06.27.03 - "Flavors" made its U.S. Premiere at the 2003 Asian American International Film Festival of New York to a sold-out auditoriuim last Sunday. A second screening of the film will take place on Sunday 6/29/2003 at 1:30 PM in Flushing Town Hall. AsianAmericanFilm.com caught up with the two directors to ask them about themselves and their film.
AAF Congratulations on the first screening of "Flavors" being sold-out at the NYAAIFF 2003! What do you think this is attributed to?
KKRJ We are all really elated by the positive response to the screening. One of the main reasons for "Flavors" having a record sellout was positive word of mouth by people who had seen it. There was a lot of what we call background hype created for the movie. Which means the publicity generated for the film was entirely homegrown – spreading the word to friends of friends of friends, people from the industry, etc.
More important, the one thing that the success of good "diasporic" movies ("Bend It Like Beckham" springs to mind) shows is that people are eager and willing for more, simply because it strikes such a strong chord within them.
AAF Why did you decide to have the film's U.S. premiere at this festival?
KKRJ You can’t ask for a better location than New York City to have your movie premiere! While 'Flavors" prides itself on being a crossover film - we hope it has a pan-audience appeal - the focus is still on South Asian audiences because they are a platform where the film would resonate most. And what better way to premiere than at the oldest [Asian American film] festival on the East Coast? We also appreciate and respect the support this festival lends to Asian American filmmakers. The fact that the timing of this festival coincides with the completion of the movie had something to do with it too.
AAF Tell me about yourselves.
KKRJ We are primarily software consultants. We met at engineering school in India, bonded over debates, quiz competitions, music and movies. Neither of us have anything to do with films beyond sharing a deep passion. What we do know about films is mostly self-taught with the aid of a few filmmaking classes. Contemporary cinema is our teacher.
AAF How did you guys start working together, and what previous collaborative works have you done?
KKRJ One of the things Raj and I found in common at engineering college was our interest in movies. They became our playground. Whenever we watched a new film, long discussions about it had to follow. More often than not, those discussions would involve how we would make the same movie.
A few years ago Raj had this outrageous idea that we should make our own movie. Very soon that became our dream and we set out to make it a reality. That involved writing and honing scripts, filmmaking classes, thinking, breathing and dreaming movies more than we already did! And before we knew it, dreams2reality films was born.
We started with a mockumentary "Love, Relationships and Other Trivial Things," which was almost like a class project. Then we made our first short, an 8 minute psychological thriller called "Just Me". Then we graduated to "shaadi.com", an hour-long romantic comedy, which actually got us our first public exposure. It played at film festivals in India, US, Canada and UK and got really good reviews.
Armed with a lot of confidence, thanks to "shaadi.com", we set out to make "Flavors". "shaadi.com" also marks the beginning of our relationship with Anupam Mittal, who owns the popular website shaadi.com. Anupam has produced "Flavors" with us.
(For more details, please visit our website www.d2rfilms.com.)
AAF Tell me what "Flavors" is all about.
KKRJ The one thing we realized after "shaadi.com" was that we had so many stories to tell about life in the American milieu. "Flavors" evolved out of our conviction that no one story would do complete justice to what all we had to say.
That explains why "Flavors" has multiple storylines that span a wide spectrum of characters. While the issues dealt with here are by no means trivial, the movie itself is lighthearted, with a large heart and a simple world view – the world is a small place. It is a comedy-drama with more emphasis on comedy. And while the story is about Indians, we hope the subject matter and its appeal is universal.
And we choose to observe rather than comment on the characters or incidents in the movie. We also believe that for any movie, the presentation is as important as the story itself, and this belief manifests itself in many ways in the movie – from the rather unusual structure to the numerous plot twists.
(For more info on the movie please check out - www.flavorsthemovie.com.)
AAF What inspired you to get involved in filmmaking, and who are your influences?
KKRJ We’ve always loved films. And the particular lack of innovation in Indian cinema over the last couple of decades (compare with the rest of the world - Hollywood, European, Chinese cinema...) set us thinking that we want to change that. Not that there aren’t good Indian movies – there are. But the number of movies that rely on proven formulas and aim to cater to the lowest common denominator far outnumber movies with original ideas.
Most of our influence comes from newer indie directors, especially those that made indie movies profitable. We admire directors who have their own style of storytelling as opposed to simply telling a story - Guy Ritchie, Kevin Smith, Coen brothers, Steven Soderbergh, Quentin Tarantino - to name a few.
AAF So what's next for "Flavors" and for the both of you?
KKRJ We hope to release "Flavors" in the theatres in the US, India, UK and the rest of the world. We have just started marketing the movie and we have to wait and see where it takes us.
We plan to make more movies – Indian, Indo-American and American – and experiment with many genres. We want to make movies that are commercially viable yet do not compromise on the artistic aspects. We like to innovate and try newer things with each movie, and grow with each one. When that doesn’t happen, we’ll stop making films and just watch them.
