“I create stories from my surroundings”: Filmmaker Mahesh Narayanan

Mahesh Narayanan’s Ariyippu is one of the top contenders at the ongoing IFFK

ITDC INDIA EPRESS/ ITDC NEWS Mahesh Narayanan’s Ariyippu (Declaration) is one of the top contenders in the International Competition section at the ongoing International Film Festival of Kerala. The film had its international premiere at the 75th Locarno International Film Festival, and was nominated for the Golden Leopard Award. The film will be premiered on Netflix on December 16. In an exclusive interview with THE WEEK, Narayanan talks about his philosophy of filmmaking and his various characters. Excerpts:

Q/ Your films usually have strong female characters, and a major conflict in the plot is driven by them. It's the same with Ariyippu, too. Is it a conscious choice?

A/ I do not see a difference between a male or female character. I do not look from any particular gender perspective. I look only at what is required from my characters for a story. In Ariyippu, you can see that the main characters are in a marriage of convenience. I believe that I have shown both sides (the male and female perspectives). It is not a film that travels along with just one particular person. I think it is the same with my other stories, too. To an extent, such a treatment could be seen in C U Soon since there is an effort to explore Darshana’s mystery character in the story. Otherwise, I have not done anything consciously to explore the stories to show the perspectives of women.

Q/ Migration is a recurring theme in your stories.

A/ I have a special liking for such stories, because there is a big expat Malayali community. Migration involves the aspects of survival - it is a big factor. In survival stories, if you look at all these characters, you will understand that their social anxiety is big. There is anxiety about a better living. And the conflicts created by this anxiety may lead you to depression or greed or other aspects. So, there are things to explore in such stories.

Q/ How do you decide the stories for your films? Any philosophy you follow?

A/ There is a kind of thrill when you say human stories. There is a kind of happiness that I get when I understand the stories of real people. I want my characters to be rooted in such stories. There is this thing called politics. But you can see that it is personal that becomes political, too.

Also, I am someone who creates my stories from my surroundings. There will be multiple perspectives for stories we pick from our surroundings. I do not know whether we can represent it completely. My job is to make it an engaging tale. Also, these people around you, have shades of grey. So, everybody has a kind of self-centred nature. I want to explore the nature of humans more.

Q/ How did the pandemic become part of the narrative in Ariyippu?

A/ I am someone who believes that a script will get expired every six months. You have to rework a script multiple times. That is when I can see the relevance of it. Even when you are saying a period film, there will be some differences in its form.

We place Ariyippu in a factory that creates export items. During the pandemic, I went to see factories in a special economic zone. The workers in these factories get certain trigger warnings - like something is going to happen; bulk orders are coming. So, when I went to an SEZ, I got to know certain things. I also understood the route of their exodus. It is not a route that ordinarily people from Kerala choose - via Mumbai or Chennai. It is via Delhi, Noida. It is an alien environment for us. These people will wait six to eight months there, they will work there along with managing their VISA processing. When I got to know about it, I thought it is an exciting story. I could find a lot of ironies, too. We are portraying a factory that produces a product that is supposed to be highly pure—gloves used in the medical field. Here you can see women who are going through menstruation treated as impure beings; they will not be allowed inside the premises on those days and they are not allowed to use the toilet they normally use. I could see such connections in the story. And, that is how you get into this story.

Q/ You once wished to become a cinematographer. But you became an editor. You directed films, later. And then became a cinematographer with Fahadh Faasil-starrer Malayankunju. What next?

A/ My wish is to remain an independent filmmaker - with less dependence on others. I do not wish to be in that extreme mainstream. I wish to let my learning process continue. There is a kick in learning new things. Now, I am getting a lot of opportunities to learn new things. I do not always get total independence about content. It would depend on the film’s budget. I am fearful of doing an extreme experiment. I am concerned about the recovery of money from my films. But now, I guess I will be able to think more freely. [OTT] platforms have helped us. But I do not know whether everyone would get that privilege. Even on platforms, there are certain concerns. The audience that we get in a film festival and normal cinegoers are completely different. Ultimately, my wish is to stay a learner, whatever the craft be.

Q/ Your film Malik’s plot, too, had certain historical connections. Do you feel that film was dismissed based on the accuracy of those historical events alone? That the film was not discussed for its form or cinematic aesthetics?

A/ It is natural. It is a film that can be read from different perspectives. I am someone who hails from Poonkulam in Thiruvananthapuram. I have a lot of friends from [the coastal belt] of Vizhinjam to Poonthura. So, I have seen a lot of stories from the area since 1994. Even now the discussions related to the harbour are on. We discussed it in Malik, but nobody really understood it. Not many readings happened about it. A corporate mafia is coming and taking over the land in the coastal belt. What is happening to the people in this belt? So, to hit people, we orchestrated certain things in films. And about historical accuracy, there is a question of who is telling the accurate history. For those who see the Beemapally incident in Malik, there may be issues [of historical accuracy]. But what we have explored in Malik is not just Beemapally. I know my flaws in that film. However, they are not related to [historical accuracy or anything]. My flaws were in some of the aesthetic experiences of the film. I presupposed certain things about it. I thought that certain things will be read in a certain way. But that did not work out for everyone. The film worked for a certain set of audiences, too. It was shown at the Rotterdam festival. The feedback I got from there—of course, the festival cut is different from the platform or theatrical cut—is that a lot of people could relate to the human relations in it. What I am seeing is that for a society that is otherwise muted, or is sitting idle without any discourse on anything, a film comes and it gives to a good discussion, then it is a good thing. We are moving from one thing to another like a chain reaction. There are chains [of events] but most times, reactions are not happening. For a reaction to happen, there should be resistance. For instance, in the case of Vizhinjam port. It was in 2015 that Adani got the right to build a port. But when Adani made the bid for the airport itself, I know that the port also would go for Adani. The port and airport are all linked. So, there is some sort of greed behind all these moves. We should be thinking about the long-term process behind all these. But there is not a discussion on it. Instead, the protests are there for just a few days and then it disappears from people’s mind, or it gets settled. My opinion is that no settlement should become a genocide. But what happens is that often settlements are finally genocides that change their shape.

Q/ You recently hinted that your project with Kamal Haasan is still on.

A/ The project was never off. There is going to be a film with Kamal Haasan. But it would take some time. Because, right now, he is committed to some mainstream films. There are certain places where he has to stand as an actor alone. But in our project, he is not just an actor. He is the writer and producer, too. So, he would require some time.

Q/ But there were rumours that you had some creative differences with Kamal Haasan.

A/ That is all wrong. There is no creative difference. There is a time for a film to be conceived. If it does not happen then, I believe that we should rewrite the script in accordance with the time. He is also like that. Now, he has several commercial commitments. He has to finish it. But we can do our film any time. But there is no need to find any other meaning for the delay that happened. We have had a strong bond for more than 10 years. And, it will always remain so.

Q/ C U Soon was a ‘screen life’ mystery. It was an experiment on the film’s form. What are the kind of experiments you want to try on the form in your future films?

A/ My only wish is to tell relatable stories. I believe that a film’s form should not overpower the content of the film. I do not believe that there should be apparent visual gimmicks in my films. Even in C U Soon, I was very particular that this should not become a gimmick. For some time, people would see it as a film happening on the screens. But then, people should go into the story. Otherwise, I don’t try enhancing certain scenes using a particular kind of lens or a certain kind of music. Even in a film like Malik, there are no slow-motion shots. Such things were avoided because I believed that it was not required for conceiving such a film. But as a filmmaker, I am also excited about new forms and technologies coming to cinema.