and ask us to make a 1 minute film. So we all come up with stories, share it with our team members, discuss. One story however catches all our attention just for the spookiness in it. We all decide to go ahead with that story (though I express my doubts that it might not fit in a minute, we are nevertheless very excited as the genre is different and difficult to attempt). However, the guy who wrote the story, Ankit is missing. None of us have ever seen him before! (It just added to the whole spookiness thing!). So anyways, the rest of us decide to attempt story boarding it. Biswa comes up with one first, and it looks really good. So we decide to make him the director and revisit the shots. Next problem (actually I realize now that others didn’t really think this was a problem except me!) is the cast. We need two girls. Biswa looks at Nibha and says, ‘I think she can be the spooky one, because she has that look!’ Nibha tries to disagree and look offended but she is shocked to know that everyone unanimously agrees with Biswa! Now comes the real shock. Next Biswa points towards me and he says, ‘I consider her as a very silent and soft person so I think she can play the spooked out one’ Now it is my turn to disagree – not about the soft and silent part (although I could disagree because I m neither soft nor silent!); it is the part where he says act. Again everybody is convinced. I try to tell people ‘Look, I can’t act’ but they just say, ‘Woh to hum dekhlenge’ and the matter is put to rest.
A Wednesday!
Then comes the storyboarding and pre-production part. We sit together in conference rooms, we discuss each shot, house layout (I actually drew Nibha’s house layout like an architect to help them understand better! ) and come up with one draft. Now we go to the core team. This day deserves to be mentioned! I don’t know the date, but I do remember that it was a Wednesday (I’m sure even Biswa remembers that, despite his memory! ); the day where our heads literally went for a toss. We meet them at 5.30 PM. Prabhu, Animesh and Ravi sit with us through it. Initially they are all excited. In time they turn super excited. And then, in no time they come up with amazing stuff just to add to the spookiness so much so that, Shripriya starts getting goose bumps by just listening to them! We have a whole discussion on whether Nibha’s character is to be interpreted as a ghost or not, the ending gets changed again and again, Nibha’s character gets spookier and spookier and Ravi is convinced that I am THE spooky person in reality, cos I come up with a whole lot of spooky ideas myself and also cos I have a broken cuckoo clock, broken mobile phone, a white dupatta which can be used for hanging oneself and so on! And then eventually more people join in, and along with them come more ideas. Finally at 9 in the night, (Biswa’s eyes were completely red by then BTW! ) Biswa and me just stare at each other trying to recollect everything that happened and what all changes can be effectuated. Biswa just scratches his head and says ‘I have forgotten what our original story was now!’ We then just decide to take it up the next day and make only those changes whatever we really like.
(BTW during this whole time, we do try to rehearse once and Prabhu tells me that I m too theatrical. I am dazed. I try to tell my teammates again that I can’t act! But again, nobody cares. )
‘Dreaded Scene 1’
So we finish the storyboard. By now we are convinced the movie won’t come anywhere close to a minute, but we still decide to go ahead with the shoot. We visit Nibha’s house to do rehearsals. We start with the first scene of the movie where I enter the house looking sad and bored. I enact so badly that I just feel like running away from there! They are baffled when I say I cannot relate to the scene at all as I have never felt lonely! Of course, finally we decide to change the scene because our actress apparently cannot enact a scene where she cant relate to the emotional content of it. (I try to tell people that I am a ‘method actress’ and that I cannot enact something I cant relate to- just because I was acting badly ) The rest of the scenes go fine (bad, but fine when compared to the ‘dreaded scene 1’). At the end of the day, I ask Biswa again if he is still confident that I can do justice to the role. He tells me (in his own sweet, inimitable way) ‘Well you are fine, except for scenes x, y and z. Don’t worry, you are doing it fine’ Some confidence. Back home, I make my brother sit and rehearse, taking tips from him. Another confidence booster.
Rehearsal Day 2
This day goes much better and both me and my diro feel more confident about my ability to act. We still haven’t decided how Nibha’s character dies and what her name is, cos we haven’t found a news paper with an appropriate news item which would help us use in our film. (Probably for the first time in my life, I was annoyed that there was no newspaper article about a girl committing suicide, or getting murdered, for atleast a month! Ironically, the day after we finished the shoot, a newspaper came up with the exact article we had been looking for!)
The D Day
Finally the ‘day’ arrives. I m nervous, excited, super nervous and super excited all at the same time I feel feverish as well. So I reach Nibha’s house and just settle down on the couch saying I have very little energy in me which I wont put to use until the shoot starts. Biswa gets a little worried and I tell him I will be fine. We start hunting for articles again, in vain. Finally we decide to go ahead with an obituary. We set the house, stick Nibha’s photograph in the newspaper and rehearse once again. Its noon by now and the core team is expected any moment. Somehow the excitement takes over and I start feeling better. Just as Biswa starts getting excited on hearing that I m feeling good, Nibha settles down on the bed telling that she is feeling feverish and tired somehow! We ask her to take rest till the core team arrives.
Core team arrives
They come at 5 PM with camera, tripod, lights and all the equipment. We tell them about the first sequence we plan to shoot and they ask us, ‘Have you blocked the shot?’ We are all looking disillusioned wondering what they are talking about. Then Leslie comes up with his quintessential ‘Babaa’ and asks us what the first action is, last action is and tells us to mark the points. We do as told and go for take-1, almost after half an hour. The first time I realize how tough it is to shoot a film. So many logistics! Lights being one of the major ones. I finish the shot and Muthu raises his hand and says, ‘Ah, one thing, the light isn’t fine on her face and also, I couldn’t see any reaction which was supposed to come from her’ I freeze. My first take of the first shot of my first movie! I get all tense and my hands are cold. Ravi kinda eases me with his jokes and comments. And I get ready for take-2. This time I do it much better and we decide to go with it.
TOW they all clap
Next we shoot the scene where Divya enters her room and slams the door on my face. At the end of take 2, they are all very happy and start clapping! It feels really great. Poor Nibha is very tired as she had to carry the heavy luggage on her shoulders for so long! She goes to sleep and we decide to finish off all the scenes which didn’t have Nibha.
The best scene of the film
We decide to shoot the entry scene of Divya because Nibha is awake by now and feeling better. She had to look like she was drenched in the rain so she goes and pours water all over her with a running temperature of 102! Talk about dedication . This is the scene where I learnt how little things need to be added to make a shot look beautiful. We had earlier decided that I would already be at the door and as the shot starts I just open it. Prabhu suggests that I enter the frame and then open the door with little bit of my head still covering the left part of the frame after I open. Ultimately this scene turned out to be the best scene of the movie.
The deadline
It is 5, next day morning (Monday). Leslie comes to us and says, ‘Look, we haven’t slept for the past 48 hours. You still have 4 more shots to do and it’s already 5. Why don’t you guys wrap up and shoot it tomorrow? It is better not to shoot than do a bad shoot. Think about it and let us know’ We are shocked. We HAVE to finish the shoot no matter what. The reason being, there is a huge cultural event happening in Infy on Tuesday in which movies are being showcased including ours. So technically we have just a day to finish the post production part of it. So postponing the shoot was out of question. We have a talk, decide to discard one shot, request the core team to give us 45 minutes. We start the last leg of the shoot in full swing and finally finish it by 5:45 as promised. They are happy we kept up the promise. By 6:30 everybody leaves as we have to get to office as well in a few hours!
Post production
We sit in Deepak’s room for the editing. It is 4, three teams (including ours) waiting for Prabhu- the man who will help us finish what we have started. We select the best takes of all the shots. It is almost 8 by the time Prabhu becomes free. Me and Shripriya say good bye to them and leave for the day. Next day we talk to Prabhu and he says the editing has been done. They sat till 4 in the night doing the editing! We have a look and all of us get excited, looking forward for the movie to be shown on the big screen.
Show time
They play our movie!!!
In presence of greats like NRN and Kris!!!
AND people love it!!!
A packed audience of over 1000 people watches the movie and applauds! Feels wonderful! (Though they did laugh at a scene where they weren’t supposed to; I don’t blame them!) Friends, other team members, random people come and congratulate me on my acting! I message Nibha telling her what all she is missing and how many people are looking for her. Friends call me and tell me that people leaving the hall were yelling ‘Mamma mera haath jal gaya!’
And that’s a wrap
Our first attempt at making a movie was successful and I am not saying that this was the the most flawless or the best film ever made but I m super happy to be a part of it! 
P.S.: The mystery man Ankit who had been missing all this while finally turned up for our post-movie-success-team-meet, so we could tell that he actually existed!
Link to the movie:
