A poetic journey to the old city of Ahmedabad, PATANG weaves together the stories of six people transformed by the energy of India's largest kite festival.
Every year a million kites fill the skies above Ahmedabad–dueling, soaring, tumbling and flying high. When a successful Delhi businessman takes his daughter on a surprise trip back to his childhood home for the festival, an entire family has to confront its own fractured past and fragile dreams.
Music and fireworks, food and laughter, a kaleidoscope of color and light, the magic of the kite flying high – a traditional recipe of healing and renewal.
With naturalistic performances from actors and non-actors alike, bold, lyrical editing, vibrant cinematography and a kinetic score, Patang delights the senses and nourishes the spirit.
CAST
Seema Biswas
(Water, National Award winner for Bandit Queen)
Nawazuddin Siddiqui
(Peepli Live, Dev D, Firaaq & Black Friday)
Sugandha Garg
(Tere Bin Laden, Jaane Tu Jaane Na & My Name is Khan)
Introducing
Mukund Shukla
Aakash Maherya
Hamid Shaikh
Pannaben Soni
CREW
Directed and Edited By
Prashant Bhargava
Written by
Prashant Bhargava and James Townsend
Produced by
Jaideep Punjabi
Executive Producers
Vijay Bhargava
Jaideep Punjabi
Cinematography by
Shanker Raman
(Harud, Peepli Live, 2009 National Award winner Best Cinematography for FROZEN)
Original Music by
Mario Grigorov
(Precious, Taxi to the Dark Side)
Sound Supervision and Re–recording Mixing by
Tom Efinger
(Sugar, Half Nelson, Goodbye Solo, Man Push Cart)
Sound Design by
Abigail Savage
(Sugar, Half Nelson, Goodbye Solo, Man Push Cart)
Consulting Editor
Joe Klotz
(Junebug, Precious, Rabbit Hole)
Costume Design by
Sujata Sharma
(Monsoon Wedding, Seven Years in Tibet, 2008 Filmfare award Winner Best Costume Design for Gandhi My Father)
Art Direction by
Meera Lakhia
(Mumbai Se Aaya Mera Dost, National Award Winner for Bhavni Bhavi)
Sound Recording by
Vinod Subramanian
(Rock On, The Darjeeling Ltd.)
Casting by
Anjali Punjabi
(Little Zizou, Monsoon Wedding)
Music Supervisor
Doug Bernheim
Shivani Ahlowalia
Original Tracks by
Shubha Mugdal
Maga Bo
Ben Horn (Djuma Soundsystem)
Copyflex (Djuma Soundsystem)
Pankaj Awasthi
Papon
Shilpa Rao
Lyricists
Aalok Shrivastav
Amitabh Bhattacharya
Khaak
Colorist
Blase Theodore
The seeds for the movie Patang were planted in 2005, when director Prashant Bhargava traveled to Ahmedabad to experience the city's annual kite festival. "When I first witnessed the entire city on their rooftops, staring up at the sky, their kites dueling ferociously, dancing without inhibition, I had to make this film."
Inspired by the spiritual energy of the festival, he returned the next three years, documenting his experiences with over a hundred hours of video footage. Slowly immersing himself in the ways of the old city, he became acquainted with its unwritten codes of conduct, its rhythms and secrets. Prashant would sit on a street corner for hours at a stretch and just observe. Over time, he connected with shopkeepers and street kids, gangsters and grandmothers. This process formed the foundation for developing the characters and story. As he began to write the script, Prashant realized that capturing the spirit of the festival and the city-its beauty and flow, joy and strength, healing and transcendence-would require multiple narratives. And so Patang found its shape as three interwoven stories centering on a family that reunites for the kite festival.
Shot on location with a cast of both non-actors and professionals, Patang draws from the neo-realist tradition. Preserving the naturalism of the environment guided every decision during filming, from shooting style to crew size to the process with the actors. The owner of the camera store, who ended up playing Bobby's father, continued to conduct business during the two days of shooting at his shop. Having become a familiar presence in the old city proved indispensable in other ways as well. Prashant recalls, "We had a rapport and support from the politicians, police officers, gambling bookies, the shopkeepers and the grandmothers from my years of research."
To encourage that naturalism and immediacy for the family scenes, Prashant inspired both his cast and crew to just live together-eat, talk, laugh, fight. Rooftop sequences were created with a group of friends, non-actors who had been flying kites together for thirty years. Renowned actor Seema Biswas co-hosted these celebrations in character, actively helping to prepare meals. Prashant had the cast improvise, shooting them in long takes. With the cameras rolling, he would whisper their objectives to them, to bring out the dramatic elements of the scene. Shanker Raman, director of photography, and Prashant shot simultaneously with two small HD cameras. Both would approach shooting as actors themselves, quiety dancing between the actor's performances.
Patang's joyful message and its cinematic magic developed organically from the deep roots in the life of the old city that Prashant had so carefully cultivated: "The sense of poetry and aesthetics became less of an imposed perspective and more of a view that emerged from the pride of the people and place."