NOI – A Short Film by Naveen Selvakumar
In June 26, I watched a Japanese film called One Cut of the Dead (2017)
It’s a movie about a director who directs a zombie movie in an abandoned building. But there is one problem. They have to shoot the movie in a single take, without any cut. While they were shooting, real zombies started to attack them and the movie was about the events that had happened before and after the zombie attack. It was an excellent movie.
The hero of the movie (who played as a director) and the director of our short film, Naveen Selva Kumar (NSK) look exactly the same. Both look wise and skill wise.
It all started in the mid of July. 16th of July to be exact.
I was planning on watching two Malayalam movies that weekend when NSK sent me a script and asked me to read it.
The next day, I watched Nayattu (2021) and Malik (2021)
Both movies brought a lot of controversies. Nayattu dealt with making Dalit as bad guys (not explicitly) and Malik dealt with the rising of a Muslim don which depicted clashes between Muslims and Christians living in one of the coastal towns in Kerala. I liked Malik more than Nayattu. Though the making of Nayattu was better and an engaging thriller, it was Malik that won me over with its outstanding performances from all the actors. It had its cliches, but they were the perfect cliches.
After watching those two movies, I started reading the final draft of the script of NOI.
It was not an outstanding script or something, but it was a script that was easy to shoot. If I had to use a term, then I would go with “ZERO BUDGET SCRIPT/FILM”. That gave us confidence and we planned to make the short film.
And a few days later (on 20th July), he revised the script once more and took a printout of it.
And in the same weekend, we planned to shoot the short film.
The D day
NSK and I became friends due to our common interest – Movies. He was also a love guru for many of us back then. He had a love failure in his high school and to escape himself from the depression, he started watching movies. And he used to talk a lot about his love stories which inspired a lot of us (including me) to have a go with love.
Though we are friends, we had a lot of differences. Not only in the kind of script we wanted to write but also in the way we think about things.
Coming to the scripts, I like writing fantasies or stories with a little bit of surrealism in it. But NSK’s scripts are more realistic and capture the essence of humanity, like describing the grey shades of how humans behave. When you read his scripts, you would get attached to the characters rather than to its story.
And that was why he was able to hone his skills better than I tried. This was also the reason for my eventual discontent towards making films. In the final year of our college, we even tried making short films, but the outcome was a disaster. But NSK kept on trying and when he joined TCS, he made a short film with the boys he worked with and it was a good one. After I joined IBM, my interest towards making films weakened and that discontent built up to become an inferiority complex.
It took a lot of time to own my insecurities and move on. And the only thing that helped me to move was writing blogs. I realised why I sucked at making films. It was because I liked the image of becoming a director more than the process of becoming the director. I used to imagine myself giving interviews to big shots and making movies with the actors I liked.
I was so stuck up on liking that image. And when I tried to walk in that path, I hated it. By writing the blogs, I came to a realisation that I never liked to make films, but I always liked to write scripts and stories.
That high orgasm that I got while writing a story is nothing compared to the headache I would get when I try making short films. I knew that I was not passionate enough to make films.
On the other hand, there was NSK. His passion developed at a constant pace along with his skills. All this ended at a certain point. That point was when NSK decided to quit TCS. He didn’t like to work in an IT company and wanted to make films. And that was how “NOI” happened.
NOI was the first script he had written after he quit TCS.
And finally, we decided to make it into a short film on 24th and 25th of July (Saturday and Sunday).
After he sent me the script to read in the middle of July, I read it and liked it, but I didn’t want to be a part of it.
I hated to do something that I decided to not do anymore; something that didn’t interest me anymore; and something that I didn’t have enough skill to do.
After reading the script, I wasn't able to think of anything to improve the script. Before quitting his job, he asked me to write a script, but I ended up writing a story. So, I wasn't able to think that way. Maybe I wouldn’t write anything, maybe, but I chose not to think or write.
And that week I watched the worst movie I had watched in recent times. It was Space Jam: A New Legacy (2021), a sequel to the original cult movie – The Space Jam. After that, I got busy shopping. We bought new phones for my brother (Realme Narzo 30) and my mom (Redmi Note 10) by exchanging their old phones.
And suddenly, the days went by and came the D days. I was supposed to go to NSK’s house on July 24, Saturday. My lethargy peaked and decided to go to his house that night. So, me and my friend SJ went to meet Raghin Chettan and Gundu Mani (who had become slim) and spent half of the Saturday with them. Then me and SJ went to NSK’s house that evening.
By then NSK anger was at its peak. He and Thala Manoj (our one and only actor for the film) started fighting with each other and didn't take a single shot in the film.
We 4 guys partied to cool off the tension and the next day, we started our shooting process. NOI is a story that involved a guy who was waiting for his COVID test result. He is being isolated in a room and the film revolves around that guy’s struggle as he was waiting for his NOI’s result.
We didn’t have any filming equipment except for a tripod. We shot the film on NSK's phone by mounting it on the tripod. We had an issue. The lighting inside that house was so poor. So, we decided to make the film a black and white film. That way, we can tackle the lighting issue by flashing the light from other phones.
It worked. And another issue came.
Our Tripod got broken.
We fixed it by mounting the broken stick in a rolling chair inside that room.
It worked. And another issue came.
Thala Manoj lacked skills in delivering dialogues although he was perfect in acting no-dialogue scenes. So, we had revised the script and minimised the dialogues.
It worked. And another issue came.
We lost interest in making the film and hurried the process.
By the time we finished shooting the last scene in the script papers, the sun had started to set. So, we wrapped up the shoot and NSK took the responsibility of editing the footage.
And this was the best and only solution we had.
On August 6, we released our short film on YouTube. And when I watched the final output of the working of that awful Sunday, it was all worth it.
Though the shot film had its flaws, NSK did a wonderful job in making it. His decision to use Surya Ji’s music was also a good idea.
Link: நோய் | Noi | Tamil Short Film
By seeing the short film, I had a little regret of not choosing to pursue my passion for becoming a director. But come to think of it, the choice was never mine to make (which I would never blame anyone else, and I would take responsibility for this forced choice, that I will!)
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