There바카라s a subtle difference between the average Mumbaikar and a taxi driver, plying the roads of the metropolis that never seems to sleep.
According to 58-year-old Mohan Pandurang Bhogle, a former cabbie-turned-location manager for some of the biggest Bollywood movies and ad films, the differentiator is the taxi drivers바카라 innate curiosity to know and anticipate what lies ahead, after the next bend along the road.
Bhogle knows it well. It was his curiosity and the ability to look beyond the obvious in a city he was born in, that got him his first gig scouting locations for Bombay Blue, a TV series plotted around the Mumbai underworld, that was released in the UK in 1997. 바카라Before Bombay Blue, location managers were not common in the film industry,바카라 he says.
Bhogle credits his taxi-driving days with launching his backend career in Bollywood by accident. Rajguru Swamy, a distant friend, had hired his taxi for a couple of days to scout some locations for a film in the early-1990s. 바카라Rajguru Swamy was my friend and boss. I was a taxi driver then. I learned a lot from him,바카라 he says.
Swamy was impressed by his taxi driver바카라s knowledge of Mumbai (then Bombay) and its intricate by-lanes. Bhogle showed Swamy sites in the city, which he had never seen before. He immediately hired Bhogle to assist him. In 1995, Bhogle changed professional lanes, switching from a taxi driver to a location scout, helping filmmakers, who approached him through word of mouth, find the right spot for the right shot.
The taxi driver in him had once again helped Bhogle see beyond the bend ahead.
After Swamy retired and migrated to South India, Bhogle stepped into his shoes, with the UK mini-TV series as his first full-fledged gig.
바카라I knew where old ships were docked for being harvested into scrap. The foreign film crew wanted live locations. They did not want a set. The film plot involved tracking down a drug mafia kingpin in Mumbai. The crew wanted to shoot at Bhendi Bazaar and other such crowded areas, where the mafia don is eventually apprehended,바카라 Bhogle says.
Interestingly, Bhogle바카라s career in feature films as a location manager, which began with the docks, also ended at a dry shipyard with Rohan Sippy바카라s 2011 film 바카라Dum Maaro Dum바카라, where he had a minor run-in with Abhishek Bachchan, who plays a surly cop.
During the shoot, which involved some dock workers welding a metal tank, the tank exploded, injuring some of them. 바카라There was some residual oil in the tank, which caused the explosion. I asked the man in-charge, what바카라s going on? He said, 바카라This is usual. It is nothing new바카라.바카라 Bhogle says.
But Bachchan, who was in the vicinity, was shocked by the explosion바카라s impact and fell into the shallow sea water. 바카라I said, 바카라Sir, that was a narrow miss, otherwise, your ticket upstairs was booked바카라". He (Bachchan) charged at me and asked, 바카라why did you say that?바카라
The star complained about Bhogle바카라s barb to Rohan Sippy. 바카라Sippy told him, 바카라Mohan jokes around with everyone바카라.바카라
Bhogle prefers scouting locations for ad films now because the schedules are more structured, unlike commercial or feature films, which work on tighter budgets. Ad-film makers have bigger budgets and the scale is much larger, particularly when it comes to foreign projects.
Much before he had his share of meeting film stars, Bhogle confessed to his obsession with films when he was young.
An Amitabh Bachchan fan, Bhogle confesses that he uses the actor바카라s dialogues quite liberally in his conversations.
바카라Many years ago, I was in an inebriated state. Me and my friends were passing by a police station. I went inside and asked for the station head. I stood before him and said, 바카라Gyarah muluk ke police mujhe doondh rahi hai, Don ko pakadne mushkil hee nahi namoomkin hai바카라 (Police from 11 countries are on my lookout. It is not just difficult to catch Don, it is impossible) He got up and slapped me across my face. My friends had run away and I was left alone with his finger marks on my face,바카라 laughs Bhogle, recalling the incident involving the iconic dialogue from Amitabh Bachchan바카라s film Don.
Such confrontation was a way of life for Bhogle, before he started working as a location manager. This streak, he says, distinguished him from his elder brother, a government servant.
바카라He is a government servant, focussed only on his job and his family. I also had the opportunity to get a government job. But I told myself I will start a business. I have seen real life as a taxi driver. I would get drunk, get into scuffles too. My elder brother is not like that. You know, once horses were made to wear blinkers, so that they could only look straight ahead. He is like that,바카라 Bhogle says.
But for someone who would get into confrontations at the drop of a hat when he was young, when he began donning the hat of location manager, Bhogle had to focus more on managing local dadas and toughs ahead of and on live location shoots.
바카라They would interrupt shooting at live locations often, citing obstruction to public movement. They have nothing to do with the public; they only want money. Sometimes they would assemble 20-25 people to stop our shoot and even heckle the police force onsite. We had to coax them, calm them down, try and understand their problem and eventually ask whether they really wanted to perform sewa (public service) or mewa (colloquial for money),바카라 Bhogle says.
He recalled shooting an ad near Hari Masjid in Mumbai바카라s Madanpura area, for a chocolate product for a Pakistani agency around 15 years ago, which posed a particularly unique problem. The brief mandated the presence of a mosque in the shot바카라s background.
바카라The ad involved school-children walking together바카라 We had managed to placate one bhai (local goon), but another bhai popped up, insisting it was his area. He claimed women passersby were being put to discomfort or citing it was time for azan,바카라 he says.
But over time, he evolved a strategy for 바카라adjusting바카라 such onsite flashpoints.
바카라We would assure them donations to the local mandal (social organisation)바카라 We would even pay people in the locality for their day바카라s discomfort. They also earned some money from it,바카라 he says.
Local support he says is most critical to shooting in live locations. 바카라I have friends all over Mumbai. For example, if I have to go to Colaba. I know there is Baburao (a friend) there. I get someone to call him. We have to maintain friendships with locals. We need their co-operation during shoots,바카라 he says.
It바카라s not just local roughnecks who are hazards for live location shoots. Sometimes, trouble comes from unexpected quarters, according to Bhogle.
바카라During the shooting of Taxi Number 9211, actor John Abraham was present onsite. There were some affluent women in the garden nearby. We happened to overhear their conversation. They wanted to physically catch hold of John Abraham. I requested that he wait in the vanity van, but he refused. As he moved to take position for the shot, the same women rushed towards him, pushed him down on the ground and started kissing him and pulling at him. The shooting had to be cancelled for two days,바카라 he says.
Shooting in the crowded lanes of Jama Masjid or Crawford Market is challenging as it is dynamic, he claimed.
바카라For an advertisement of a foreign courier company, they wanted a shot of a delivery boy running through a crowd through different weather to deliver the parcel. They wanted a small lane, so I opted for a lane from Jama Masjid to Crawford Market (South Mumbai). We created a rain scene with water pouring down five to six buildings through sprinklers and pumps. We packed bullock carts, horses and elephants into the narrow lane too. The filmmaker wanted all the 180 shops in the lane opened (for the shoot) and I got that done too. It was a successful shoot,바카라 Bhogle recalls.
Dealing with live location shoots over the years, Bhogle has seen the footprint of greed widen along with the girth of the city and the ground-swell of political parties that inhabit the metro.
바카라Earlier, these (political) party groups would not interfere with film shoots. But now, people who claim to be representing political parties arrive on the sets and argue that 바카라if you are shooting a Rs. 50 crore film, how can you not even spare us Rs. 5,000? We are not asking for Rs. 5 lakh바카라,바카라 he says.
Even at a time when cutting-edge LED screen technology for set-creation appears to challenge the significance of shooting in live locations with widespread use of advanced visual effects, according to Bhogle, location managers would not go out of business. Technology-generated sets he suggests, cannot match the real feel and vibe of shooting at a live location.
Obtaining permission from multiple government agencies, often regarded as a bureaucratic bane, he says, is also a ticket to combating technological advances, for location managers like him.
On average, shooting at a live location in Mumbai involves sourcing a minimum of four to five permissions from government agencies, which include the traffic police, local police station, the Commissioner바카라s office, the municipal corporation, even local parking agencies. If the location is a heritage site like the Gateway of India, permissions need to be sought from the Indian Navy, the nearby Port Trust authority and top Mantralaya bureaucrats.
바카라You can search for whatever location online, but you will still need people like us to seek and process permissions. Companies now have production managers who have their own teams for processing these permissions. But even they cannot 바카라adjust바카라 in Bhendi bazaar or Kamathipura, where you have to deal with the locals,바카라 Bhogle insists.
바카라As long as films exist, so will location managers,바카라 he says prophetically.
(With inputs from Haima Deshpande)
