Daily Times

The film, ‘5 Rupya’, directed by veteran ad filmmaker Piyush Panjuani was screened at the Dubai International Film Festival 2017. Closing to thunderous applause and lengthy Q&A sessions and meet and greets, the festival was attended by Piyush Panjuani himself, actress Shabana Azmi, the young actor Youhan Panjuani and Pakistani playwright Umera Ahmed, who had penned the dialogue of the film.

‘5 Rupya tells’ the heartwarming tale of “Hamid” (Youhan Panjuani) and his grandmother (Shabana Azmi), based on Munshi Premchand’s short story ‘Idgah’. Premchand’s story follows Hamid’s story in a fairly straightforward manner but a few twists and tales were added to the story by Umera Ahmed, the acclaimed Pakistani author.

When I met publicity-shy Umera at the festival, she was surrounded by fans, young and old, whom she met smilingly; she talked about how Piyush and she had worked from a distance and had met for the first time in Dubai in person. I caught up with Piyush and Youhan and asked them about the filming of ‘5 Rupya’, Youhan’s casting, and the response they got at DIFF 2017.

For Youhan Panjuani, the film was a “fun experience.” He says, “This is my first film and it was a lot of fun.”

Piyush says, we realised how well the film was doing when we got a call from DIFF that they wanted to do one more additional screening

Even though it seemed as if the film wasn’t an easy shoot – Youhan’s favorite part of filming was when his coin falls into the river. Youhan says, “My favourite part of shooting is where my coin falls in the water, and I have to go into the water to find the coin. And my least favourite part is the last part, when my granny is hitting me; this was the worst part. After the scene was done, I told my mom I don’t want to shoot it for the second time.” But Youhan feels a lot better, now that he is seeing such a great response to his film. “I want to do more films,” Youhan says confidently. Apart from being a gifted actor, Youhan is a gifted football player and has won many games. His favourite player is Messi. “I love how he (Messi) dribbles and how he scores.” Did Youhan’s friends like the film? Does Youhan want to do more films? “My friends like the film. They said you acted cool. Whatever film comes I’ll do it,” he said.

Piyush Panjuani spoke at length about ‘5 Rupya’ as well.

How has the response been for ‘5 Rupya’, from critics as well as from audiences?

Piyush: It was great. I feel the film has made people feel a lot hopeful and happy. We had a screening in IMAX, which was a house full. As for the Q&As, it is not about what people ask. It’s about how they ask it. That says a lot. In that regard, we got a great response. We realised how well it was doing when we got a call from DIFF that they wanted to do one more additional screening. We had a total of three screenings, and it was due to popular demand. It’s a wonderful feeling.

What made you do a children’s film? What attracted you about this story?

Piyush: I can’t exactly tell you a ‘why’ as to why I wanted to make a film about this story. I wanted to make a film. Nobody wants to make a children’s film, or an adult’s film, or a light film, or a dark film. No one decides that when they start the process. And those who do that are doing ‘projects’. Somewhere down the line, your heart has to meet the heart of the story. And the story calls out to you. Then you start developing it – I didn’t want to make a short film for sure. Tell me what a children’s film is? I am still trying to find a definition to this. Any film that kids can watch is a children’s film. And we hadn’t decided that it was going to be a ‘children’s’ film. It’s a film for everybody.

It’s always difficult to work with children and animals – and they were plentiful in your film. The shots were also difficult. How did you manage a lot of that was happening?

Piyush: Kids have a blast at such places. The environment was great, and it was all quite playful, so they had a lot of fun shooting. I have been into advertising for 18 years. It was a great training ground for all sorts of work back then. This is how I have gotten the idea of how to deal with kids. And Youhan was such a great kid. There were two kids from Delhi, one kid from Haryaana, one kid from Kashmir, and one kid from Mumbai. We worked on their chemistry too; we had workshops. We called kids to Mumbai and had a drama teacher, Avit, who trained the kids. We kept them together; we got them to play games. And your body language had to be perfect for namaaz also. So except for one kid, no one knew how to offer the Muslim prayers; we taught them that too. It was all part of their training, and we tried to do it in a very fun manner. And it got them to bond.

Published in Daily Times, March 29^th 2018.