Why Do You Think People Should Give You Money To Complete Your Film?

***Shared via the official blog of 

The 0ne Rupee Film Project***

Important question!

Critical in other words!

In this short blogpost, we'll try an old method to solve this riddle; negation of the negation. We'll state why people should not give us money and whatever is left shall be the reason for them to give us money. 

Let's start

1. We don't assure any return. So, people should not give us money expecting some sort of financial gain

2. We don't serve to any political party. So, people should not give us money expecting we would promote their propaganda

3. We haven't won any big award. Our films have never been screened at any renowned international film festival. So, people should not give us money thinking we'll make them proud by bringing glory to the nation

4. Our film is not produced/co-produced by some retired Bollywood actor/ working Bollywood director (without or with a revolutionary image). So, people should not give us money thinking they'd be participating in something "BIG"

5. We are not casting Tolly/ Bolly/ Holly - wood stars in our film. So, people should not give us money expecting a dinner date with Karina Kapoor in return

6. We are not making a film on how the Indian revolution can be successful. So, people should not give us money thinking we are a gang of messiahs of the proletariat

7. We are not descendants of Heeralal Sen/ Dadasaheb Phalke/ Devaki Basu/ Ritwik Ghatak / Satyajit Ray/ Mrinal Sen/ Mani Kaul/ Shyam Benegal/ John Abraham or any living or dead person having any relation to any regional or national or International film industry or business. Not Even Jean-Luc Godard or Jon Jost. So, people should not give us money thinking we have it in our blood

8. We don't have a long time PR policy. In fact we have no PR policy or marketing plan at all. So, people should not give us money thinking we are making history in the 21st century

9. We have never done this before i.e making a film gathering funds from the crowd. So, people should not give us money thinking we are experienced enough to come up with an Indian Kickstarter some day

10. We certify that everything stated above is true and correct to the best of our knowledge and belief. So, people should not give us money considering this blogpost a cool marketing stance that comes under the "just kidding" category

Is there anything left, any reason that should make people give us their hard earned money? 

Guess not! Then why the hell are people giving "Us" money to complete "Our" film? 

Confusing, no?

1. S N Nanda

2. Rajiv Sinha

3. Carole

4. Kanungo

5. Swagat Sen

6. D.K Sornam

7. Dev Daruka

8. Surya Shankar Dash

9. Maharatna Banerjee

10. Dhrubaa Ghosh

11. Bagula Bhagat

12. Hemant Kumar Gaba

13. Samarendra Das

14. Gurpal Singh

15. Whose handwritings are not readable (3)

16. People who forgot to drop a mail (12-15)

17. Riddhiman Basu [Associate Producer]

18. Ritam Bhaumik

19. Two Unknown Foreigners

20. Avishek Thakur

21. Ginnetta Correlli

22. Jason Marsh

23. Kanchan Sengupta

24. Sayan Chakraborty

25. Shamayita Banerjee

26. Apratim Ganguly

27. Ajasra Das

28. Manju Chakraborty

29. Kamal Kumar Roy

30. Monomita Roy

31. Shubhankar Mazumdar (24fps.in)

32. Debdut Sadhu

33. Supratim Sanyal (Washington Bangla Radio INC.)

34. Tushar Sarkar

35. Anirban Roychowdhury

36. Gairik Roy

37. Sunando Patra

38. Nishan Chatterjee

39. Kumar Chitrang

40. Tuhin Mallik

41. Soumyaditya Nanda

42. Moumita Chakraborty Goswami

43. Sushanta Kar

44. Sonali Sengupta

45. Suddha Prasad Bagchi

46. Gangotryi Sorcar

47. Achintyarup Ray

48. Caesar Mandal

49. Soumya Maity

50. Atish Baul [Associate Producer]

51. Justin Andrews

52. Joydeep Thakur

53. Avijit Ghosal

54. Debajyoti Guha

55. Mrinal Mazumdar 

56. Anirban Dashgupta

57. Debajyoti Mukherjee

58. Sanjoy Sinharoy

59. Saptarshi Dey

60. Sreemanti Sengupta

61. A. Dasgupta

62. Siddhartha Nath

63. Anindya Bose

64. Mukherjee Twish

65. Amiya Kumar

66. Bipad Bhanjan Behera

67. Antara Kundu

68. Avishek Nag

69. Indranil Ghosh

70. Somak Dutta

71. Saswata Chakraborty

72. Rupa Debnath

73. Soumya Bhattacharya [Associate Producer]

74. Snigdha Sheel

75. Mr. Dasgupta

76. Maifuz Ali

77. Sabyasachi Das 

78. Koustav Bhattacharya

79. Mrinmoy Chatterjee

80. Ugen Bhutia

81. Adheesh Verma

82. Neeti Tandon

83. Aroonav Das

84. Ankush Hore

85. Neha Bhat

86. Koushik Bagchi

87. Tarang Desai

88. Shre Kumar Chatterjee

89. Gautam Kar 

90. Rijabrata Chakraborty

91. Samyamoy Sen Gupta

92. Somnath Roy

93. Sounak Kar

94. Rammohan

95. Manas Tarai

96. Aniket Mukherjee

97. Nabanita Bhattacharya [Associate Producer]

98. Shounak Ghoshal

99. Supriyo Das

100. Soham Pal

101. Nilabhra Banerjee

102. Ankan Paul

103. Bikramjit Chakraborty

104. Atma Prakash Mishra

105. Amik Das

106. Amir Motlagh

107. Snigdhendu Bhattacharya

108. Varsha Chakraborty

109. Argha Sen

110. Tuhin Subhra Sinha

111. Ugenther Kumar

112. K V Krishna Rao

113. Arnab Ganguly

114. Rohosen Bandyopadhyay

115. Riccardo Bella

116. K V Srinivasan

117. Kannaiah C H

118. Sanhita Modak

119. Ushnish

120. Ipsita Palbhowmick [Associate Producer]

121. Maj Gaurav Garg

122. Two old LFEBF members 

123. Salil Biswas

124. Soumen Atta

125. Arpan Chowdhury

126. Tushnik Chaudhuri

127. Nabendu Bhattacharya

128. Ranjan Roy

129. Subrata Mukherjee

130. Ramakrishna Bhattacharya

131. Anirban Bandopadhyay 

132. Debanjan Das

133. Anirban Chattopadhyay

134. Parambrata Chatterjee

135. Abhinandan Ghose

136. Anisha Das

137. Anonymous

138. Indrani Datta

139. Subir Kumar Sengupta

140. Mrs. Sengupta

141. Mr. Sengupta (Junior)

142. Samran Huda

143. Deva Agarwal

144. Dinu Bandopadhyay

145. Abhinesh Warrier

146. Deep Shome

147. Sriparna Chatterjee

148. Pratim Ray

149. Pinaki Sen

150. R P Das

151. Biswajit Das

152. Samik Mukherjee

153. Yashowardhan Kauns

154. Sayonto Kundu

155. Dwaipayan Basu

156. Lohit Grover

157. Sharmila Roy

158. Atin Dutta

159. Suranjan Ghosh

160. Dewan Rameez

161. Debjit Bagchi

162. Suman Manna

163. Anonymous 2 [Associate Producer]

164. Krishanu Majumdar

165. Indranil Ghosh Dastidaar

All these people have actually spent money to make this film a reality. 

Not on this list, there are those 16 patrons too who contributed via Funduzz.com! 

What do you think, why did they do that? 

Now don't call them all insane since there are more than 180 of them!

And there'll be more, even if you don't find an answer...

***Shared via the official blog of 

The 0ne Rupee Film Project***

One Rupee Film Project - First look

The first look of Aashmani Jawaharat aka Diamonds in the Sky [widely known as the 0ne Rupee Film Project] (2013) is now live on youtube. The film is suffering from lack of funds. Have a look, if you like it consider to stand by this initiative financially. Any and every amount of contribution above 1 rupee is welcome...

The 0ne Rupee Novella - Part II

We have started a project named The 0ne Rupee Film. The film does not look forward to traditional producers neither to traditional distributors but to your support and contribution. The film will be made by whatever you donate. The minimum contribution is just One Indian Rupee. We are posting the story line in form of a novella to gear up the fundraising process.






If you are interested please follow the blog http://onerupeefilm.blogspot.in/
Or the official Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/onerupeefilm

A man opens the door with a smiling face; must be a servant who already knew that another young filmmaker is coming in search of luck. No one would have guessed that such a rich man can live here in this soon-to-be-abandoned kind of building. How did he become so rich, the filmmaker tries to think while moving towards the drawing room. Suddenly, the thoughts gets obstructed as he sees a young man playing cricket. Not exactly playing, rather practicing, but where's the ball again! What is this man trying to do? He's got a bat, he is posing as if he is playing different shots and, nevertheless he is also narrating the whole action in English. A shadow practice with commentary, nice! The filmmaker stood motionless, watching, until the servant calls him inside. Unexpected association of images and sounds! The fat film producer enters the room

-- 'Welcome, my dear friend, what'll you have, cold drink or beer?

-- 'Beer of course!'

As if tea or coffee is meant for a mediocre only! He knows very well where this conversation is going to end. Sometimes he thinks he must learn to lie. Does it really matter if you cheat some fatsos to make your dream a reality? You just need to say that you know some buyers and they live in some UK or USA and the only thing needed is three or four copies with Spanish, French, Itallian and Russian subtitles other than English. You need to convince them that you know every bit of the international market but, fuck man, you are a maker and not a merchant. You can't humiliate yourself at least! So, again he says the same things like even Uttam Kumar had to cope with flops. Absolutely no one can be certain whether a film is going to work in terms of revenue or not. And the producer would say

-- "See, it doesn't matter to me if your film is a flop. It's my money and I just want to know how I can get it back, I mean at least what I invested. Can you show me a structure?"

-- "That depends on a lot of things."

-- "Then my financial support too depends on a lot of things."

Then they will talk about the market trends and how much investment can assure some return etc. The producer will talk about his previous experiences with other directors whom he thinks to be eminent names now-a-days in the industry. How they came to him when no one had heard their names and how he changed their lives etc. All the same, all the same! Then after a couple of bottles, the filmmaker would get depressed and open up again

-- "The taste has changed a lot, you see. No one likes a good film now-a-days. If you use some slow moves, prolonged zoom-ins and zoom-outs, they will call you outdated. No one wants a Hrishikesh Mukherjee in the 21st century. The longest shot should last less than 6 seconds, that's what they like. Even these kinds of conversation sequences, like we are having a discussion now, sitting face-to-face on two sides of a table, shot-reverse shot-over the shoulder-POV; they will call it cliched. I know, I've used these devices previously. I've heard that film insurance is an option in Mumbai provided that the project profile looks fine. The the kind of casting required to avail that...well, I don't think you are that much strong financially.

-- "Who told you to think about my financial background?"

-- "No, on a second thought, the kind of stars that we have here won't be fit for my film. Most of them are incapable I think. Moreover, viewers can empathize more with a new man, a new face. This is a psychological factor that always works. In case of stars, the process of self-identification gets hindered.

-- "Whatever! If you comne up with something interesting let me know. Just give me a call and we'll see"

Another door is closed.
New face?
What's new again?
It's just a common face
But a face that's uncommon for the screen
For the spectator
In a sea of thousand faces how'd you know who finds empathy in what shape or which complexion
Everyday
I stand in front of a wall
All covered up with posters
Everyday
I shuffle between a thousand images
All I look for is a face
Similar to mine
Yet dissimilar

...And the rain starts to fall

The 0ne Rupee Film - 3

We have started a project named The 0ne Rupee Film. The film does not look forward to traditional producers neither to traditional distributors but to your support and contribution. The film will be made by whatever you donate. These are some recent posts shared from the official blog.


If you are interested please follow the blog http://onerupeefilm.blogspot.in/
Or the official Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/onerupeefilm









Thursday, March 22, 2012

The Story Behind It
The truth is, I'm an idler. Although I was suffering from fever since we were back from Jadavpur and then something happened to my broadband connection (I was able to access internet using my dongle) they just don't stand up as good alibis for not posting on the blog since the 13th. It's been 9 days without writing. The feverish feel didn't even let me feel how fast time flies by when one is not working.

On the 19th evening (or may be night), in the month of February, at around 22:30 hrs. when I told Mr. Gurpal Singh "Gurpal ji, bahat ho gaya, abhi feature banani hai. Logon se ek ek rupiyaa leke suru karne ka socha hai [It has been enough, now I want to make a feature. I thought of starting it by putting a demand of one rupee to everyone]" Sriparna and Surya were there in front of Chakrateertha House, Puri, Orissa and I was quite astonished that I've actually said it. Before that, the idea was shared only once with Sriparna. Gurpal replied smilingly, like he does on every occasion, 'well, it's a great idea but is there anyone here who believes that you won't spend those one rupees on fags and boozes. See, there have been many people in the last years, coming up with ideas like these, collecting money for making film and afterwards none of them were traceable neither their films." --- This reply is what made me feel the necessity of starting this blog.

Four hours before that, I was sitting in a train, Howrah-Puri Duronto Express, at seat no.2. Beside me there was a guy on no.1, named Mr. Abhayanand Pathak. Sriparna, her mom and my mom were on Seat no. 3, 4 and 5. Between us there was the passage, so, I really had no option but to chat with this aged friend of mine when he started talking. Normally I don’t like explicitly religious people, but this time it was different. I felt a touch of wisdom in his words. He speaks a lot (I mean when he starts). Soon I discovered that he is one of the uncles of actor Vinay Pathak. So we talked a bit about Vinay’s performances in different films. Mr. Pathak said that he is a poet and he has two books to his creddit. So, we moved on to poetry and he said he is not a regular poet. He does not understand poetry; rather he tries to understand his religion and the world through his poems. I said, one doesn’t need to understand poetry really, that must be left to the academicians and critics. One must understand oneself to write or compose. Thus, philosophy and religion occupied the central thread of this conversation. Mr. A.N Pathak is one of those guys who say Hey Ram even while yawning. But I, somehow, did not really have any problem to carry on chatting with the Bihari Pandit Brahmin. I myself came to know that I ‘m a Kankubji Brahmin and not a Gaudiya one. Later on, he told me a story of a writer he met at Kurla station. He saw this guy in a bit untidy white shirt and black trousers, asking for one rupee from everyone on the platform. He came in to the waiting room, approached a man sitting next to Mr. Pathak. That man replied negative in a rudely manner and then turned to Mr. Pathak and said “Look at this poor guy. He has learnt this much English only to become an unconventional beggar. What’s becoming of this country”. Mr. Pathak did not reply. He silently started to follow this unconventional beggar and wanted to know the reason of his begging. The man told him that he is a writer. He has written a novel and now he is raising funds as he does not have enough money to publish it.





Yes, it’s an idea copied from somewhere else. I don’t know the name of this writer (I wish I had) but his way can prove to be fruitful for us. Till date, as a forum, LFEBF has produced 14 short films and two feature length films since 2008 out of which 12 shorts and two features were released in three compilations in three consecutive years. Do you know another forum in this country which has been this much consistent? Do you know a filmmaker in India who did take up no-budget as a serious method of film production before or by the year 2008? And when you visit the websites on so-called “Indian Independent Films and Filmmakers” how many times do you find mentions of these works there? Except producing a feature there’s another aim behind starting this fund-raising that is the process itself works as a campaign. This is a good form of no-budget promotion. But some of these so-called ‘devotees’ of “Indian Independent Film” are not even spending a single word on this project. Moreover, some of them are not even responding or replying while communicated with proper information. Where is the problem, can you tell me? Is it with Bengal? Is it with the forum? Or is it with the No-Budget method? I mean if everyone knows us or keeps on following us on facebook why do they become misers when it comes to sharing or writing something about some honest and off-the-track initiative?

Recently my latest film Memories… of a Dead Township (2012) was reviewed by Dr. Ian McCormick. Dr. McCormick also interviewed me via email and posted it to his blog. It’s something adequate to make us happy but we’d have been happier if the review was written or the interview was taken by some Bengali friend of ours, or at least by someone from India.



Thanks to Dr. Ian McCormick and everyone who’s reading, sharing, talking about this blog/project/initiative or the forum. Thanks to all the contributors who helped us reach the threshold of 19k within one month.



The truth is not only that I’m an idler but I belong to a community full of slackers and idlers I believe.

A post from the One Rupee Film Project

We have decided to share the posts from the 'One Rupee Film' blog from now on. It's a project that looks forward to your support and contribution in order to materialize. These posts are made by Anamitra Roy.
For previous posts check out the blog or to get updates regularly check out the FB Page

Promised Post: Explanation, Expectation, Resolution

I hope I don't need to explain the delay. If you are a reader of this blog you must have already guessed that I'm really not doing some office-work, neither do I have a secretary to do this job for me and just like you, I too have my own problems like depression etc. Today, I updated my old websitetoday for the first time as well as an old blog after 2010. And now, I really don't have much time. I'll have to leave soon for the city, I must be there by night. Anyway, let's come to the point.




Why is the minimum amount of contribution still Re.1 while I'm clearly stating that even more than Rs. 25 k is welcome from a single person?




My answer is: See, Firstly, Little Fish Eat Big Fish was initiated and founded in 2008 by me, Sriparna and Arupa da (Arupratan Ghosh). It's been quite a long time since then. In this period we've learnt a lot of things about films and also about other things. We have released three DVDs on our own. For various reasons we were compelled to set the minimum participatory contribution at Rs.100 (150-200 for other states). In kolkata till date spending 100Rs. for 5 short films is not an easy thing for all the students. Yes, there are students who can spend Rs.1000 everyday just for anything but they were not our target audience. People who found interest in our works mostly belong to middle and lower-middle class. What we used to do is, we first focused on recovering the production cost and once it is recovered we used to distribute digital copies for free to the people who could not afford spending 100.




Secondly, till date common people in Kolkata are not really that much interested about the independent efforts in film-medium (Well, basic reason behind this is the trash produced by rich kids and the idiotic school-goers who god knows why ever tried to make a film). Even those who are interested are not habituated to contribute to Independent films or filmmakers. This project looks forward to raise this habit. One rupee is nothing, it doesn't hurt. Most of the people use this very amount only to satisfy pushy beggars. The basic difference between us and the beggar is that we are providing them with a little piece of paper containing information regarding this project so that they can check back and verify or contribute more if they feel like. With the exchanged value of one rupee, the unique approach will surely help them remember the fact, we feel. It's not building houses in the air in the name of Independent filmmaking. Our fathers are not our producers and we still believe in the from-the-mass-to-the-mass structure.




I hope that's enough to clarify why the minimum amount is one rupee only. Now, why am I asking for more?




See, just like the ovum needs sperm to produce a new life, a film needs money to come to life. We believe that there are some friends of ours who like the way we are continuing against all odds. Some of them do receive a handsome paycheck at the end of every month. Among these friends there are some we know personally. They are film enthusiasts, fan of good literature, loves music too. It's a clear call to them, "Dear, it's the time for you to act. Maybe once you dreamt of making 'That Film' but then this job and all, and then you had to get married and now you raise a family... alright! No one is calling you to get out of your closet, but we are on the streets. Can you lend us your umbrella? We'd love to smell it and believe that you are still here with us."




For the next two days, me and Sriparna, we'll be available at JU (Jadavpur University) campus. You can come, meet, discuss with us about the film, contribute. For any assistance call me on 919883103809. When I get back from the city I'll start uploading the storyline little by little in the form of a novella. Can I expect you to just copy and paste that on your blog / web with some basic information about this project. That'll be of much help. Let us know.

Thanks

Updates: BYOFF, 2012

The 23rd Feb was the Little Fish Eat Big Fish Evening at BYOFF this year. The 3rd compilation was screened at screen 1 and was received with warmth. As usual, people were overwhelmed when they came to know that 'Replica' was produced with 400 rupees or the production of 'Memories...of a Dead Township' required no money. It's good to see that people are recognizing us as a unique kind of platform that takes up or comes up with unbelievably produced films every year.

The interest is increasing. This year at BYOFF Anamitra Roy started his fundraising campaign for a 90 minute feature. The campaign has launched as "The One Rupee Film Project" and can be followed on this blog.