While the film culture, in terms of directing and producing, still has a long way to go in the State, a few passionate filmmakers have made their marks, set their goals and are definitely moving on towards promoting the film industry.
What started as a one-roomed tiny studio, which was certainly not enough, has now been upgraded to a more viable one at AG colony Kohima, and that’s where their ‘crazy’ ideas take off. All of them are in their twenties and felt no need to pursue the ‘Essential BA’, which is considered mandatory in a society like ours, except for Lanso Yanthan, who later on studied 3D Animation. The rest are happy with crash courses on filmmaking after their 12th.
headhunters-Team
Headhunters Entertainment is a name closely associated with the reel life, and a group famously known for films like F-A-K-E, The Reborn, Liquidators, The Naga Jedi, Azure Delusion - Apocalypse (music video), OFF- Save me (music video), The Debt (short film), Doolally commercial, and several other video clips it has produced over the years.
Liyo Kikon, the man behind the formation of the group along with Ponen Longchar some eight years back, recalls picking up filmmaking as a hobby even as he confesses how he was so entirely fascinated by Star Wars during his school days. But it was not until the year 2008 that they seriously thought about making films as a career. Although Ponen Longchar left for the UK in the process, in pursuance of a higher goal, four other young film enthusiasts - namely Kele Yhoshü, Lanso Yanthan, Ashemo Ezung and Aben Ngullie - were added to the fold, making Headhunters Entertainment a team of five who don’t mind talking films, watching films, and making films.
A group that has also proven that passion can definitely lead people somewhere, Headhunters Films have been screened in several places across the world including Delhi, Mumbai, Kohima, Dimapur, New York and elsewhere in Europe. It also has the distinction of being awarded the Best Director/Producer, which Liyo Kikon bagged during 2011 at the Nagaland Video Music Award while Headhunters Entertainment further received the award for the Video of the Year for “Azure Delusion”, which was also shown in popular channels like VH1 and MTV.
Their love for filmmaking is evident even as they say in one voice: “We make money to make movies.” If one wonders how they make money since they do not sell the many films they have already made, the Headhunters Group take in clients’ jobs, which range from local to national, from private clients to government projects and goes beyond borders at the international level. The latest being a Canadian film titled, “Crossroads” which they took up for refining the visual effects and has just been completed.
In the recent past, they have also made an animated movie on ‘Puliebadze’ from Easterine Kire’s Naga Folktales retold.
A shooting day in a filmmaker’s life is made of waking up really early to make sure that the rising sun is not missed….”shoot, shoot and after shooting, edit, edit…” “Shooting part is great, we have a good time shooting. Editing is more like testing our patience,” they say, as they dwell on what goes around in the day of one who makes films even as they all agree that filmmaking has its own share of challenges.
“You have the script, the plan…but on the day of making it, something else comes up and everything needs to be changed”, one of them expresses. Liyo Kikon goes on to add, “As a filmmaker, you need to have the guts to say that a particular shot is not working, and if it does not, you have to let it go…you can’t be emotional about it and that’s the hardest part.”
The crazy passionate bunch of filmmakers, who do not mind skipping their sleep especially when they have to edit, are also multi-talented because sometimes they themselves are the actors. And when they are not making films, they are all musicians, who sing, play and make music.
But it is certain that their hearts rest on filmmaking even as they commit to saying, “We will keep making films and in some 5-10 years from now, the film culture would have caught up….it needs a lot of patience but hopefully, we will also have our own production unit with a full film crew, make up artistes, and all that is required to complete the picture.”
Also observing that there is a lack of people who can do art performances, they also wish that there were screen writers, script writers, and more people who knew how film works. But their hopes are definitely not broken as they work towards achieving these dreams someday. They consider themselves still in the process of being successful, but adds, “We still got time”. For them, the mantra to life seems to lie in the quote - “Experience is what you get when you don’t get what you want.”
While the group has a great following, they are flattered that a kid fan in Chandmari has his room filled with posters of Headhunters. Regardless of the fact that Kohima is the only state capital in the country without a film theatre, the scope for filmmaking is not limited, and although they admit it sounds clichéd to say something like ‘if you like something, just keep pursuing……”, they do strongly believe that passion gets you somewhere. And that’s what they are – passionate and truly loving what they do, which is filmmaking.
No comments:
Post a Comment