Kathmandu:

The much-awaited film Kagbeni is finally set to be released on January 11 in Nepal, India and New York. People have been waiting to see the debut production of Quest Entertainment. The movie has been directed by Bhushan Dahal, screenplay by Prashant Rasaily, Bidur Pandey is the cameraman and music has been composed by Sarad Gurung. The producers are Nakim Uddin, Rajesh Siddhi and Bhaskar Dhungana. The cast of talented actors and Dhungana, shared their bittersweet experiences while making the movie.

A new team

“We felt that a new work should be presented in a new way, with new actors and a whole new team. Since it was the first time for everyone undertaking such a major project and the level of experience was almost same, there was no feeling of seniority, this made working with each other more comfortable, accepting each others good qualities and flaws too,” says Bhaskar Dhungana.

Acting on the big screen

Diya Maskey has acted in serials like Katha Sukha ko and Dalaan, has been doing theatre, while talking about making way into the silver screen she says, “I think its just a difference in medium, I didn’t find it difficult.” Whereas, Saugat Malla, theatre actor, who has also done small roles in movies like Daag and Panchi says, “I’m still not very familiar with the camera and don’t feel as comfortable as I do while performing onstage. He adds, “At first I found it quite difficult but when I came to think of the camera as my audience it got easier for me.” Both say that it was the intimate scene they had to enact in the movie which, they found the most difficult to shoot.

And for Nima who is a big movie buff especially of British movies says, “After music its movies that really interest me and when I got this opportunity it was a dream come true for me.” He adds, “With such quality music videos that are being made these days, we saw that there are talented people who have the potential to start a new trend in movie making in Nepal.” And when he got a chance to be a part of it there was no looking back.

Getting into the character

The Kagbeni team stayed in lower Mustang shooting in various places like Jomsom, Shyang, Marpha and Kagbeni. And talking about the people there Diya says, “The way they speak and even the body language was not very different from ours so it wasn’t very difficult.” Agreeing with Diya, Saugat adds, “I felt the character I was playing was very much like me, so it wasn’t much of a problem”.

Memorable incidents

Nima instantly remembers the scene where he had an accident, he says, “I had to act out a scene where I fall down, my friends were telling me I was doing fine, but I thought of doing it even better but ended up falling down really bad and hit a stone.” But he does have good memories too, “During Bhai tika a girl came up and put tika on my forehead,” he remembers. And all the others elaborate that Nima had a huge fan following and fan clubs there as well.

As for Saugat, he recalls an incident when they were shooting in Khinga — people came and asked who was the hero of the movie, when Nima pointed to Saugat people left as they could not believe it was a shooting of a movie at all.

Singing and dancing with the local people while celebrating Tihar is what Diya fondly remembers the most. “I also loved the journeys we had walking through the beautiful, scenic places there,” she adds.

The flip side

It was the weather that Diya found a bit difficult to acclimatise to, as it was quite cold. And Nima says, “I felt very homesick, staying away from my family for a month.” “In the starting even the locals were quite excited to see us, but since it’s such a small place, after sometime it started getting a bit mundane, I felt like even the locals must have been bored seeing us everywhere, everyday.”

A note to the audience

“People have tried imitating Bollywood but it doesn’t work here, so we have tried to make a movie that has our own style. The movie is focused on the crowd that goes to watch Bollywood movies and NRNs too,” says Bhaskar Dhungana.

He adds, “This is just the beginning. We are tr-ying to introduce a new style and encourage the new generation. This is just adding a layer to the present market.”