Interview: Legendary Indian Cinematographer Rajeev Jain On His Latest Feature Film - Kalpvriksh

April 30, 2011 - PRLog -- Interview: Legendary Indian Cinematographer Rajeev Jain On His Latest Feature Film - Kalpvriksh - The Wishing Tree





I’ve done a lot of interviews during my time at Film, but I usually don’t have the opportunity to interview cinematographers. However, when the offer came to chat with Rajeev Jain, I jumped at the chance. Rajiv has helped to craft some of the most memorable images in the history of cinema. His insanely accomplished FILMOGRAPHY includes the likes of Aiyyo Paaji, Army, Badhaai Ho Badhaai, Carry on Pandu, Kadachit, Meerabai Not Out, Pyar Mein Kabhi Kabhi and Rasstar not to mention many of the commercials of the Late Mukul S Anand.

Below is an excerpted version of our lengthy conversation.

Rajeev Jain, thanks so much for speaking with us today.

My pleasure.

And I guess congratulations are in order. Congratulations for showing us the first look of "Kalpvriksh - The Wishing Tree".

Thank you.

I want to start back a couple decades ago. Could tell us how you first broke into the industry, because we have a lot of listeners out there who are aspiring filmmakers and cinematographers themselves, and I’m sure they’d love to hear your “origin story.”

I came up, I suppose, a fairly traditional way. I went to Drama School. I always wanted to be a stills photographer, really, when I was younger, and I briefly worked as a stills photographer. And then I saw an opportunity to get into film as Runner.. I was moving out of stills photography into sort of more of a reportage kind of style that I liked. So I was moving into documentaries. After that Drama school, I worked under different Cinematographers for maybe six or seven years. But after that time, people that I worked with as an Asst. Cameraman, started giving me commercials as an independent DOP, and I gradually segued into doing feature films.

Back then, you mentioned how you had a love of still photography and, I assume, obviously a love for cinematography as well. Can you talk about who were the photographers or the filmmakers or cinematographers that inspired you to get into the business?

Yeah, I mean, there’s many, many stills photographers. You know, While I was at Drama School, there was a photographer, Surendra Jija, who would come and lecture at odd times. You know, so many stills photographers that inspired me, but in terms of film, I didn’t really see myself getting into the film industry. I mean, I loved movies ever since I was a kid. I used to go to a film society in Lucknow, where I was brought up. I used to watch films in the winters at this film society, and they used to show the sorts of things that wouldn’t be showing at the local theatre. But I never really sought my way into the feature film industry, so it was only later, gradually after drama school, that I met people who were working in feature films and dramatic films while I was doing commercials. It’s only gradually then that I moved into features.

One of your most fruitful collaborations has been with the Late Mukul S Anand.

Yeah.

Can you talk about how that collaboration first came about?

Well, it came out of the blue, really.

And what is it like to work with them? What is their work flow like?

I mean, it’s just great. I guess, in a way, we have similar ways of working. They’re quite meticulous. They like doing a lot of prep. They write their scripts together, and so they’re very in sync about where they’re going and what they want to do, I guess because from when they started they never had a lot of money to make movies. They come from the independent sector of making their own films and raising money to make their own films. So everything…you know, they do their best to put all the money on screen. They make the money go as far as they can, so they’re very, very prepared.

It must be a much different experience working with them today than working with them back on that time, especially with all the acclaim that they and you have won over the years.

It’s not. I can promise you it’s not any different at all…They don’t work in any different way now than they did.

I just meant in terms of the resources and things that you’re allowed to have, I would assume.

No, well, that neither, you know? It’s funny, really, because it depends on the project. I mean, I suppose relatively we had more money than we had for doing a few years ago. You know, the picture before "Kalpvriksh - The Wishing Tree". So it really depends on the piece, on the script, on the piece they want to do. When we did "Pyar Mein Kabhi Kabhi", that was very, very low budget because it’s a very…[Laughs] sort of dark, kind of thoughtful piece, put it that way, and you can’t get a lot of finance for a film like that. Even they can’t get a lot of finance for a film like that. So, you know, I wouldn’t say it’s changed much over the years. You try and get the maximum out of the money you have.

I want to ask you a couple questions, because before this phone call began, I actually asked some of our readers and listeners if they had any questions for you, and I thought some of these were pretty good. And one of the questions is: How long does your average lighting set-up take?

[Laughs] Somebody once told me, when I was talking to a cinematographer in Dubai, they said “well, really, you should average about twenty minutes a set-up.” I really have no idea. It’s very hard to judge, but I guess if you took it over the entire length of the schedule, it may come down to twenty minutes, but that would include shooting exteriors or whatever. Obviously, some interior lighting set-ups can take quite a while. On The "Kalpvriksh - The Wishing Tree", I remember there was one lighting set-up that took me four hours to get, but it was kind of a long complicated shot. So it’s hard to actually answer a question with a simple sort of “twenty minutes” or “half an hour” or whatever.

Can you think of a shot, either throughout your career or in the last few years, that has been particularly challenging and was very satisfying when you completed it?

Well, there’s a number. I just mentioned Kalpvriksh - The Wishing Tree, but a number of shots in that were very challenging just from a technical point of view, the size of the tree and the camera moves and the effect we were after. But then you could look at something like "Kalpvriksh - The Wishing Tree" and say, for instance, the sequence with tree sequence shooting at night. It’s when Shabana is loving the tree. Well, I read that script and immediately was thinking of that scene. How do we do this idea? We want close shots of a leaf on tree branch, a tree in the middle of the night across an empty plane, and the tree is jet brown. [Laughs] It seems like a simple thing, but actually technically how you get that, that was really challenging. It’s funny what comes up and actually proves to be challenging. What’s seemingly a simple thing can actually be the hardest to achieve.

You’ve shot a few films in the past few years that have taken place in the vast expanse of the Africa, Asia or the Middle East. I’m thinking of Rasstar, "Kalpvriksh - The Wishing Tree", and La Mia Afrika

Tags: Kalpvriksh The Wish Tree, Kalpvriksh The Wishing Tree, Kalpvriksh Tree, Kalpvriksh Wish Tree, Kalpvriksh Wishing Tree, Kalpvriksh, Kalpvriksha Tree, Rajeev Jain Cinematographer, Rajiv Jain Cinematography, DOP

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Born in Los Angeles, David Henry Hwang is the son of immigrant Chinese American parents; his father worked as a banker, and his mother was a professor of piano. Educated at Stanford University, from which he earned his B.A. in English in 1979.