New Delhi: A guy of few words, Sudhir Mishra thinks that everyone can get a different message from his latest movie. Lately, the director was making projects for OTT like ‘Hostages’, ‘Tanaav’ and ‘Jehanabad—Of Love & War’. His latest movie 'Afwaah' hit the theatres on May 5. The events depicted in Sudhir Mishra's movie are ones that have lately occurred in our society. Not a single plot thread is left hanging; everything presented in the film is relevant to the overall narrative.
Sudhir Mishra gave an in-depth interview to ABPLive, discussing his newest movie 'Afwaah' starring Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Bhumi Pednekar, and Sumeet Vyas.
Read the excerpts from the interview:
What do you think what message the audience will get from 'Afwaah'?
There was a very big director named Cecil B. DeMille. He says, “If you want to send a message, send a telegram”. You don't send elementary messages, you tell a story. You put the audience to an experience. ‘Afwaah’ is about whatever monster chasing you is a rumour. And often monsters chasing people these days are rumors. Then it's very difficult. There's no place to hide because the rumour will always get there before you. How do you run away from a rumour? So that's the experience that I thought was the basis of a great film. So you take people through a journey.
Aap logo se milte ho, bhot tarah ke characters se milte ho. Aur wo sb milke, ek tajurbe ke baad, ye aap pe h. I mean if you're using the word message, you might take one message and you might take something else depending on your bias. Because we are all biased.
You choose Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Bhumi Pednekar for the film. Any reason behind this pairing?
I like Nawaz, I’ve worked with him before. And I've always loved him as an actor. I thought Nawaz is always being cast sometimes in a ‘tedha’ role like a killer. I mean he was so good in 'The Lunchbox' if you remember. He played a very normal person. So I thought that was a good basis and I cast him. Ab wo kitna acha hai wo aap dekhenge film me. But he’s a normal person like you and me. A small-town boy made good.
Uska accent nhi h, uski angrezi nhi h, lekin wo pohoch gaya h bhot uncha. Like an advertising agency ad ‘Desi Hai’or ‘Chote seher se aaya hai’. Toh uss tarah ka ek normal aadmi jo thoda apni jadon se ukhad gaya h. But he does what is expected of him like a good man should.
According to the director, Nawaz was always his choice. His story for why he cast Bhumi is that they met and then decided. He said, “Bhumi I met and then decided on her. She's also actively wanted to do this. She's very today and she comes with a lot of preparation and she is very efficient. And she's stunning in the film.”
Talking about the other cast, Sudhir said, “There's a lot of good actors in this film and you'll see Sumeet Vyas in a totally different part and he's brilliant. Sharib Hashmi whom you've seen as a nice guy in ‘The family man’, is brilliant. In fact, Sumeet and Sharib are very important in the film and so is Sumit Kaul, who was in ‘Tanaav’ with me. He played the antagonist. Then there’s a girl called T. J. Bhanu. She was in 'The Forgotten Army' and 'Guns and Gulaabs' with Raj and D.K. So, she’s stunning. All of them.
“Today there's a huge talent and they are challenging every accepted star system,” he concluded.
ABPLive review of the movie read: “Perhaps, time and again, we will need a filmmaker like Sudhir Mishra to remind us what cinema can do and sometimes, as an art form, should do amidst mindless entertainment and mediocre content consumption we have become slaves of; on social media or to the technology we created to make our lives easier.”