NEW YORK: New York based independent filmmaker Shailja Gupta has launched her maiden film ‘Walkaway’ online for viewers in India.
The Indian American movie is in English. Positioned as a light-comedy drama, the film mocks the clutches of social obligations on young Indian professionals settled in New York City. The story softly weaves through the lives of four couples from diverse backgrounds, as they face the non-envious dilemmas of living in an international contemporary society, away from home, while still being expected to fulfill archaic and age old Indian tradition and how they deal with it.
Set against this backdrop the movie gives us a glimpse of the tangled web we weave when dealing with the affairs of the heart. The relationships and the sometimes typical and sometimes unique individual reactions of the characters in the movie, as they deal with the varied situations, strike a chord with the viewers.
New York’s best South Asian acting talent – Manu Narayan, Samrat Chakrabarty, Manish Dayal, Saniv Jhaveri, Deepti Gupta, Carrie Anne James, Pallavi Sharda, and Ami Sheth have been cast in the soft romantic movie. The film has received positive reviews from international press.
This is one of the first ever movie to be released with in-video paywall. The New York Times said “A little Bollywood, a lot American Indie” about this movie and Newsday said “Filmmaker Shailja Gupta has a sure hand and eye” and Access Bollywood said “Will resonate with anyone who’s ever been in a serious romantic relationship.”
Over the last two years she has donned many hats – from conception and fund raising, through production and post-production, to marketing and release. “I have grown as much as a professional with this movie. While the two year journey has not been easy, the whole hearted support of the industry has been very encouraging. My unique method of launching this movie in the country might just inspire more independent film makers; who get tired running after the distributors, to release their movies online as a more viable option to showcase their art.” Shailja Gupta said.
“Shah Rukh Khan has been a major factor that has helped me realize my dream into reality.” Reciprocating on her comment, King Khan said, “It’s a lovely movie and is straight from the heart. I would love for all of you to watch it and enjoy it as much as I have enjoyed viewing it.”
The movie has eight songs across languages as they track the cross cultural stories in English, French, Hindi, Marwari and Tamil. Bollywood’s mega music directors and leading international artists like Vishal & Shekhar, Ram Sampath, Sagar Desai, Manu Narayan, Kurush Mistry and Samrat Chakrabarti have contributed to the foot tapping music of the movie.
Academy Award winner (sound mixing for Slumdog Millionaire) Resul Pookutty has provided the sound mixing for Walkaway. Renowned actor Shah Rukh Khan’s production house Red Chillies Entertainment assisted in the post production, editing and VFX.
The movie is available for viewing on http://www.walkawaymovie.com or facebook.com/walkawaymovie via a unique, first of its kind, in-video paywall at a minimum cost of $2.99. Once paid, viewers can watch the movie anytime within 24 hours of the payment. Users can also support the cause of Independent cinema by donating higher amounts which gives them different options from getting DVDs to posters, website credits to producer credit. One can also download the songs from all Android Market Place and I-tunes.
India Post News Service
