Deepa Bhatia made some of the best films in recent times happen on her editing table. Hazaar Chaurasi Ki Maa , Taare Zameen Par , Rock On! , My Name Is Khan …the list is enviable.
Deepa says a movie is written thrice. “Once, when it is written, the second, when it is directed, and the third, when it is edited. It is unfortunate that editors don't get their due. It frustrates me when people think cutting is editing.”
She says the whole going back and forth narrative pattern in My Name Is Khan was achieved on the editing table. But, why didn't she clip the much-criticised long-drawn-out climax?
“Karan shot it even longer! We cut it quite a bit, but an editor shouldn't interfere with the director's vision. An editor's job is to polish the director's point of view.” It was this quality that Govind Nihalani noticed in Deepa, when she was assisting him on Hazaar Chaurasi Ki Maa, and gave her a break as an editor. “One day, he asked me to cut the rushes. He quite liked the way I worked on the material.”
She says that as film editor, she has to spend a lot of time with the material; so, she always picks projects that will continue to excite her during the long process of making a movie.
“A movie without depth does not interest me at all. A movie has to have a soul; it should mean something to the world. I would rather work on a documentary than on a commercial movie.” In fact, she has made a documentary, Nero's Guests , on farmers' suicide based on journalist P. Sainath's writings Nero's Guests. Deepa says Sainath's writing makes us see the India we don't want to see.
Sensible promos
However, the ace editor is happy with the way mainstream cinema is shaping up. “Some bad films might be working, but no good film is failing.” So, what happened to Rocket Singh ? Deepa feels a film's promos play a crucial role in deciding its fate at the box office. “ Rocket Singh' s promos suggested that it was a dhamaal movie. Nowhere did it come through that it would be an inside view of the sales world. Compare it with Taare Zameen Par . We kept the focus on Darsheel from the first promo. It was only towards the end that we started showing the face of Aamir Khan,” says the wife of Amole Gupte, the man behind the thought-provoking film. “He helps me in understanding characters better,” she says of her husband.
Having grown up on a ‘masala' diet of cinema, Deepa says Amitabh Bachchan films were her staple till she saw Mirch Masala . “Suddenly, I realised that there was a whole new world of cinema out there.”
She has come a long way since then. UTV World Movies has chosen her as the personality of the month to pick four movies of her choice from the channel's collection. “I have picked Machuca , Cousin Cousine , Twin Sisters and 8 Women, ” she says.
