CREATING SOUNDSCAPES: TAPAS NAYAK

Tapas Nayak has been working in the film-industry for close to two decades now, with a number of blockbusters and award winning films under his wings. Asking him to pick a few of them to discuss their soundscape is a real challenge, since every film in which he has worked is equally dear to him.

Here, I asked him to select a few representative ‘tasks’ that challenged his limits of imagination and creativity; they might not be his best work, or his best films, but they define an attempt to do something new and unique, and always as a team. I expect this should add to our learning curve.

*Tapas brought home an award for ‘To Let’ – from Chile, South Film and Arts Academy Festival*

A sound-engineer, like every other creative artist/ technician is only as good as his director. No, Tapas didn’t say that, I did.

I sincerely believe that the job of every film-technician, including script-writers (who write for others) is to make somebody else’s dream come true. But that doesn’t mean that we cannot make those dreams align to our own desires.

A good director will give his team enough leeway to let their creative juices flow – but also prevent them from going over-the-top.

This balance is what makes a good film great.

Within that premise, let me first bring you what Tapas told me when I asked him about some classic examples of using sound as a ‘character’.

STORYTELLING IN SOUND

“If you take Ritwik Ghatak’s film ‘Meghe Dhaka Tara’ – the boiling sound of the rice becomes such a big metaphor.

Or that belting of the horse; when Neeta, the character has so much of turmoil in her life that she is almost like that horse that is being belted to run all the day, sacrificing everything of her own life.

There are so many examples. In films like ‘Pushpak Vimanam’ – the character of Kamal Hasaan comes from a noisy, crowded, shanty kind of area. One day he has to spend a night in a five star hotel. But when he tries to sleep – he is feeling so awkward with the silence. He is not used to it and it is terribly unsettling for him. So he goes back to the shanty with a tape-recorder and records all the cacophony of the place, comes back to the hotel, plays it back and sleeps peacefully.

So there, the director is taking a point of view. He is using sound as a tool for the audience to think in a certain way.

That’s what I call storytelling in sound.

Lots of directors have used sound very effectively. Like in ‘Pather Panchali’- the train horn becomes such a big motif in the whole film. It’s like a contrast – a progressive train line is on the other side, and in this side you have a village family that is suffering and going through a phase of depression. And then these kids go to discover one day – and the approaching of the train, and what they hear – all of that is integrated into the storytelling.

So beyond the human characters, Ray has added another character here – that is sound.”

Tapas believes Sound Technicians can contribute immensely when they are involved from the beginning of the film.

Like what happened in Prasanna Vithanange’s ‘With You Without You’. When Tapas met Prasanna for the first time, he was ready with a bound script. Believe it or not, that’s a rarity.

I’ll let Tapas tell the story in his own words.

BRINGING SOMETHING FROM BEYOND THE FRAMES

” Prasanna sir said, look, this is the script. You like it, you do it. There are no compulsions. Ever since that first meeting, with him, I have always felt that he respects every technician as an artist. So he wants our perspective.

Once you look for it, only then you get it. Most of the times, the doors are shut from the other side, and that’s the problem.

See that film is a love story between a Sinhala man and a Tamilian woman. This man is a pawn-broker who is confined to his iron-house kind of residence, always locked up inside where people come and pawn their stuff.

That film was originally planned without music. Afterwards we though three pieces of music would really help it. But because I got the script from the beginning – we discussed and thought how we can bring in something from beyond the frames.

We told Prasanna Sir – why don’t we do something? While this person is looking outside the window – there is a temple nearby. So the leakage for the temple can become a character for the whole film.

So just because that one shot of the temple got incorporated in the film, the audience perceives that there is a temple nearby, and that temple will be always active in terms of morning, evening and so on. So when the characters start fighting, or when things are not going good, or when they really start living together for the first time – all those sounds that are coming from the temple really helps in creating another character, or an atmosphere.

That’s the benefit of involving a sound person from the beginning. However, most of the times it doesn’t happen that way; you get to see the film after it is edited most of the time, so its rhythm and pace is already set.”

Another film that put his creative faculties to test is eminent cinematographer Rajeev Ravi’s direction debut in Malayalam, Annanyam Rasoolam, from 2013.

It’s a love story, but the way local sounds play a role in building tension and forming seamless points of transition is fascinating.

At times, it did feel to me, that this was probably the first tribute of Tapas Nayak to his early struggling days in Chennai – not ‘To Let’. For those of you who might be wondering where all this is coming from – you probably have to read my post on ‘To Let’ – a fascinatingly realistic film from director Chezhiyan. But I would suggest, don’t break the flow. Scroll down, but do come back to this post, later.

CRAFTING REALISM: THE ‘TO LET’ SOUNDSCAPE

Here, I interviewed director/cinematographer Chezhiyan, ace-editor Sreekar Prasad and Tapas Nayak.
This film, I believe, is a text book in cinematic realism.

Rajeev Ravi, from FTII, is a cinematographer per excellence.

His work with directors like Madhur Bhandarkar and Anurag Kashyap has already made him a much coveted technician – replete with his own brand of creative aesthetics. When someone like him makes a directorial debut, he obviously wants to go all out to make his maiden statement heard.

Well, silence is probably the best heard sound of all.

FEELING THE EMPTINESS THROUGH SILENCE

” That film is Rajeev’s tribute to Romeo and Juliet. He set it up as a love story between two different communities.

So towards the end of the film, if you notice, there is a major cacophony and Farhad Faasil who plays the lead character, he runs and he knows what is waiting for him. He knows that the love of his life is dead – she is no more.

He keeps running and comes to her house. When he reaches there – there is absolute nothing in there. Total silence – and the camera is just focused on him. That was one of the trickiest scenes that I have handled.

That’s because we debated and discussed – and whatever music we put was really diluting the impact. It was really making it melodramatic. So we had some 25-30 seconds of silence, actually. Silence means – it’s absolutely nothing. You can feel the entire emptiness of the death.

The easiest way could have been putting a piece of music or something like that – maybe put a solo violin – but whatever we tried to do didn’t work. The purpose of the film was getting defeated. So then we just put in silence – when he is looking at the dead body of Anna.”

Yet another example of total silence is from Mani Rathnam’s film ‘Raavanan’.

At the end of the film, the lead character, played by Vikram in the Tamil version, falls into a seemingly endless gorge, and there is complete silence. Just before that, an entire squadron of policemen were pumping bullets into him with deafening sound – and the contrast between that and this fall becomes a classic example of the ‘emptiness’ that Tapas was talking about.

But that’s not all. For Tapas, Ravannan remains a memorable film for many reasons. Though he was assistant to H Sridhar, who has worked on quite a few films with Mani Ratnam – Raavanan was the first time he was independently working with him as a Sound Designer.

‘A DIFFERENT KIND OF SOUNDSCAPE’

“Mani sir is someone who enjoys every aspect of film-making.

Maybe that’s why he pushes every artist to their limits. He will not be guiding you and telling you – ok you do this or that, rather he expects every artist to come up with their own vision for the film – and then see if it works or doesn’t work.

That film had a dense soundtrack; with A R Rahman’s music as well as all those elements of nature which were used properly to create a different kind of soundscape for the film.

One of the sequences I remember a lot. The lead character, Raavanan, is coming in search of Sita, there are faint remnants of her in that space. So we processed the ambience in a manner that it felt like a dream; as if she is still there, her presence is there, but the reality is, she is not there anymore.

And of course, the end part of the film which had total silence after such a huge cacophony – that was special.”

Among all the films where Tapas has worked, R Balki’s ‘Paa’ remains special for him. Not just because of the creative challenges it posed – but also because it made two of his deepest dreams come true, at one go.

Tapas always wanted to work with Amitabh Bachchan and Illya Raja.

But then, who doesn’t!

‘CREATING HIS VOICE WAS A CHALLENGE’

” In that film Amitabh Bachchan was playing a progeria patient who has aged but who is a kid. So the challenge was to make him sound his age while not making him sound his age.

You know he has a rich baritone, which is always distinct. But if you see the film, all his voice chunks had to be pitched and processed to make him sound in-between. In other words, if he is too much away, then the audience will feel that it is not Amitabh Bachchan.

At the dubbing studio, Mr. Bachchan himself took care to make his voice lighter – not to have that rich texture. Then of course during the post processing we pitched it up slightly and fabricated his voice – to make it sound not to have a low, boomy voice, but without losing its essential texture.

That was the first time I was meeting him, during the dubbing. That film was special because I had the privilege to meet two of my role-models – the first was of course Amitabh Bachchan and the second was Illya Raja sir.”

So more than being a challenge, it’s more of nostalgia for me, that film.

Whatever Tapas might say, it was a challenge for sure.

To better understand, perhaps one could refer to what happened when someone tried to do something alike earlier. Yes, I am referring to ‘Agneepath’ – the original 1990 film.

First-day-first-show Bachchan fans like me still remember the audience reaction when they heard Amitabh’s voice in that film after its immediate release. To emulate reality, and probably taking a cue from Marlon Brando’s role in Godfather, the creative team had decided to add a certain special husky texture to the voice of Vijay Dinanath Chauhan.

This ‘experiment’ didn’t go well with either critics or the masses. In fact it raised such uproar, that to save the film from bombing, Bachchan Saab had to redub the entire film in his trademark baritone.

Yes, I saw both versions and I loved the first one; and no, I am not comparing. That was another time, another craze. But tampering with Mr. Bachchan’s voice is always like walking the plank, even in a total experiment like ‘Paa’.

Now for another film from Kerala by another talented director Dileesh Pothan. Rajiv Ravi was the cinematographer here. Tapas mixed the sound.

“ FESTIVAL LEAKAGE HEIGHTENED THE STORYTELLING”

” This one is a very interesting film.

It’s a police station story – about a thief which is being played by Fahadh Faasil. He swallows the chain of a woman who is travelling in a bus. He is taken to the police station where a whole lot of things are happening – like an X-Ray and all that.

The challenge there was – because it’s a cop-story and because it was expected to be very realistic – we wanted something to happen in the background that connected to the audience. It was of course the director’s decision, to include this seven days festival that was happening just near the ground adjacent to the police station.

So the leakage from the performances – the Kalariattyam and all that was happening in the festival, is leaking into the police station. But the drama that is happening inside the police station is in total contrast to what’s happening there. Of course, it’s not a standalone thing – in the sense that if you open the window you can see the performances going on and all that; also, there is a night sequence where the woman’s husband and the thief spends the night together in the police station – so they are sitting and talking while all those performances are going on in the background.

Of course, later on, all that was happening in the background gets connected to the story as well. One of the guys run and got into that festival.

That one was a sync-sound film. Not done by me, by two other guys but it was a sync-sound film. But the festival leakage and all that was put in later – to heighten the storytelling.

Look that’s what Bresson says – what’s happening in the scene or what I get from the location is one thing, but for me what is important is what I keep on adding to make the audience think what the character thinks.

That’s another aspect to it. So we put in things together from the festival at certain points in the drama so that it works or gels or maybe create the contrast needed to tell the story better.”

Of all the films that I have seen that features the work of Tapas – Super Deluxe is my own personal favorite.

Like I mentioned in my last post, I loved the structure of the film a lot.

Not just this film – I have been a big fan of multiple-narrative story lines, or what some critics call ‘Hyperlink Cinema’.

Can’t help but bring you the trailer …

Even if we keep aside that ‘linking’ aspect, the entire colour-scheme of the film and its ‘pulpish’ yet richly realistic treatment is something really endearing for me.

If films like these are being made in India now, I really feel sorry for myself – since I should be the one writing them. Well, if not an entire film, the least I can do is to write a complete blog post on it; will try talking to the director Kumarraja soon.

For now, here’s what the Sound Engineer had to say.

“SOUND CONNECTS THE MULTIPLE NARRATIVES”

” Super deluxe is a complex film.

When we started off I met the director who said that he wanted to make a film that will be about multiple stories travelling in time – but they will converge at some point.

He also said that, overall, this film will be talking about life and philosophy. Almost the way – for example, a film like ‘Tree of Life’, Terrance Malik’s film, that talks about evolution, time and all that.

Super Deluxe became a special film for me because it had multiple narratives travelling through time; and sound played a major role in binding the film.

For example, during the high point of the film when the characters are talking – a TV is supposed to fall down from the skies and a guy is supposed to be dead after it falls on his head. But that TV falling has already happened in another story. In the film, much earlier, the TV has already fallen off.

So how do we connect these two time-frames? In the first story, where they throw the TV, we had an aircraft passing. So we brought in the aircraft sound here in the second story as well, so that the audience feels that both the stories are happening within the same time-zone. So that becomes the connection of the time zone from that film to this film.

Fact is, the whole film has been treated with a very complicated sound scheme – and something or other is happening all the time.

And of course, the way Kumarraja treats silence and music is entirely different in approach; it’s almost like a pulpish film, which has been treated in a way that the audience is always on the edge.”

How Kumarraja and his creative team did that is something that I too want to understand in detail – and not just from Tapas. So I am reserving some of his revelations here for that other prospective post, in which I will try to talk with the director as well as the editor of Super Deluxe.

Let’s see when that happens.

Regular readers of my blog would know that this post is in continuation of a two-part special with Tapas Nayak. Here’s a link to the earlier post.

STORIES OF SOUND, AND SILENCE: TAPAS NAYAK

And yes, the courtesy for the header image in this post goes to Kumar C Dev, assistant to Mani Ratnam, who accompanied Tapas for the ambiance recording trip to Kerala. It was taken during location recordings near Adiraapali waterfalls – for Ravaan.

Here’s the trailer of ‘Gaadi’ – a film by Prasanna Vithanange where Sreekar Prasad, Rajeev Ravi and Tapas Nayak have joined forces.
I have been fortunate to have a sneak-peek at the film, even before its Lankan release. It’s pure poetry, in everything it has done.

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