QUOTE MARTIAL
MAKING WAVES
REVIEWS
SHORT TAKES
SOUTHERN SPICE
ROUGH CUTS
MEMORIES
ARCHIVES
MOVIES CHAT

Murder and menace

A still from Gup Chup. Click for bigger pic!

M D Riti Whodunnit? As of now, only three people in the whole world know -- the director, the protagonist and your own favourite Internet magazine.... And not one of us is telling. Other than that that after years of family dramas, heavy on the heavies masala and urban comedies, Kannada audiences will soon get to see a full-blooded murder mystery.

"Gup chup!" whispers environmentalist, film-maker and actor Suresh Heblikar conspiratorially as we walk into the darkened editing room of Chamundi Studio off Cunningham Road in Bangalore, to see the rushes of the half-finished movie.

Apart from its being the first mystery movie in many years, there are many other reasons why Gup Chup promises to spur some interest. It is comedian Aravind's first foray into film production with all its attendant risks. Likewise, director Lingaraju, who has worked as assistant director on an entire range of films from commercial to art over the past decade, finally gets to try his own directorial wings here.

A still from Gup Chup. Click for bigger pic!

A sizeable segment of Kannada movie regulars remember with nostalgia Heblikar's detective films like Aale Mane, Aagantuka and Aparachita. Now the director is back, balder and a little fatter, yes, but still with a gripping story to tell.

In true Heblikar whodunnit tradition -- the exception being his last one, a home production, Chamatkara, which was poorly made -- this movie too has a cast of sinister characters. There's the elderly Vasudev Rao, once famous for his role in the award-winning Chomana Dudi, producer Aravind himself who plays a gardener and Lohitashwa playing an estate owner. The film opens with the gardener going out of his hut into the estate gardens at midnight and hearing the raised voices of a man and a woman. Fellow estate hand Rao emerges from the eerie darkness, waves Aravind away, turns towards the camera and says, "Sshhh...." The title flashes on screen.

Since Lingaraju is his former assistant director, Heblikar has taken more than an actor's interest in this film.

"He thought up the title," says Lingaraju. "In North Karnataka, where I come from, Gup means to keep quiet," laughs Heblikar. "And chup comes from the Hindi word for the same thing."

Director Lingaraju. Click for bigger pic!

Lingaraju wrote the screenplay for this film, based on a story by T C Ramachandra, almost a dozen years ago, but was never able to get anyone interested in this project. So, many years later, Aravind tried to co-produce his first film Laali Laali Sukumara, but had to abandon that project when the other producer walked out. So he decided that he must produce another film immediately, in order to prove to the film industry that he was a winner.

Along came Lingaraju, who was more than willing to dust off and revive his old script. "Only the core remains the same, the rest has been completely changed around."

The movie is being shot in Cinemascope on a budget of about Rs 300,000-350,000. Music is by V Manohar, who says he will start work on it as soon as the shooting is complete. Will he go the Kaun way and use music to enhance the suspense, as Bangalore boy Sandeep Chwota did so effectively?

"No," says Lingaraju. "But I do plan to record the sound effects on a different track from the music, so that I can have them raised or lowered as I like, and they will make a better impact in the theatres."

There will be two songs, one a duet in a flashback featuring model-turned-actress Chaitali of O Mallige fame and lesser known actor Abhijeet, and the other a sorrowful fantasy of Chaitali, who plays estate owner Bettappa's daughter Shanthi, a girl full of sad secrets.

A still from Gup Chup. Click for bigger pic!

S P Balasubramanyam is to sing both songs. Surendranath Begoor, who has won international acclaim for his photography, handles the camera.

Nobody, including Lingaraju, expected Heblikar to get as involved with the film as he eventually did.

"In fact, I got so much into the spirit of one of the fight sequences that I hurt my arm quite badly: it still hurts all the time," laughs Heblikar ruefully, rubbing the injured spot.

As always, Heblikar's other persona -- that of an environmentalist -- makes its impact on the film in the choice of lesser-known, scenic, green locales. The crew shot all over the Chikmagalur-Horanad area, from Kalasa, Baale Hole, Thotadooru and Jaipura to Baalehonnur and Sringeri. Heblikar also predictably used a film press conference as a forum to discuss local environmental issues like how coffee planters encroach on forest land.

"I advised the local media to lay off the poor small encroachers and go after the big offenders like a state minister who has taken over almost 100 acres there," he says.

In the first part of the film, Heblikar plays an ornithologist and a guest at Bettappa's guesthouse. Later, you discover that he is actually a CBI officer investigating the mysterious disappearance of a young man.

A still from Gup Chup. Click for bigger pic!

Both characters don stereotyped outfits -- one has him a bearded and bespectacled man wearing trousers with suspenders, and the other in a trench coat and hat. Haven't audiences long outgrown such old-fashioned imagery?

"I just thought we would get a little theatrical and clearly demarcate the distinctive images in the minds of viewers," explains Lingaraju rather lamely.

"I enjoyed the experience of acting in this movie, and I hope it turns out well," says actress Tara, who plays Heblikar's public prosecutor wife in the film, which eventually turns into a courtroom drama. The camera does seem to focus a little too long on Aravind in the movie, but Lingaraju hastens to insist that that particular character is so crucial that this measure was necessary.

Does Lingaraju now really believe that this kind of mystery movie will have universal appeal?

"Right now, Kannada movie audiences are particularly dangerous, and you cannot predict what they might accept or reject," confesses Lingaraju. "All I can say is that I have made a film in which the story, and not any particular actor, is the hero. It is clean entertainment with no sex or double entendre. I hope spectators like the idea and fill up the theatres. This is a pure commercial entertainer, but with a different story track."

This isn't the first time we've heard that line, but, we suspect, going by Heblikar's background, there could be something to it this time.