Isn’t it wonderful to reside at a friendly place absolutely free of cost when travelling to unchartered destinations? Utopian it might sound but it is a healthy reality for some 22,000 couch surfers in Delhi and another 26,000 in Mumbai, says scriptwriter-cum-director, Akshay Choubey.
While talking about his directorial debut, Couching Tiger Mannu , Akshay elucidates on the genesis of the movie, “When living in Bombay at a friend’s place, I met a lot of couch surfers who thronged to his place. He had a lot of nice people coming in, and as a filmmaker’s mind is always ticking, I felt that this concept could be made into a commercially viable bollywood venture.”
Recalling his foray into the world of films, the Delhi boy now based in Mumbai says, “I always wanted to be a filmmaker. I guess it was natural progression, I have been working in the industry for around eight years now. I worked with Rohan Sippy’s Bluffmaster as the director of behind the scenes. Besides that, I assisted Milan Luthria in Taxi Number 9211 , Ashvin Kumar’s, The Forest , Anubhav Sinha’s Cash and Dibakar Banerjee’s Oye Lucky Lucky Oye .”
Talking about the inception of his newest venture, Akshay mentions, “It was while working for a production venture that I was acquainted with the producers of Couching Tigers Mannu. I discussed a few of my story ideas with them, and they liked this one.”
Describing his venture as a comic drama Akshayrefers to it as a story about and for young, hip and uber cool youth.
“The main plot starts with Mannu discovering the concept of couching. We also have Richa Chadda performing an item number and veterans like Tinu Anand and Sanjay Mishra are also a part of the movie.”
While talking more about the star cast and plot of the approximately two-hour hour long movie, Akshay states, “We have Arjun Mathur as the main lead and the movie will be a full power Bollywood commercial movie. It will be fast paced and entertaining, but intelligent and certainly not idiotic. The concept of couching is good, but with reservations, you really never know what kind of a person comes by, and that is how the story evolves.”
Produced by Khushi Motion pictures and Happy Bee films, the movie is scheduled to release in by the end of 2013. A gamut of young artistes would be composing music for the movie. “I am very lucky to be in a space where young filmmakers are given a chance. Even though this movie does not have the Shah Rukhs and Saifs, we are hoping for success. I feel it is very important for moviegoers to explore the work of young artistes and to appreciate it, if it is worth it.”
