Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Everything you want to know about kannada movie LUCIA


When I wore a Lucia T-shirt and walked down the aisles of Mantri mall, I was pretty impressed to see that lot of people giving a sneak peak at my tees as if they know about Lucia. Their gestures and smiles told me that you’ve done a pretty good job by supporting project Lucia. However, when I wore the same tees to my workplace, I was asked by many of my colleagues, both Kannadigas and non kannadigas What’s LUCIA, What does it mean? And so many other questions. And I thought; why not post it on my blog? Read on!
LUCIA poster


LUCIA needs no introduction, but if you don’t know, it’s the first public funded (YES!) movie, a first of its kind experiment in the history in the Indian Cinema. Apparently, there are a lot of regional directors who make good cinema, but they seldom push it to the audience. So exceptional film makers like Girish kasaravalli don’t come to limelight until a national award is conferred on them. By the time we get to know about it, we’d have missed watching it. Thus a good movie misses reaching the audience. Pawan, the brain behind Project Lucia, very well knew about this atrocity. He knew that a good director should also be good at marketing, so that it reaches the right set of audience.

Why he went public: Even after 6 months of completing the script for Lucia, he couldn’t find a producer who was interested to listen to the gist of what Lucia is. They made fun of him. They mocked his idea and approach. Many producers told him that they’d give a chance to him to direct for a remake script.  Pawan was hell bent. LUCIA or NOTHING. His gut feeling was that Lucia can become a cult film for kannada industry. That’s when he decided to come to “US”, the real critics of the movie. For detailed discussion in his own words Click here

Pawan Kumar - brain behind LUCIA
How he went about it: He got offers to make it in other languages. But Pawan was very determined. It’s LUCIA in Kannada or nothing. But Lucia was only in script. There was a problem. The mother of all problems. Who will fund it? The project had to be shelved. But some of his admirers, supporters and followers gave him the idea of making Lucia with public funds.Yes. Collecting funds from the audience, by making “them” the producers of the movie. Making a movie with Public funds..??? Oh yeah..?? Really..?? 

But the option did not seem impossible. He started with no hopes at all. But he kept himself a 100 day deadline to reach the 50 lakh target. After working out all the pros and cons he decided to take the suggestions of the audience and opt for Crowd funding model for making the Film Lucia. That’s when the revolution started. Within a few days of announcing how he would go about it, he started getting mails that people were ready to invest in his venture. Within 12 hours more than a lakh had arrived in his account, all from people he doesn’t even know. How awesome is that. How he raised funds in detail – Click here
Another LUCIA movie poster

The making: Now, there were enough mails in his inbox to boost his confidence that this could be a reality. Now all he wanted was actors and technicians with flair; A passion, a fervor to deliver good things. To reach out to the right talent, he launched a 72 hour challenge, which was very simple. He asked the role seekers to make 4-5 min long Promo video about Project Lucia. They were free to be as creative as they want to be, use any medium to shoot, it could be live action or animation, but please use copyright free music and visuals only. And you have 72 hours to make this promo.

Ninasam Sathish offered to join. Auditions for actors also happened. Siddhartha Nuni took the director of photography on his shoulders, Poorna Chandra Tejaswi, a budding musician decided to create lovely music. Shashidhar Adapa offered to create sets which are as creative as himself and with so many others joining and taking the ownership, LUCIA team finally created the magic.

Now, next and the later:

Now: LUCIA has won the YCE (Young Creative Entrepreneur) award by the British Council. Lucia was selected for the London Indian film festival, won the award in the Audience choice category for the best film. All the international dailies including The Guardian and all Indian dailies have appreciated Project-Lucia for its accomplishments. 

Next: Theatre rent, television promotions, ads and other forms of marketing for the film needs an additional budget of 1.8 crores approx. So Project LUCIA has come up with a plan where you the audience can be the distributor. Yes! You can pre order it to watch online. Pre-order is an opportunity for you to play the role of a DISTRIBUTOR at a very low price/low risk. 

Later: With a Pre-order, not only are you getting a copy of the film, but you also get an opportunity to make money of the film. And we want you to do that. The more the money you make, that many more audience we get to watch our film. And that is what we want – more audience. For more details on “YOU” as a distributor click here

 There is already a buzz in the sandalwood that LUCIA has come very good and it’ll thump the box office. People are humming “Tinbeda kammi” merrily and gleefully. People who’ve watched it at the London Indian Film festival have given the audience back in India, a green signal. Momtaz of asiana tv says
Lucia is a real ‘milestone’ in South Indian cinema, and a film everyone should watch”.
Click here for complete review

Another audience Roopa Upadhya says
“Pawan Kumar lives up to his words, he has made a film that is young, intelligent, complex but still lot of fun”
Click here for complete review

For a man with Penny in his pocket and dreams worth million, this is much more than just achievement. His efforts are weirdly impressive. They say “Be the change you want to see in the world” and Project LUCIA and Pawan Kumar is an archetype that proves it. He deserves a standing ovation for this venture. I wish him all the very very best.
Watch LUCIA not to support him, but to appreciate what he is able to create out of nothing; to appreciate his endurance in driving this transformation; his taste for original scripts and his zeal for movies.   And of course for good movie watching experience, which has become a rarity in Kannada these days.

Thursday, August 8, 2013

The IVR (irritating voice response) blues



Dear Mr. whoever the fuck  you are, my hearty congratulations on launching one common toll free customer care number across India for your phone banking services. A great move, perhaps. Need of the hour, I must say. However, this is to bring to your kind notice about a paradox, a mockery of your customer’s patience in your IVR.  

Let me tell you that, I wouldn’t have bothered to write this if your IVR was toll free. Do you think we have lot of money and time that’s why we keep calling you? To hell with you. I had some enquiry to be made and I called your phone banking to get things clarified. But, when I ended the call, I went into a state of trance wondering, do I really know enough English to understand your IVR menus. The call lasted for more than 30 min, but I couldn’t find a way to talk to a phone banker. It took me more than 30 min (and of course my mobile bill) to find out that there is NO such option. Like Shah Rukh Khan and Karan Johar tricks the audience, I was a victim of your cheap irritating voice response strategies.

Which dumbass gave the IVR idea? Even H D Devegowda couldn’t have thought about it. I mean it. Press 1 for English..  Press 2 for Kannada………… Press 52 for Konkani... Press 53 for Bhojpuri….  Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah…  Why can’t you keep it simple..??? I pressed 1. (Thank heavens, it didn’t verify my English skills and ask me to spell “English”.). Again, Press 1 for account details. Press 2 for some other bullshit…  Press 23 for your checkbook’s 21st leaf number… OH MY GOD. OH MY DEAR GOD.. When I pressed 1. It said my 14 digit account number at 0.0000001 characters per sec, murmured my account balance which even Peter Parker with spider senses couldn’t hear and got disconnected by itself. 


Where the hell is an option in your IVR to talk to phone banker?  After wasting 30 min of time and with my mobile bill sky rocketing, I still couldn’t find it. I reached the card block dept (That’s the only easily, or rather reachable dept) and a guy told me “Yes saar, Tell saar.. Saar, I’ll place you on hold saar. And I get to listen to a sucker punch instrumental which sounds like a fucking Pakistani singing a sufi song when his testicles have been clutched. You’ll fall asleep. After ages, the associate gets back and says “saaar”, that’s when you regain your senses out of panic.  Saar, select the ‘Press 2 for check book details’ option saarand that will connect to phone banker saar. OK saar..?? TANK you saar. I wondered if Rameez Raja joined call center…!!!

Holy crap. How the hell did your analysts think that anyone would select “Checkbook details” to talk to phone banker? Even our CID Pradhyuman wouldn’t have cracked this one. I really want to know to which god damn Service Company is offering you this great service. Are you not paying them..?? Or is your IVR service a lifetime free complimentary gift from some startup enterprise for throwing them a couple of corporate accounts?
Aren’t you ashamed of yourself? You call yourself best bank in private sector, won awards… Screw you..!!! Do you even know what customer service is? To hell with those juries which give you these awards. They should be banned from functioning, for a lifetime. 


Please understand that OUR PHONE + YOUR BANK does not sum up to customer service. Forget good customer service, it’s not your cup of tea. At least, let your customers know how & in what innovative way you’ve cheated them. Alas, they deserve it. Don’t they? Please do something before your IVR finds a place in daily cartoons, SMS jokes and emails. Wake up..!!!

Image courtesy: google images