The Final Cut

“It is a small scale version of a commercial film. Everyone works as a team,” says Singha,as he takes a break from the sound editing process. His film is titled Naad (Sound) and tells the story of a city affected by a strange virus that causes blindness. It creates mass hysteria and people wear eye-patches. “The story takes a turn when a little girl who is lost in a big rally screams loudly that apparently cures everyone,” he says. The girl eventually attains the stature of a goddess and in the process of being worshipped by multitudes,loses her childhood.

Time is never a luxury in the film word. Twelve diploma films are made by every batch each year. The budget per film has now been upgraded to R1.25 lakh. “It used to be R 50,000 until a few years ago. Now we have Rs One lakh for pre-production and the remaining R 25000 for post production,” says Singha. Along with Vats and Oza,he began shooting in January this year and the final product will be ready in December. “We will not be allowed this kind of liberty in the outside world for sure,” Oza remarks. “A two-hour film is completed in less than six months these days and we took almost a year to make a 20-minute film. If you tried that in the industry,you will be kicked out,” he says with a laugh.

Delays are inevitable for them due to conflicting schedules of other students in the editing,camera or sound departments. Most are involved in the Bollywood projects too. The rought cut of Oza’s film Afterglow about the widow who attempts to cherish the memories of her dead husband as well as come to terms with social hypocrisies moved their batchmates tears,remarks Tanmoy Basu,the film’s sound editor.

Editing a film takes up a lot of time. Vats,whose film is an adaptation of a short story by Sharad Joshi,explains that post production is a complicated time. “In fact,the final mix for films has to be done at Dolby certified 5.1 Dolby Sound studios,all of which are located in Mumbai. The final procedure is called ‘marrying’ where the sound and the edit negatives are merged to create the final cut of the film,” he says.