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EARLIER this year, when Ritesh Batra was about to wrap up the screen adaptation of Julian Barnes’ novel, The Sense of an Ending, he was offered to direct yet another movie based on a novel, Our Souls at Night, by Kent Haruf. This also brings together two yesteryear on-screen sweethearts — Robert Redford and Jane Fonda — after a gap of four decades.
By the time they approached Batra, the lead cast of Redford and Fonda, who have been onscreen couples in The Chase (1966), Barefoot in the Park (1967) and The Electric Horseman (1979) — had already come on board. So, one of the first tasks before The Lunchbox-director was to grab a copy of the novel, which has been adapted for the screen by Scott Neustadter and Michael H Weber. “I loved the novel. After reading that, I picked up some more books written by Haruf,” says Batra.
Our Souls at Night is set in America’s Colorado and begins when Addie Moore (Fonda) pays an unexpected visit to a neighbour, Louis Waters (Redford). Both have lost their spouses years ago. With their children living far away, they are leading lonely lives in big houses. This film premieres on Netflix in 2017.
Though there is no particular “rulebook to follow” when it comes to movie adaptations of novels, Batra believes in making the story his own before going to the floor. “The process is to live with the material as long as one can.”
As he explored the world of Haruf, he found the characters fascinating and their stories gripping. Compared to this, Batra believes, The Sense of An Ending was a difficult book to adapt. “This book does not lend itself to adaptation easily. This project taught me a lot about patience,” says Batra, who has also introduced some new characters in the cinematic version.
Till Our Souls at Night was offered to Batra, he had not met Redford personally. Busy with the preparation for Our Souls at Night right now, the Mumbai-born director says, “The pre-production is a very sacred process. Just watching Redford and Fonda, for whom I have the highest regard, rehearse and prepare for the film has taught me a lot. Their body of work speaks volumes about their passion for cinema.”
The filming of Our Souls at Night will start soon. Once production is over, Batra wishes to work on a story based in Mumbai. “I wish to take up an international and Indian project alternately,” he says.
Though he has been working with an international crew, Batra says he has been missing The Lunchbox crew. When he directs his next in Mumbai, most of them, including the costume and production designers, would be back on his sets.
Like the characters played by Irrfan and Nimrat Kaur, those to be taken up by Redford and Fonda too seem to be “lonely hearts”. What is it about such characters that attracts Batra? “That connection is for the viewers to make. I am definitely attracted to their stories,” he adds.
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