Apurva Asrani

Apurva Asrani
Born	Apurva M Asrani (1978-03-21) 21 March 1978 Bangalore, Karnataka, India
Residence	Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Other names	Apurva
Occupation	Film editor & writer
Years active	1995–present

Apurva Asrani (born 21 March 1978) is a National Award winning film maker, film editor and screenwriter based in Mumbai, India. He has a multimedia body of work in film, television and theatre and is best known for editing films like Satya, Shahid & City Lights.

Early career

Apurva began his career in 1995 as an assistant on the Bollywood countdown show Bpl Oye! that aired on Channel V. At 19 he became a film editor on the film Satya, directed by Ramgopal Varma. He then went on to edit Sunhil Sippy's bilingual comedy Snip!

Apurva's other work includes the gang war film Chhal, directed by Hansal Mehta. His work on the film received rave reviews from critics. Film critic Subhash K Jha wrote 'The real hero of Chhal is Apurva Asrani's editing'. Apurva edited Anupam Kher's directorial debut Om Jai Jagadish and Kalpana Lajmi's Kyon?. He also collaborated with Nagesh Kukunoor on his Akshay Kumar starrer Tasveer 8x10 as supervising editor and as film editor on Nagesh Kukunoor's Aashayein, starring John Abraham.^[1]

In 2012, Apurva edited Nila Madhab Panda's Jalpari The Desert Mermaid,^[2] after a collaboration with the director on the promotions of his last film, I Am Kalam.^[3] Jalpari is an adventure film that deals with the issue of female infanticide released on 31 August 2012. The film received glowing reviews and several critics praised Apurva's work on the film.

Shahid

Apurva edited & co-wrote Hansal Mehta's Shahid (2012) that is produced by UTV Films, Anurag Kashyap & Sunil Bohra.^[4] The film is based on the true story of slain lawyer Shahid Azmi who fought several pro-bono cases in India. Shahid world premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on 9 September 2012 & went onto win the Silver Prize at the Mumbai International Film Festival. Director Hansal Mehta had this to say about Apurva's contribution to the film – 'Apurva, besides editing the film also shaped the narrative into a seamless, linear progression for which I have credited him for screenplay. If the film communicates a compelling story a lot of credit for it goes to Apu'.

Awards

Apurva won the Filmfare Award for Best Editing for Satya at the Filmfare Awards held in 1999.^[5][6] In 2001, Apurva shared the National Film Award for Best Editing with Suresh Pai, for their edit of Snip!, a bilingual comedy directed by Sunhil Sippy. The National Awards citation read, "For creating an evocative rhythm enhancing the pace of the narrative while aesthetically maintaining the unit of form and content." He was also nominated for a Zee Cine Award for his edit of Hansal Mehta's Chhal in 2001. For the film Shahid, Apurva was awarded 'Best Screenplay' at the Life Ok Screen Awards in 2014 & the award was shared with Hansal Mehta.

Writing & Directing

In 2005, Apurva directed the music videos of Sony Music India's album Tera Mera Pyar. The title track, "Tera Mera Pyar", was sung by Kumar Sanu; "Yeh Kya Hua" was sung by Shreya Ghosal and composed by UK-based artists Partners in Rhyme. The video, shot in slow motion, featured a young couple playing out their romance at the movies. Tera Mera Pyar won album of the year at the Sahara Music Awards in San Francisco. Apurva was credited for directing portions of the Bollywood film Out of Control in 2003. He has also written & directed several episodes of the horror series 'Khauff' for SAB TV.

In March 2006, Apurva represented India in Editing Fashion, a multimedia experiment for UK-based showstudio.com. Apurva's short film Imperfect Moon was showcased along with the film of British director, Mike Figgis. On the UK stage, Apurva has collaborated with a British theatre company RIFCO to write dialogue for three successful UK touring productions: Bollywood: Yet Another Love Story (2000/2003), The Deranged Marriage (2006) and There’s Something About Simmy (2007).

2014–Present

As of July 2014, Apurva saw two major film releases as editor. Mrityunjay Devvrat's Children of War (formerly titled 'The Bastard Child'), a stark portrayal of the Bangladesh genocide of 1971 and Fox Star Studios & Vishesh Films CityLights directed by Hansal Mehta & starring Rajkummar Rao, Patralekha & Manav Kaul. Both films received glowing reviews from leading critics.

Aniruddha Guha in his Time-Out review of CityLights said: Hansal Mehta benefits from his association with long-time collaborator Apurva Asrani (editor, co-writer) who lends the film a personality that’s distinct (even from the original film). Rahul Desai in his Mumbai Mirror review of CityLights said: Mehta and writer-editor Asrani pull off a rare feat here. They not only choose the right film to adapt-based solely on its theme and universal topicality-but build upon the original, without being overambitious

In 2015, Apurva edited Viacom 18's 'Dharam Sankat Mein', an adaptation of the British hit The Infidel. The film stars Paresh Rawal, Naseeruddin Shah & Anu Kapoor in lead roles. He is also editing Manish Mundra & Ishka Films 'Waiting' directed by Anu Menon & starring Naseeruddin Shah & Kalki Koechlin. In 2015, Apurva makes his debut as a full fledged screen writer by writing the story, screenplay & dialogues of 'Aligarh', a human rights biopic produced & directed by Hansal Mehta.

Filmography

Film

References

Further reading

• Editing is storytelling
• Apurva Asrani at Show Studio
• Apurva Asrani at Times of India

External links

• Apurva Asrani at the Internet Movie Database