Guwahati, Jan 27: For Rajat Kapoor nothing matters but the script and the role he is offered. Kapoor has played a key role in Assamese language film ‘Anur’ which is released across Assam on Friday.
The actor-director who has acted in some of the highly critical and widely watched films in the last three decades is portraying the role of a retired IAS officer, Loshit Modliar in ‘Anur’.
“If the director is well known or lesser known, it doesn’t bother me. What matters to me are the script and the role that is being offered,” Rajat Kapoor told The Assam Tribune on his reaction to doing the first Assamese film.
‘Anur’ is being directed by Monjul Baruah and is based on a short story by Anuradha Sharma Pujaree. Gopendra Mohan Das has produced the film.
“I think the script was a decent one and the role I had to play is a decent one. So, I said yes, when I was approached,” Kapoor added.
Apart from Rajat Kapoor, Boloram Das, Jahanara Begum, Udayan Duarah, Bibhuti Bhushan Hazarika, Rajjashree Sharma and Bidya Bharati among others are seen in the film.
Kapoor also had to deliver his dialogues in Assamese for the film.
“That was a little hard as it was not your language. So, I had to memorise the lines. With Hindi and English I don’t have that problem… but with the new language, you can’t improvise much. That took a little bit of an effort but I could work around it,” he reckoned.
“I have also worked on two Bengali films earlier. So, it’s not a new experience as Assamese and Bengali are not very far.”
The story is about an aged widow who is a retired teacher living alone in the house built by her late husband and for whom the house and everything associated with it, are inseparable from the memories of her husband she carries through her lonely days and nights.
One day she comes across a trespasser who happens to be a widower and this suspicious intruder, through some happenings, comes across to her as a person whom she badly needs to break open the shell of her claustrophobic life, to whom she wants to confide her fear and desire.
Before getting released, ‘Anur’ had to struggle a lot and with the intervention of the Assam State Film (Finance and Development) Corporation, it finally got a few screens. Though the producer had booked the slot in April 2022, because of the big-budget ‘Pathaan’, ‘Anur’ was sidelined.
“It’s not a clash between regional and Bollywood films but small and big budget films. Even in Hindi, the kind of films in which I work, always have this kind of problem,” Kapoor said.
Director’s take on the story: “Anuradha Sharma Pujaree has always been one of the few Assamese writers I read for a nuanced understanding of the society I belong to. With my father’s death barely a month behind when I was contemplating a new project, the producer handed me a copy of a story by the novelist. I was stunned by the uncanny coincidence of the central character being a sensitive widow and my perception of my mother’s state of mind in the aftermath of my father’s death,” Monjul Baruah said recalling how it started.
“Suddenly Anuradha baideu’s that story made me empathise with several other widows of my acquaintance. I immediately felt connected to what I took as the subject of the story and so to speak I got hit by the idea of filming the story.”
