Love Shots – Get High on Love

Love Shots, an anthology of six short web – films about love is the latest venture by Y-Films. Directed by Ankur Tewari and produced by Ashish Patil, the mini stories give you a refreshing take on romance through their slice-of-life characters. With Farida Jalal and Kulbhushan Kharbanda being the naughtiest of the cast and music composer Salim Merchant making his acting debut coupled with the intense acting skills of Nimrat Kaur, Saqib Salem, Shweta Tripathi, Rhea Chakraborty, Mohit Marwah and the others, this team looks like they had a blast. We caught up with them at the premiere of Love Shots and here’s what they had to say about their working experience.

Director Ankur Tiwari

Experience of making the short films

Ashish (Patil – Producer & Writer) and Aparna (Nadig, Writer) who wrote the script were very sure that they wanted to do something different from a web series. Hence they came up with the idea of doing short films. They said that it would be be interesting but I was not sure till I read the script.

If it wasn’t for all the actors showing up on time, coming for rehearsals and giving their heart and soul to the project, this would not have been possible. The actors asked many relevant questions and made the films much more interesting.  The child actors, Shubham (Tukaram, Actor) and Shravni (Desai, Actor) gave an intense audition, which was brilliant. After seeing their first take I thought that they should be doing art house cinema. We shot the ‘Textbook’ in two and a half hours as they did their shots in one take each and we didn’t need any retakes at all. 

READ: THE WEB IS A FAR MORE DEMOCRATIC THAN MOVIE – SHOUVIK

Bringing together Farida Jalal and Kulbhushan Kharbanda

It’s genius casting to see the both of them together. We’ve seen them in the past and seeing them in this avatar is going to be refreshing. Theirs is one of our favorite films. These two were the youngest and the naughtiest actors on set with so much energy and it was a fun experience. And you can clearly notice it when you see ‘Scandal Point’.

Brief to the musicians

It was quite a cliche for me to ask the composers to create something out of the box, which they did do. The idea was not to make a song for the film but to feel the theme and write whatever they want, even if it does not literally translate into the film. In fact I didn’t give them too much of a  brief. I wanted it be honest and be the way they wanted to express themselves. 

Producer Ashish Patil

Conception of the idea

Everyone loves a love story and we thought that it would be very interesting to do this in a fresh format of short films, set against interesting backdrops. I have seen some of these stories happen in real life. The love story that Shweta (Tripathi) and Saqib (Salem) are a part of is something that I’ve actually seen at the Churchgate bus stop during my college days. Farida ji and Kulbhushan ji’s stories are inspired by my parents who are still as romantic and as naughty, which is why the love story is called ‘Scandal Point’.

Yash ji would always tell me that no one knows whether the movie would be a hit or a flop but you must have fun while making it. And we did have a great time while making Love Shots.

READ – LOVE STORIES WITH A TWIST

Marketing strategy for Love Shots

Our platform for publishing and distributing these films is primarily digital. We’re going to put up one film, every week, on the Y-Films YouTube channel, which is one of the fastest growing channels in the country today. We are just around 100 days old and the channel subscription stands at around two and a half lakhs. And a large chunk of the marketing is going to happen through social media.

We have an incredible partner in the form of Airtel who have already started deploying the film’s incredible music on their music platforms. We also have these incredible talents on board who come with their own set of followers and friends who will help us in spreading the word.

READ – DIGITAL CONTENT IS GOING TO GET BIGGER

Inspiration from the Late Yash Chopra

We have taken inspiration from Yash (Chopra) Ji and are trying to follow his footsteps. People would want to watch his films even today and even after a hundred years. And that’s what we’re trying to make here – create small love stories that people enjoy watching. The films are hugely inspired by all the work that Yash ji and Adi (Aditya Chopra) have done.

Farida Jalal

Experience in the film industry

This is such a proud moment for me. A journey never ends and Love Shots is such a major step in my journey. This entire concept is very new for me; it’s not from my generation. I’m four decades old (in the industry), so being a part of it even today is a big thing for me and that makes me very happy.

Take on Love Shots

All the short films are excellent. I was floored after watching them. I couldn’t imagine something like this with the superb music, acting and emotions. It was something new with a very different approach. And I enjoyed being part of it.

Working with Kulbhushan Kharbanda

It was very nice and it’s always a pleasure to work with him. 

Saqib Salem on being part of Love Shots

I can do anything that Ashish (Patil) asks me to do. He gave me the script and I found it to be really good. It was a very challenging part, something that I haven’t done before. I’ve become an actor because of Y-Films and I think that we should really promote unique concepts like Love Shots. It’s a great platform for actors and technicians to put their work out there. We can’t always make a commercial film out of such concepts, so it’s good to keep trying new things.

Shweta Tripathi on her experience with Love Shots

I’m very fond of Ashish and Ankur. I had called Ashish for something and that’s when he told me about this really interesting project. He said that Ankur would be directing it while Saqib would also be in it. There was an excitement at every level because a lot of people have tried pairing Saqib and me before and finally it happened.

READ – RECOGNITION DEFINITELY MAKES YOU CONFIDENT – SHWETA TRIPATHI

Mohit Marwah on being part of a short film

My experience was amazing. This is the third short film that I’ve done and I’ve always tried to keep this side of me alive. Tomorrow if I become a big star, I don’t want to lose this side of doing short films.

Rhea Chakraborty on why she said yes to Love Shots

When I heard about Love Shots I was very excited because I haven’t done anything like this earlier. For an actor it’s very important that they keep trying new things and keep acting and performing. You have to do other interesting stuff apart from your feature films and it was fun doing this because Ankur and Ashish put together an exciting and interesting team.

Salim Merchant on his acting debut

Music and acting are like the same medium, in the sense that it’s all part of cinema. When I score the music for a movie, I always watch the actor, feel the spaces and the silences. Ankur is a dear friend of mine whom I’ve known since a long time. When he gave me the script, I read it and loved it and instantly said yes. It was a great experience and I learnt a lot from Tillotama (Shome), which is the best part about this field – you get to learn from each other. I’m very fortunate to have worked with such a good actor.

I was always intrigued by acting but never thought that I would act someday. I just got an opportunity and it looked interesting, so I said, “Why not!”

Tillotama Shome on working with Y Films

All my life I’ve been traveling from one place to another so I always felt like an outsider but working with Y-Films and Ashish and Ankur really felt like I’m home. I was very excited with the idea of working with this kind of talent and also nervous because we’ve never worked together. But the most beautiful thing was that Salim (Merchant) was a great listener. Whenever we were rehearsing, he would listen to everything I was saying. I don’t know what he has learnt from me, but I have learnt that if you’re a good listener then half the battle is won.

-Kiran Dave