An actor playing a double role can’t be at two places at the same time, but two filmmakers certainly can. While shooting an action sequence for their forthcoming film, A Gentleman, director duo Raj Nidimoru and Krishna D.K. strategically used the strength of two to their advantage. The duo split up to shoot at two different locations, with a clear strategy in mind. While Krishna held the mantle at the top of a skyscraper, from where Sidharth Malhotra was supposed to jump using a rope, Nidimoru was in charge of filming a scene in the parking lot below, where the actor would eventually land. The two coordinated over the phone to maintain uniformity in the sequence. “Shooting in the U.S. is very expensive, so this way we could do two day’s work in one,” says Nidimoru. “Plus, it’s an action intensive film, which we shot on a romcom budget,” adds Krishna.
For the longstanding collaborators — who have been friends since their engineering days in the U.S. — working together enables them to keep a check on all aspects of filmmaking. “Like the other day, DK was in the studio looking at the VFX, while I was in the mix looking at the tapes,” says Nidimoru. “It’s like the director can be everywhere at once,” grins Krishna.
Eclectic appeal
A Gentleman is the duo’s sixth directorial collaboration. When the Andhra techies started out in 2003 with a self-funded indie film, Flavors, little did they anticipate that filmmaking would eventually become their full-time profession. “But that movie suddenly became this cult film,” recounts Nidimoru. Despite the appreciation, Flavors’ popularity among the Indian diaspora abroad didn’t materialise into an instant entry into Bollywood for the duo. So they returned to the U.S., where they resumed their lives as engineers. On the sidelines, they jointly wrote scripts. After six years, they returned to Mumbai to give movies another shot. Their second film 99 (2009), met with a positive reception and managed to get the duo noticed in Bollywood. Since then, the two have worked on a singular motto: to make every film different from their previous ones.
With that in mind, Krishna and Nidimoru, made a crime comedy, Shor in the City (2011); a zombie drama, Go Goa Gone (2013); a romcom, Happy Ending (2014); and now an action film, A Gentleman. The duo prefers to describe their latest movie as “self-aware action film”, which is an ode to the big budget popcorn cinema they grew up on.
An aspect that runs across all films of Krishna and Nidimoru is a light touch of dark humour. They clearly enjoy black comedy but use only a palatable amount of it in their work. “It’s like 60% dark chocolate,” jests Nidimoru. “In Shor or Go Goa Gone we went all out, but A Gentleman is more mainstream of the films we’ve made,” says Nidimoru. “But we also wanted to bring this sense of wackiness in mainstream cinema that we rarely see,” Krishna chimes in, as Nidimoru nods in agreement.
Starting out with an independent film — made purely for the love of creativity — the duo now has to factor in the demands and suggestions of producers, studios, marketing teams and distributors while directing a mainstream effort. Despite the restrictions and instructions, Krishna says they have adapted to the system with time but haven’t compromised. Nidimoru illustrates an example. The working title for A Gentleman was ‘Reload’, but once completed, the marketing team along with the producers pointed out that the title would have no connect with an Indian audience. “And they were right because reload is a very technical term,” says Nidimoru. “So we knew it was going to be a nice guy, a common man, a family man or a gentleman”.
Conflict resolution
For the duo, who not just directs but also writes collaboratively, conflict resolution comes easy. Krishna claims, and Nidimoru agrees, that the differences which crop up between the two are minor, owing to a shared taste in cinema. “It’s like this, if there’s a critic you like or follow, your likes and dislikes in movies will match with that person 90% of the time. We both have that natural alignment too,” explains Nidimoru. However, Krishna emphasises that it is imperative for the two to be entirely in agreement with a decision. “Once we’ve decided we’re going to use a chair in a scene, the debate would be something small, like the colour of the chair,” says Krishna. “And I haven’t done anything that you hated completely,” says Nidimoru, looking at Krishna expectantly. “Never,” he responds.
The camaraderie between the two is reflected online as well. Nidimoru and Krishna share a Wikipedia page, which the duo is unaware of. When informed, they are pleasantly surprised. “It’s nice to have a singular identity because we’re representing the same thing,” says Nidimoru. “We’re not two heads going in different directions. So whoever made that common Wikipedia page, it makes sense”.
A director duo that Krishna and Nidimoru admire the most are the Coen brothers. “After being fans of [Steven] Spielberg and watching other Hollywood films, suddenly you see a couple of guys who are in the system but are doing their own thing… that appealed a lot to us,” says Nidimoru. The two techies-turned-filmmakers hope to thread the same path as the Coen brothers, where they end up with a filmography of eclectic and eccentric movies.