Directors of Pak's Oscar entry Zinda Bhaag talk about its universal appeal

The Pakistani film Zinda Bhaag is making waves, especially after it became Pakistan’s first entry to the Oscars in over 50 years. Excerpts from a conversation with the director duo, Meenu Gaur and Farjad Nabi. The Zinda Bhaag team is a remarkable union of Indian and Pakistani talent, from the directors to the technical crew. Did that ever create issues, logistical or political or personal? Farjad Nabi: Far from it, one was hard-pressed to tell the Indian crew apart from the Pakistani one. The ‘Indians’ were hard-core Lahoris by the time they left. The logistical issues of visas etc. were always there, but when are they not? And if there is anything we take real pride in, then it’s this: that our 200-odd Pakistani cast and crew were all working on their first feature side-by-side with four committed, passionate filmmakers from across the border. And look at how far we got together! Is there such a thing as Pakistani cinema, and where does ZB locate itself within that field? How does it feel to represent Pakistan on an international stage? Farjad Nabi: It’s slippery terrain if you try and define it too precisely. The new films coming out of Pakistan are very varied in terms of content and that is how it should be. Meenu Gaur: We didn’t set out to make a film that would represent Pakistan on an international stage. We really struggled to get prints made so as to take the film into small-town cinemas, in Sargodha, Gujranwala, Faislabad, Multan, etc, because we thought of the story as very local. But screenings abroad have made us realize how universal this story really is. A Bulgarian lady in Canada told our producer that “these boys that you showed in your film, these are the kind of boys I went to school with”! [caption id=“attachment_1150585” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Courtesy: ibn live[/caption] Tell us about the story of Zinda Bhaag. How and why did you zero in on illegal immigration and gambling as themes? Farjad Nabi_:_ We had heard some real-life stories from very close friends and relatives. These stories form part of Lahori street-lore, and I believe across South Asia. We just had to put our ears to the ground and listen. We found that this urgency to do what is called the ‘dunky’ in Lahori lingo (the illegal route to Europe) is tied up with ideas of masculine honour, success, tradition. It’s also about a simple belief in what our ’70s’ films embodied so well – the system as the enemy, the system that never allows us to take ‘legitimate’ routes to success. As for gambling, it is as much part of the daily lives of young men as reading the newspaper. Why did you decide to use non-actors for the central roles (Khaldi, Taambi and Chitta) but not for Pehelvaan? Meenu Gaur: We knew we wanted audiences to relate to the boys intimately, like they would to nephews, cousins, friends. In the audition, we were looking for certain personalities rather than actors as such. However, Pehelvaan was a character who was essentially a storyteller who had to hold the audience’s attention. We knew it had to be an accomplished actor who could carry that off. Farjad Nabi: So as soon as the words ‘accomplished actor’ were used, Naseer saab’s [Naseeruddin Shah] name was sure to follow. Is Pehelvaan modelled on a real person? What about Rubina? Farjad Nabi: Yes, on many real characters. His look with red henna hair symbolizes a particular kind of older man in Lahore. In the old-style concept of ‘Puhlvani’, a euphemism for using force, the violence was never overt. The philosophy goes that one’s power must be like the wind: always felt, never seen. Meenu Gaur: Rubina is supposed to be a ‘cheetee’ (leopardess) in Lahori lingo. She is ambitious, straight talking and hard-working. The character is culled from many women we met while researching in local beauty parlours. The film explores a serious subject in a visually playful, often boisterously funny way. Meenu Gaur: You have to be Lahori or know the culture of what is called the ‘juggat’ (repartee) in Lahore to get that aspect completely. It’s the Lahori style of conversation. Farjad Nabi: In terms of form, it’s a tribute to the now-collapsed Lollywood film industry. We loved the films of the ’70s & ’80s, the time Lollywood was at its peak. Meenu Gaur: So we used flashbacks, voices in the head, a very warm colour tone, the concept of the ‘shareef badmaash’ through the character of Pehelvaan – these are all elements from a certain era of Lollywood. Did you always plan on having songs in Zinda Bhaag? Farjad Nabi: Yes. It was a deliberate decision on our part. … There is a tendency amongst the cultural elite to have a knee-jerk rejection to this South Asian film form and view it as inferior to Hollywood or European film form. Whether a film has songs or doesn’t is a lazy way to judge the impact or truthfulness of its content. Filmmakers should feel free to choose a form that feels right for their storytelling. Our traditional stories have always been told through songs: Heer Ranjha, Sassi Punnu, this is all theatre in verse. Meenu Gaur: We wanted situational songs, like in older films, where they were a space for expressing that which cannot be expressed in dialogue, that which needs a poetic expression. Situations of romance, suffering, existential angst, a spiritual or moral dilemma, desires, fantasy, aspirations, of mocking the rich and powerful… So Zinda Bhaag uses film songs in their most traditional form. Bagga, our music director, took this a step further and created the music through live instruments, to evoke film music from a bygone era. So all these really amazing veteran violin players, saxophone players, cello players and brass bands came together for our music. This was probably the funnest bit of making this film.