Kathryn Bigelow’s ‘The Hurt Locker’ won 6 Oscars this year, ‘hurting’ its competitors, especially James Cameron. However, the film has only benefited Bollywood and how! Hollywood movie lovers often criticize Hindi films by saying its high on content but low on technology and it will take donkey’s years for Indian cinema to look as sleek as those of the west. Filmmaker Abbas Tyrewala has thus roped in the best of Hollywood to do the production design of his forthcoming film starring John Abraham.David Bryan, Supervising Art Director on “The Hurt Locker” who was widely praised for his life like replication of the battle scarred streets of Iraq in Jordan, is the Production Designer for Abbas Tyrewala’s next which is tentatively titled 1-800-Love. The really interesting story however, is that David only managed to get into Abba’s film as a Production Designer after showing Abbas footage from “The Hurt Locker” and how he’d recreated the streets of Iraq in the award winning film!
David impressed Abbas with his detail and precision in Production Design. Looks like Abbas is going to every extent and recruiting genuinely talented people to mount this film on a large beautiful canvas. It may be recalled that during the shooting of Abbas’s film in London, the production had managed to block off traffic completely on Tower Bridge for 3 nights and had shot several scenes with even boat traffic on the Thames being restricted! David’s first release after “The Hurt Locker” is to be Abbas’s new film, now under post-production. Speaking on working on Abbas’s film, David said, “We wanted to portray the real London that is rarely seen, it’s an amazing city with very diverse locations. In particular we were looking for a real iconic Studio Apartment for our lead actor John Abraham. Later in Autumn, the climax to the film grew into an epic 4 nights filming on Tower Bridge with John doing his own stunts, a real star!”.
He went on to further add, “Working with a Bollywood crew was a great experience, much more than on a similar British film”.
Expectations are already high from Abbas’s new film, coming as it does on the heels of the scripting and debut directorial magic that he displayed in the smash hit Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na. Now with a key member of the history making Best Picture Oscar winner responsible for creating the look and feel of his film, the expectations are only bound to grow.
