Sit back for a FAM COM

The fact that Prateek Chakravorty is the grandson of Pramod Chakravorty,a veteran producer and director of Pramod Films,a banner that produced Hindi films like ‘Love in Tokyo’,’Ziddi’,’Deedar’,’Dream Girl’,’Nastik’,’Jugnu’ and so on,is not pressuring him at all. “I was very close to my grandfather and loved watching most of his work . My grandfather has greatly influenced my life. However,the way I perceive cinema is very different so there is no question of comparison,” says Chakravorty,whose directorial venture,’From Sydney With Love’ releases on July 27.

Chakravorty prefers to call ‘From Sydney With Love’ a ‘fam-com’,a film that the entire family can watch together. “The movie is about a small-town young Bengali girl,who moves to Australia after winning a scholarship. As the film progresses,it unfolds her adventurous life and some tough decisions taken by her at the crossroads,” explains the director,who has worked as an assistant director for films like ‘London Dreams,’Singh is King’ and ‘Action Replay’.

The film,says Chakravorty,is his perception of the events of his life and his friends. That is also the reason he decided to play the lead actor in the film. Sharing the screen space with him are newcomers like Sharad Malhotra,Bidita Bag,Evelyn Sharma,Karan Sagoo and Reshmi Ghosh. “I did have a choice of a star-studded cast but I don’t think established actors could have portrayed what I had in mind,” adds the 29-year-old actor-director,who has also written the film.

Talking about his choice of the location,Chakravorty says that Sydney is one place he is most familiar with. “Infact the idea of this film struck me in Sydney in 2004,when I was pursuing MBA there. So it was fun shooting at places where I used to hang-out with my college friends,” adds Chakravorty,who has great admiration for filmmakers like Raj Kapoor,Guru Dutt,Quentin Tarantino and Woody Allen.