for snagging a nice interview with Anurag Kashyap at the screening of Paanch at the 2006 edition of the Indian Film Festival of LA. [noted here previously]. Lots of trivia (but one hoped for even more, alas) and the hope of catching Paanch, when (if?) it finally gets a release in June 2006. My favourite section of the interview lists the reasons that the Censor Board offered for not sanctioning Paanch:
* Too much hate in the movie. It is too stark. Not good to show to an Indian audience.
* Drug usage shown in the movie. The Indian public does not do drugs. Not good to show it.
* You can't shoot in such a dim light. It's bad for the viewers' eyes.
* This movie has no entertainment value.
Right. A round of applause for our Censor Board and Bollywood, ladies and gentlemen.
And here's a post about a theatre workshop that Anurag Kashyap conducted in March 2006 in Bombay. At one point, Fellini had 91/2, Kashyap now has 2.8.
Meanwhile, the local excuse called Film Festival of India 2006 kicks off at the High Museum today with Deepa Mehta's Water, the only film in the festival with a credit for Anurag Kashyap (assistance on the Hindi dialogues). Despite the ban in India, I don't think this film will have a problem finding distribution; a cast roster headed by John Abraham and Lisa Ray doesn't help much; and grumpiness at the absence of either Black Friday and Paanch hardly remedies the situation.
Other Anurag Kashyap posts in this space include:
* his Maqbool connection and the small matter of a deleted scene
* Kashyap's guilty movie pleasures (featuring classics like Loha)
* initial notes and more on the music of Black Friday, Kashyap's unreleased follow-up to his unreleased Paanch
* The primary strength of Yuva
* a hasty note on possible influences of Kashyap's second-now-abandoned venture Allwyn Kalicharan
* notes on a few flicks including Paisa Vasool, another producer-requested copy that Kashyap worked on
* the Black-lash where Kashyap and Mishra sounded truer than most of Bollywood about the "loudest film of 2005"
update/review: Oz's review of Paanch, the first fairly comprehensive take I've seen on the film so far, isn't heartening. One could blame the various elements at play that forced Kashyap to make several rewrites and concessions, and one could take heed of Kashyap's warning ("Don’t use logic"), but it all doesn't quite add up, especially when you consider paeans like Surely you're joking, Mr.Kashyap by Abbas Tyrewala. One can't also discount the unfortunate consequences of hype fuelled by years of anticipation and hope. Still, I'd give anything to watch it once -- I'm prepared to deal with any consequential disappointment, if at all.
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