As the curtain goes up…

Filmmaker Ajay Govind is eagerly awaiting the release of his debut feature film After The Third Bell

Ajay Govind, director, After The Third Bell

For two years and a little more Ajay Govind has been working on his debut feature film After The Third Bell . This dream project will finally get a theatrical release on April 4. And Ajay is keeping his fingers crossed.

“We recently began a crowd funding campaign to raise around Rs. 7 lakh towards the release of the film. And at the end of the second month of this campaign have raised Rs. 6.23 lakh so far,” says Ajay, who hails from Kozhikode and is now based in New Delhi.

“My parents are in Kozhikode now and that’s where my dad is from, I tend to say that I am from there. For some time, immediately after my graduation and a course in media studies, I stayed in Kozhikode. I moved there because I'd never lived there earlier. And during that time I worked with the

The Hindu's NIE Program. I conducted workshops in schools and then also became a ‘Trainer of Trainer’ with them. I was involved with this for two years in Delhi also. Incidentally, I even worked with

The Hindu MetroPlus as an intern in Delhi.”

After his schooling in Delhi and Bangkok, Ajay graduated in English Literature from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi. Ajay’s films are presented by his agency, ‘words. rhythms. images’ and produced by his production house Sisyphus Rocks Films. He hopes to release the film in PVR Cinemas in eight screens in Delhi, Gurgaon, Dehradun, Chandigarh, Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru and Kochi.

A murder mystery, the film kicks off after the third bell is sounded and none of the actors or the audience had a clue about what they were going to be witness to. An actor dies on stage during a live performance. ACP B.C. Banerjee is forced to cut his vacation short and take charge of the case. Banerjee is disdainful of theatre and homosexuals and during the course of the investigation his prejudices get the better of him. At every stage he finds himself getting closer to finding out what happened…

“It is a small independent film with almost every one associated with it, cast and crew, are debutantes. Apart from me, Krishnaprasad K., the editor of the film, Sreekumar Nair, the colourist, and music director Nitin Krishna Menon are from Kerala. We recorded one track for the film in Shivam Studio, Kozhikode, with local musicians and a pianist from Delhi. Apart fomr that Nitin has composed an instrumental track. The background score has been composed by a Mumbai-based music director.”

Prior to this film, Ajay has produced around 40 documentaries for various national and international organisations. “One of my documentary films on the ‘Voucher Scheme’ commissioned by Futures Group International India was selected to be screened at the American Public Health Association’s film festival in Boston in November 2013.” His Bhranthande Prekshakar (The Madman’s Audience: 2005) in Malayalam was screened at Videolab Coimbra (Portugal) and India Habitat Centre (New Delhi. “This was made during my Kerala stint. It was my first feature-length docu-fiction film and was based on Naranathu Bhranthan. That documentary was edited by Sreekumar Nair (he is from Thodupuzha) who has done the colour grading of my feature film.”

Another documentary by Ajay, Where Boys Do Cry (2006) has been screened as part of anti-ragging initiatives in various schools and colleges in New Delhi.

In addition to working on the screenplay of his next film tentatively titled Antara , Ajay has recently finished working on the script of an untitled romantic film.