Filmmaker Rakeysh OmPrakash Mehra speaks to Shifa Naseer about taking inspiration from Mirza Sahiban for his forthcoming project and his suggestion that the censor board should not be involved in politics
Mirzya, a story based on folklore, circles around the love story of Mirza and Sahiban with Sahiban’s betrayal as a twist in the romance, turning it into a tragedy. Haunted by the idea of this story since his college days Rakeysh OmPrakash Mehra talks about his new upcoming film, “The inspiration of this movie is the folklore of Mirza Sahiban. It’s a romantic tragedy. We have taken the essence of the folklore and reinterpreted it in today’s time. The movie is a parallel between the folklore and the present times.”
Reminiscing about his college days when the seed of this idea was planted in his head through a play performed by the drama society of his college. Talking about Sahiban, the protagonist of his film, he says, “She is an amazing protagonist. She broke Mirza’s arrows, when the time came. He could not defend himself and so he died. That was the story. I was always wondering what went into Sahiban’s mind to break the arrows. How do you sacrifice in loveIJ Why do you end up hurting the people you love the mostIJ You know these kinds of illogical things … this story stayed in my head. So I went to Gulzar one day and I asked him the same question ‘Sahiba ne teer kyu tod diyaIJ’ and he told me ‘bachu yeh toh tum jake ussi se pooch lo’. So I told him ‘bohot dhoondha par mil nahi rahi hai. Ab aap hi bata dijiye’. So we went into the story and he gave a new twist to it.”
Claiming to be a reinterpretation of the folklore, Mirzya consists of deviations which Mehra did not highlight but urged us to find out for ourselves. He doesn’t believe in working for a specific genre and emphasises to work on those themes and subjects on which he holds a strong and unique opinion. Elaborating on the idea, he said, “I usually go for those subjects which I can talk about. like as I shared with you my take on love, for me there is no checklist for love. I cannot fall in love by keeping a list. It doesn’t matter who you fall in love with, could be anyone.” Talking about his experiences while working on Mirzya, the director said that the story is a cooked up recipe in which the actors, cameramen, technicians and costumes as ingredients. “It’s an amazing journey. So every day something new is being created which was not there before.” When asked about his views on the movies which carry a social message, Mehra was very clear about his opinion while giving reference to Mirzya. Calling the film a tragedy, he said that it consists of Shakespearean essence but no social message. In his words, “They are very boring.” His work revolves around a wide range of themes and genres and expresses the fact that Mirzya is a totally out of system film for him. The need to discover something more is so high that he never visits the same thing which he has done before. Referring to his earlier movies like Aks or Rang de Basanti, he said, “The theme may be the same. Somewhere or the other, you are the same person. Subconsciously, the threads of the movies may have the same base. A director makes only one movie. All his movies are one. There might be threads of inner conflicts involved. My past movies have had such introspections. Here, you define Sahiban’s conflict.”
Comparing the movie to a Shakespearean Tragedy, he refused to talk about Sahiban’s hammartia or the tragic flaw and emphasised on the importance of joy of discovery for the audience, “You see the film and form your opinion rather than me colouring your imagination.”
Being a member of the Censor Board for the past five months, he talked about the rigourous work and effort that the entire Board had to go through while reviewing the issue of Udta Punjab. His take on the matter involves the abolishment of scissors, “I am not just talking about Udta Punjab. I am talking about the censorship. It cannot be there. I have invested a lot of time in it while working on Mirzya. One had to study the Cinematography Act. It was crazy and involved so much of learning in order to understand the fabric of this country. Based on that, we made the recommendation. You cannot curtail expression. At the same time, if anything is unconstitutional, that doesn’t fall in the preview of the Censor Board. Then it becomes something else.”