Debutant filmmaker Nishant Kalidindi discusses the aesthetics of ‘Kadseela Biryani’
A murder at the center gets thrust in Nishant Kalidindi’s play Kadseela Biryani, releasing in cinemas on Friday. It has that masculine energy that you would find in the work of Lijo Jose Pellisserie; Nishant is undoubtedly a fan of the Malayalam filmmaker.
The effect does not end here. Set against the backdrop of a forest in Kerala, Kadseela Biryani An allegory for the jungle and the animalistic traits of its characters, a hat tip to Tamil filmmaker Thiagarajan Kumararaja’s debut, aranya kandmi,
“The post production and editing phase is when we got some stylistic elements from filmmakers like Lijo Jose and Kumararaja. aranya kandmi, I liked that process,” Nishant admitted right after a press screening. ,Kadseela Biryani It’s an amalgamation of everything I’ve seen from filmmakers. ,
Nishant and his friends worked to achieve a common objective: to make a film that had a certain style and treatment. They were bouncing plot ideas and narrowed down on one that eventually became the movie. “The writing didn’t take long; It was written in a month’s time. But we were more concerned about fitting the style and taste,” says Nishant.
They say that this style has come from not doing certain things, which we have come to associate with regular commercial films. “For example, the use of high speed shots in our films. We have used very little artificial light and we were clear about how to color the film.”
Starring actors Vasanth Selvam, Hakim Shah and Vijay Ram, the film stars Azeem Mohammed and a technical crew in Hestin Jose Joseph (Cinematography), Vinoth Thanigasalam (Background Score and Sound Design) and Ignatius Ashwin (Editor).
Despite being made on a limited budget, Kadseela Biryani Boasts a rich visual grammar that you wouldn’t normally find in the work of a budding artist. It comes from his documentary days, says Nishant and is inspired by Hollywood films of the 70s and 80s. “I am fascinated by the cinema of that era; my all time favorite french connection, We, in fact, used lenses from the ’70s … we made sure the camera just observed and didn’t intrude.”
Nishant, a student of Rajiv Menon’s Mindscreen Film Institute, says that he studied cinematography primarily to understand the craft of cinema. He has worked on short films and made documentaries for a particular school before making Kadseela Biryani, Nishant had to raise funds from friends and families to do his first work, which is now presented by Y Not Studio. “We are not associated with the film industry. by creating Kadseela BiryaniI was trying to understand the process of filmmaking and this is what you see on screen.”
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