KARACHI: A few days ago, a teaser of a Pakistani film was uploaded on Youtube – the video started with a shot of satellites in outer space and, after many twists and turns, ended up on the destruction of Karachi.
The film is called Kolachi and the promo has gone viral on the internet with every next person sharing the link to what seems like Pakistan’s first science fiction feature film.
The film that will enter the production phase in April 2011 is written by Summer Nicks, a Pakistan-based Australian filmmaker. Produced by Nicks, Meher Jaffri and Craig Peter Jones, the film will be directed by Mansoor Mujahid and shot by Faraz Iqbal.
Meher Jaafri, Summer Nicks, Hisham Aziz, Moiz Baadshah, Akbar Islam, Saqib Khan, Fawad Khan and Shahroz Subzwari have been roped in to star in Kolachi, scheduled to be released at the end of the year.
“The film deals with the Karachi that can exist five minutes from now or maybe five years from now,” director of the film Mansoor Mujahid told The Express Tribune.
“The Karachi we are aiming at is a cross between New York and Iraq. If we look at what has happened in the city in the past few years, we find that a lot of foreign investment is coming but our basic ethnic and sociopolitical issues have not been resolved as yet”, said Mujahid.
“The film is about how all the issues from target killings to bomb blasts will eventually erupt into a bigger issue that Karachi will have to face. So, largely it is about concerns that will eventually lead the character of this city to apocalypse,” Mujahid told The Express Tribune.
He added that on a more philosophical level, the film is about joy and fate and how the characters are left with the choice of either accepting their fate or taking responsibility.
“Basically if you look at Karachi, the city generates 70 per cent of the country’s revenue and all it gets in return are bomb blasts and target killings. The city poses a question to us,” said Mujahid.
The director is very optimistic about facing the problems of censorship and other difficulties that filmmakers in Pakistan have to deal with, “No artist can be a fan of censorship , but you must respect all cultural sensibilities and sensitivities.
I might have to make a separate cut for Pakistan if required but I am completely fine with it.”
Kolachi will be 60 per cent in English and 20 per cent in Punjabi and Urdu each. As the film deals with the circumstances that lead to an apocalypse, there are a lot of special effects incorporated in it.
“The film has a tremendous amount of special effects. Karachi fades away, a lot of bad things will happen to the city as the image of Karachi we portray is an alternating image of the city – it is more of a reflection of Karachi as Gotham City reflected New York in Batman,” said the director.
All the foreign investors interested in the film wanted the filmmakers of Kolachi to hire foreign crew members but the director has made a conscious effort to employ as many Pakistanis as possible. 75 per cent of the people working on the project are from Pakistan.
“We are all really excited about the film and we have received a great response to the promo.
“Optimistically speaking, if everything goes as planned, we will release it in 2011,” Mujahid told The Express Tribune
Published in The Express Tribune, February 25th, 2011.
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