mid-day Opinion: Kyunki yeh (sirf) movie nahin hai...

Even if director Aditya Kripalani hadnrsquot posted a few videos online of young actors in Andheri copiously weeping before the camera while stepping out of the theatre mdash Irsquod believe him about the sort of visceral impactresonance that his film Main Actor Nahin Hoon MANH would have on the community itrsquos based onThe filmrsquos female lead Chitrangada Satarupa plays a sincere professional actor somehow surviving in Bollywoodrsquos strugglercentral Yari Road and thereaboutsOpposite her is Nawazuddin Siddiqui as a depressed retired banker in Frankfurt They get into a daylong conversation over videocalls that turn into an acting workshop of sorts in real timeFilmmaker Aditya KripalaniBeyond that art including acting equals therapy in its own right mdash MANH engagingly examines the sort of emotional turmoil that artistes go through in order to produce art itself The art is public The toll is inevitably personalAditya explains ldquoIn a sense acting is the opposite of spirituality Wherein you profess to project outwards but end up peeking deeper within insteadrdquo Aditya read screenwriting from FTII in 2003Ever since hersquos remained the rare champion of selfexpressive lowbudget filmmaking prolifically writingdirectingproducing since his debut Tikli And Laxmi Bomb 2017 Tottaa Pataaka Item Maal 2019 Devi Aur Hero 2019 Not Today 2021MANH is his first theatrical release For a genre the film belongs to the naturalistic mumblecore wherein the distance between reality and fiction feels zeroIn an early scene you watch actor Naveen Kasturia make a cameo mdash his slacker comedy Amit Masurkarrsquos Sulemani Keeda 2013 similarly set in Mumbairsquos competitive migrant movietownship is a fair sample for the said film typeAnother fine Indian example is Ram Madhvanirsquos Letrsquos Talk 2002 that launched the brilliantBoman Iranirsquos film acting career in his early 40sAditya met his star Nawaz through Instagram who in turn came onboard his film without charging any feeFrankly itrsquos hard to instantly imagine Nawaz as a polished supersuave former manager director of a top bank in GermanyItrsquos harder still to see this NSDgrad since 2012 Gangs of Wasseypur in particular as anything but an actor His characterrsquos learning the ropes of acting throughout MANH As is the audience Nawaz has to act like a nonactor Itrsquos a bloody bold moveI remember Nawaz telling me once that the world of social media mdash where the public was getting so used to watching people as they are on the screen round the clock mdash was making it all the more difficult to reproduce the same reality as an actor onscreen Itrsquos so much easier for audiences to spot fakeness thenI can kinda sense what mustrsquove drawn Nawaz to Adityarsquos script Itrsquos could also be some of the films hersquos starred as lead in lately mdash the sorts of Haddi Tiku Weds Sheru Jogira Sara Ra RahellipMANH equally explores the thick line between art and circus Fundamentally artistes actors included tend to gain if theyrsquore in line or naturally inclined towards seeking validation from crowds of strangers for what counts as baselevel entertainmentOr simply playing the influencerPR game You sell out to earn more No knock or moral judgement mdash therersquos also a living to be made noItrsquos brutal to so clearly witness the talented professional actor Mouni in MANH mdashand Chitrangadarsquos incredible no doubt mdash pursuing art as soup for her soul while being denied basic richescomforts that her daylong banker student Adnan mustrsquove taken for granted all his lifeTradeoff is perhaps hers alone His job couldrsquove been mindnumbingly mundaneboring compensated for with great pay Jealousy is still completeWhile certain audiences are getting moved in unknown ways by his film and you can see why Aditya tells me he saw MANH in another light himself last nightSo much of writing is subconscious And one of his favourite films mine too happens to be Ram Gopal Varmarsquos Rangeela 1995 also placed in BollywoodAditya argues ldquoOver there Mili Urmila Matondkar was a lsquodabbarsquo actor but she wanted to be a star Mouni is her sadder version going down a rabbit holeThe film is a tribute to RangeelardquoWhich was a musical of course Unlike MANH that as Aditya explains was simultaneously shot live over 33 days straight mdash with the lead actors between two cities Mumbai Frankfurt responding to each otherrsquos lines that changed with each frickinrsquo takeThe film dives into emotions that actors draw out for performances But thatrsquos just one crippling aspect of art You need the distance of plain clinical skills to pull it off still Nobody notices that Or is meant toAditya sounds kinda pissed to me that film critics in general havenrsquot quite acknowledged the technical craft that went behind the making of MANH If I was him Irsquod take that as a complimentMayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass culture He tweets mayankw14Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper