The right blend

Siblings Nirup and Anup Bhandari have grown up watching movies and discussing cricket. They have both been trained in music, dance and theatre but between the two, Nirup took a strong liking to theatre and Anup took to writing in a big way. Whatever their interests, the twain had to meet for, after all, they are siblings. That’s how the just-released movie ‘RangiTaranga’ happened and has been running into full house since its release. The movie is the directorial debut of Anup and Nirup’s debut as an actor.

Talking about how the project was conceived, Anup explains, “Nirup and I have always discussed only movies and cricket since we were kids. Now cricket is out of the picture and it’s only movies.” He further states, “Nirup is a theatre artist and dancer, so he was already prepared in that sense. When we didn’t get the dates of a few of the established actors, our producer HK Prakash suggested Nirup take the lead because he had seen a few of Nirup's performances and was thoroughly impressed.”

Anup confesses that he has no experience in filmmaking. “I have not assisted anyone. I have learnt everything by making short films, watching thousands of movies and watching great filmmakers talk about movies. So, on the first day of the shoot, it was overwhelming when more than a 100 people were waiting for my instructions to start. I took it as a challenge and started my work,” narrates Anup.     However, the biggest task was to get people used to his style of working. “A lot of people found my style of working quite unusual. When you don’t follow the set path, people assume you don’t know what you are doing but luckily things fell into place pretty fast,” he says.

Anup and Nirup observe that today’s audience not only expect entertainment but also have the capacity to view cinema with a critical eye. “People are smart enough to discuss camera angles, continuity and screenplay, so a film has to be entertaining and technically sound to leave an impact,” observes Nirup.

Nirup explains that duo always wanted their debut project to be a blend of emotion, romance and mystery. “I think we have managed to achieve that in ‘RangiTaranga.’ “The movie has been designed to keep the audience hooked to the screen with plenty of edge-of-the-seat moments,” concludes Nirup.