Award winning Bollywood and South Indian filmmaker Sandeep
Malani has always made women centric films. All his films, be it short films or
feature films have women playing the main lead (central character) with the
male lead playing supporting characters. Be it SMS 6260, Jo Jo Laali, Sulige
Sikkidaaga, Shaayad, Janleva 555 and Maa – Yeh Cinemaa Hai. Following this
trend, his latest short film is titled ‘Bandagi’ (Respect Woman).
What is Bandagi?
'Bandagi' emphasizes on woman empowerment with various topics
and issues that the celebrities talk about. It fights for a woman’s freedom, to
live peacefully.
The various topics in the film create awareness in society to
stop child marriage, dowry system, rape, molestation, eve teasing, domestic
violence etc and to encourage girl education, adoption, rights for women in
society, girl empowerment and woman empowerment. It also gives importance to
motherhood.
The Concept
It
all begins with Ayushmann (Silver Malani) addressing his classmates in the
college, talks about successfully completing the video project which he was
working upon from a long time, and finally, releases it. He thanks his lecturer
Sanjay Sir (Dilip Malani) and his family members Mahesh (Mahesh Dulam), Namrata
(Anita Dulam), Alia (Sanjukta Ghosh) and the little ones too (Aditi and Sriman)
for supporting him. The project is revealed as ‘Bandagi’, fight for a woman’s
freedom, to live peacefully. And
Ayushmann captures them all – those include celebrity messages, artists
singing, the college band singing, the Ladies discussing, a round up at the old
age home, peace and candle light for support etc.
The
Artists
The artistes who carry strong social message in the film
include award winning actress/dancer Sudha Chandran, actress Adaa Khan (of
Nagin fame), Mangalurean actress Sonal Monteiro, Kannada actress Harshika
Poonachcha, fashion stylist Janu Arasu and model Komal Atmaramani.
The musical video ‘Jeene Se Pehli Hi’ features Meena
Malani, Sanjukta Ghosh, Shubha Raksha, Reshma Malani, Anitha Dulam, Sharanya
Jit Kaur, Jagruti Mehta, Jyothi Harindranath, Varsha Acharya, Cherrie Ash,
Ranjeet Jha, Mahendra Pandey, Vishal Digani, Mahesh Dulam, Akash Hora, Bharath
Lakshmikanth, Anant Joshi, Mann Hora, Chirag Kundapur, Vivek Mishra, Vivek
Punjabi, Kkewal Vyas, Prayas Singh, Shivam Kataria, Chitranjani Chittu, Shane
Abhishek, Priya and Drushika Padmanabhan with Aditi Dulam, Sheetal Malani and
Silver Malani.
In addition to it, Thirumalesh, Valerian Menezes,
Aurobindo Kiriyakere, Jayashri and Madhura Ammu have been part of the song,
which is been shot separately. The song has been sung by Soma Basu and
Shrikanth Nair with lyrics by Roop Kumar and music by Jayant M Aryan.
Also messages regarding Mother and Motherhood have been
given in a very special way by actress Kalpana Pandit, actress Sowmya Murthy,
dancer Jyoti Colaco, teacher Salome Pinto and model socialite Jaz Shabir.
Malani also acknowledges Arpit Goyal for the title, Sanidh
Poojary for giving his voice for Ayushmann, Dilip Malani for being the support as
Sanjay Sir. Also, students of St Josephs’ College Bangalore, Ladies Social
Service League and KASK members of Mangalore have been part of the song. Special mention is of St Ann’s Old Age
home/St Anthony Ashram members who are part of the song as well.
Editing by Santosh Chawla and Vignesh Thanupillai for The Studio
Agency. Concept, screenplay, camera and direction by Sandeep Malani for Malani
Talkies Production.
Malani’s
Message
The
episode also has a special segment wherein Sandeep Malani speaks about the
strong women in his life who influenced him in his career. He attributes and
gives full importance to his mother Meena Malani and his wife Reshma Malani,
the two strong women in his life because of whom today he is a successful
filmmaker and besides the reason; he is in films is because of Sridevi; who he
has been a fan since he was a child and has followed her films and that
influenced the strong women character she played in all her films and same way,
he has portrayed the women as strong characters in his films too; be it Jo Jo
Laali, SMS 6260, Sulige Sikkidaaga, Shaayad, Janleva 555 and now ‘Maa - Yeh Cinemaa
Hai’. The women in his films who have played strong centric characters namely
Janu Arasu, Kalpana Pandit, Shona Chabbra, Jenica Kalra and all the female
characters of ‘Maa’. The message Malani gives is - Respect women in your life,
be it your mother, your sister, your wife, your daughter, your neighbor, your
colleague or your friend.
The
song and message can be viewed here:
Malani’s all films have a beach song and a sensual effect to
it, which looks very classy and aesthetic. Be it the song in SMS 6260; ‘This is
me telling you’ picturised on Janu and Digant at Mangalore Tanneer Baavi bach, ‘First
Time Heegaithu Nange’ the Kannada song picturised on Sowmya and Digant shot in
San Francisco for Miss California, Kalpana Pandit and Akash Hora for the love
track in Jo Jo Laali, Kalpana and Rajeev for the sensual track for Janleva 555,
and as also all his short films have a beach visual. And so included the Jeele
Jeele track and Le Chalo from Yeh Cinemaa Hai.
