The Nowhere Son

The Nowhere Son is an 2013 Indian/American independent film written, shot and directed by San Banarje starring Dadasaheb Phalke Award winner Soumitra Chatterjee, Trisha Ray, San Banarje and Biswajit Chakraborty. The film, produced by Next Actor Studio, Houston, was shot in India and USA in cities such as Calcutta, Kashi, Houston, Galveston and New Orleans.^[1]

San Banarje in "The Nowhere Son".

The film is listed in movie critic Joe Leydon's list of 'Five movies not to miss at Worldfest Houston'.^[2]

Plot

Physician Sanjay Chakroborty (San Banarje) lives in Calcutta with his professor father Anil (Soumitra Chatterjee) in a centrally-located house owned by their family for decades. The corrupt minister Maity (Biswajit Chakraborty) wants to acquire their plot for making a luxury hotel. However, the professor is against selling the house. Within a few days, Anil goes missing. Now Sanjay gives up everything in search of his father.

Production

While filming in Kashi (Varanasi), director San Banarje was detained by the local police for pointing the camera at a Hindu temple without permit. He was released after two hours.

This is the third film that San Banarje and Trisha Ray shot with Soumitra Chatterjee.^[3]

After filming his last feature Bodhisattva in seven days, director San Banarje used a different approach to film "The Nowhere Son," taking almost a year and half to shoot the film, in two different continents.

Almost every crew including the assistant sound recordist, assistant production manager, unit production manager, and production assistants acted in speaking parts.

In most of his solo scenes of Director and Cinematographer San Banarje, the camera was often operated by tourists in New Orleans, rickshawpullers in Kolkata, boatmen in Kashi (Banaras), porters in Howrah and sometimes it was kept on a stand while he performed in front of it.

Soumitra Chatterjee had to leave town for a few days when San Banarje approached him for doing this film. When San told him that he would not shoot the film without Chatterjee, the legendary actor cancelled his trip to play the part of San's father.

Trisha Ray edited the film during her chemotherapy to keep her mind distracted from her treatment.

The film was ready in September 2012 but just before burning the DVD, the hard drive crashed. The producers drove to Austin to try and get the data out but were told the drive was beyond repair. The rushes had to be digitized and film was recut from scratch, finally finishing in February 2013.

During the second edit, director San Banarje introduced new characters and fleshed out the story to add layers to the characters.

Cast

Soumitra Chatterjee

San Banarje

Biswajit Chakraborty

Trisha Ray

Samba Banerjee

Sankar Roy Chowdhury

Dibyaroop Roy

Ramasankar Paul

Suman Nandy

Sukanto Bhattacharya

Shahab Peer

Thiago Paes

Crew

Producers : San Banarje and Trisha Ray

Writer : San Banarje

Director : San Banarje

Cinematographer : San Banarje

Editor : Trisha Ray

Sound : Gautam Nag

Music : Gianmarco Leone

Production Manager : Sambhu Munshi

Screenings

The film first premiered in Houston at the Worldfest Houston International Film Festival in April 2013 where it was named as "Top Five Not to Miss Movies at Worldfest" by critic Joe Leydon. In June 2013, it played at the Hoboken International Film Festival in New York. Writer-Director San Banarje was interviewed by Garden State Journal prior to the screening.^[4] In November 2013, the film was screened at Alexandria, Virginia for Alexandria Film Festival.