JOIN USThe Eleventh Hour’ was the product of budding filmmaker Akshay Sidharth’s imagination and curiosity. He was impressed by the film form ‘film noir’ and wanted to make a short film based on it as it is rarely seen in the short film category.
Akshay says, “I took different film noir techniques and tried to use them in a minimalistic way. I have scripted keeping in mind these requirements and come up with ‘The Eleventh Hour’. The film is in monochrome and a thriller.” The production stage is going on and two schedules have been completed. “The film is a tribute to all the filmmakers (Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorcese, Orson Welles, Ram Gopal Varma and Anurag Kashyap) and films such as ‘Citizen Kane’, ‘Sarkar’, ‘Satya’, ‘La Confidential’ and ‘The Godfather’ that have inspired me. I believe I am sending a sensible message to all the young filmmakers to try and experiment in cinema,” he adds.
Why film noir? “When I learnt of ‘film noir’, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I pondered over why there aren’t many films that employ these techniques now. Yes, the audience’s taste has changed but that is not a sufficient reason to not make use or borrow some of the elements of this amazing film form.” He adds, “Film noir actually plays with the characters’ psychological emotions with unique techniques like lighting, shadows and camera gimmicks.”
Films like ‘The Godfather’, ‘In Bruges’ and ‘LA Confidential’ left an immense impact on Akshay, and Anurag Kashyap his biggest inspiration in Indian cinema. He says, “When I started researching on his (Anurag) movies, I found elements of film noir which has made me more confident about this project.” Akshay says, “It is very challenging to add up all the elements of film noir in a 12 – 15 minute short film. But I am affirmative about taking up new challenges as that is what determination is all about.”
The film crew includes Akshay (story, screenplay, direction), Athulya Madhu and Anmi Elizabet Sabu (assistant directors), Limson PA (cinematography), Augustine Cyrus Hemrom (stills), Sumoth Sam (editor) and Lisa Baker (art and make-up).
“My crew is an amalgamation of passion, confidence and determination. We share everything about films and discuss film matters,” says
Akshay. “The story and the character I play in this film have a lot of depth. There is something hidden in him, so it makes it really hard to portray the character. Who doesn’t like a challenge in their passion?” asks the lead actor Anoop Alexander. “I learnt a lot from this film, especially how to sync your motion with the camera. Each shot was taken at least ten times to get the technical side right and a lot of patience and hard work was put into every shot. Apart from the learning, it was a lot of fun working with the crew,” he adds. Sound is a very important aspect of the film and Akshay plans to record live sounds and mix it according to the situation. He sums up, “I want to experiment with new things and I don’t like spoon-feeding the audience. I want them to contemplate and extract satisfaction from the film.”