Sweet tale of love

With the release of Sanam Re last Friday, Valentine’s Day has a sweet addition for everyone – ‘a pure love story’. The Sanam Re team was in the national Capital last week regarding the movie’s release and that’s when the bubly director Divya Khosla Kumar and the talk of B-town, Pulkit Samrat and Yami Gautam  shared their experience with Millennium Post. Looking gorgeous in a blue and peach gown, the director looked confident with her movie.

How was the experience of working with a new team for Sanam Re?

It’s quite a tough job to make a film and it is a challenge which you have to accept. There’s a lot of hidden potential in the actors, they are not newcomers, so I did not have to train them like I had to do in Yaariyan. Since it’s a love story I needed actors who could deliver, and they did the job very well. When you see them onscreen, you’ll find that they were made for the roles of Akash and Shruti.

How was the experience of shooting in the exotic locations?

I had done a lot of research for the location. If I have to paint a picture it has to be larger than life and give a wow factor. There are certain constraints, like even when you don’t have a big budget, you have to show a ‘wow’ movie onscreen. It’s not always as glamorous as it looks. We stayed in hotels in Kalpa, 10 hours from Shilma, where there was no electricity or water and we even stayed in tents in Ladakh. Eventually the result was nice. I did enjoy the shooting from a creative perspective.

Why include the Akkad Bakkad song?

It is just a promotional song, not a part of the film, we’d shot it in the last week. The entire album has got love songs and we just wanted to add a peppy number to make it nicer. It was just a part of the promotional strategy. The audience expects above-the-level music from T-Series. We wanted to start a trend for singles for movies, like a movie-single.

She had to loose weight because she’s also playing a 16-year old in the movie. I thought that she needed to look different in the two phases. She’s obviously a very good actor but I was a little unsure of how to make her look fresh since her face is plastered all over in her ad campaigns. So I did a lot of workshops and look tests and finally after 5-6 months I was convinced that I’ll cast her. I wanted to make her look different and fresh.

Urvashi’s role Akansha is a very crucial for the movie. Even though the story is about Akash and Shruti, Akansha’s a catalyst in both of Akash and Shruti’s journey.  

Sanam Re and Fitoor are releasing on the same day. How do you think will be the competition?

Fitoor is a 70 crore budget movie while Sanam Re is only 15 crore. The box office collections cannot be compared in that sense, there’s no comparison in that regard. As a maker I’m confident of my product, because I have to rely on my own confidence and my talent. If Sanam Re becomes a hit and audience gives their love to the film then probably when my third film will come, people won’t shy away from coming with me.

It is the story. It is a classic tale of love. I think after Aashiqi 2 there hasn’t been any pure love story in the industry, but there have been several rom-coms. Very rarely we get to see a story which really answers questions about love and about finding your soulmate and making your love stronger.

Pulkit: It was exciting because it’s a love story. It was really fun to work with Yami as she has a very good sense of humour. But it’s also very challenging as the locations we shot at were both beautiful and most difficult to shoot at. We shot at Kalpa and Kladakh.

Yami: It was a very good experience. There were a lot of physically challenging tasks, like shooting in extremely low temperature. In Kalpa it was -13 degree C, it was very difficult to shoot in Pangong Lake with such low temperature and high winds and less oxygen. Since it’s a love story, there’s an emotional depth that’s required in your work. The kind of age groups we play, from 16-60, in some portions it was required for us to transform ourselves. It has been a crazy journey, but it’s all worth it. When you have a lot of work to do in a film and you run about doing everything, and you’re actually doing it, suddenly things start to work on their own. But it was a dificult for us as we had maintain the calm and composure and sustain throughout the cold weather, especially while shooting in the chiffon sarees and him in the bare body shots.

You were also riding horses...

Pulkit: Yes that was in Alberta. I love horse riding and that was the most exciting part for me, it’s a passion.

Pulkit: Kalpa, we were there for about five days. I think everybody’s favourite location while shooting was Kalpa. Nobody wanted to come back, but because of the limited resources we had to leave. It is a very remote place, but it is so beautiful. You can’t do justice by just talking about it.

Pulkit: Actually there’s a phase where we had to play the role of teenagers. We had to look cute and chubby for the teenager roles and then look fit again to play our age. We had to work on that transition, it was a bit difficult to stay fit.

Yami: Wherever we were working there wasn’t a single Gym, so we did our workout wherever we could, sometimes by the riverside or under a tree in between shots. Balancing all these things together was quite challenging.

Yami: All the songs are beautiful. Apart from the Sanam Re title track I would say Kya tujhe ab ye dil bataye.

Pulkit: A love story without good songs is not a love story. The songs have to be nice. Even when you go on a romantic drive you need good songs to set the mood. I think the team has managed to get some of the best songs for the movie.

Yami: The Akkad Bakkad song is just a part of the promotional scheme. Of course I like the song, Badshah is one of the most happening singers today. He’s so cool and he’s from Chandigarh! Look at the talent we’ve given to the industry. Chandigarh ka talent timeless hai! The theme was wrap up party, it was really well placed.

Pulkit: One of the best parts of shooting the song was shooting with Badshah. A nice peppy number with interesting and quirky lyrics, that’s what I think works for the song.

Yami: The kind of response we are receiving, it’s been good so far. A love story is not possible if you are not hooked to the lead characters.

Pulkit: We’re receiving a good feedback from the social networking sites and from the media as well.

Yami: When we signed this movie it was scheduled to release on February 12. We wished that Valentine’s Day was on a Friday, then the film would have released then, as the movie is about love and there couldn’t be any better day to release it. So my message would be to love your loved ones even more. And amidst the hustle bustle of today, give it a little rest, come watch Sanam Re with us. It is not just a movie to be watched with your boyfriend/ girlfriend but also with your family. It is also a family movie and has an emotional drama.

Pulkit: We used to celebrate this in school a lot. We also believe that if a girl proposes you on Valentine’s Day in a leap year, then you should say ‘yes’, or it will be a curse. We had these myths back then in school. So I always accepted their proposals! (laughs)