Welcome to Sajjanpur to be screened in LFF

Veteran director Shyam Benegal's latest offering 'Welcome to Sajjanpur' is set to be screened at the forthcoming London Film Festival .

The movie will be screened in the competition section on World Cinema at the fortnight-long festival starting Oct 15. The LFF screening will also mark the movie's Britain and European premiere. The film is being released in India on Sep 19.

A comedy, 'Welcome to Sajjanpur' is a satirical take on the reality of the contemporary rural India, especially on the government's much-vaunted literacy drive. Shreyal Talpade, Ravi Kishen, Divya Dutta and Amrita Rao essay the key roles in the movie.

Benegal, who is better known for his thought-provoking serious movies, takes a detour and tells a light-hearted delightful tale in the movie. He recently said he was inspired to make the movie by a unit hand, a light man of his own production unit.

'Some time back the light man, who had never gone to school, got married to a girl who has some education. Since she lives in a village in UP and he in Mumbai, he would ask others to write letters on his behalf to his wife. That inspired me to weave a story around his new-found life,' Benegal said.

This is how the movie came into Existense.

Amrita Rao in a New Avtar in Sajjanpur

Amrita Rao is on a new high having starred in Welcome to Sajjanpur directed by the legendary director, Shyam Benegal.

Asked how she felt acting in a comedy by the famous director, Amrita Rao said, “I am super duper excited. Being a part of a Shyam Benegal movie was actually a high point for me when I first read the script. He is somebody who is liked and revered by everyone in my community.”
She recounted how she was impressed with his film Zubeida and when she got an offer from him, she had no qualms in accepting.

Asked how she landed the role, she said,” He said that he had seen me in Vivah and felt that I most appropriately suited the role in terms of look and age and all that he was looking for. So yes…I got lucky .

Is Sajjanpur a different sort of comedy? “The film is a fascinating story of the people living in this village called Sajjanpur. Mahadev is the protagonist of the film and he’s the common factor amongst all the characters in the film. He is the only literate guy in the village and everybody comes to him to write their letters.

The village Sajjanpur is full of mad-hatters and we want people to come and forget their own world come into this small village and have fun with us.

Not just that, in fact when you come out of the theatres, you will realize that in retrospect, some of the things, which you laughed about during the film, are some of the grave issues that our country is facing.

Even today in the so-called modern India there are villages like Sajjanpur which face the issues that the film portrays.” explains Amrita Rao.

Welcome to Sajjanpur ready to get released

Shyam Benegal’s film “Welcome to Sajjanpur” has been selected for the London Film Festival 2008 which will be held in mid Oct. The film features Shreyas Talpade, Amrita Rao, Divya Dutta and Ila Arun. The film reportedly will release on 19th September.

Amrita Rao seemingly took lots of pain to get into her character. She played a simple village woman who is a potter by profession. Amrita learnt pottery wearing the clothes which she was required to wear for the movie in order to lend credibility to the character. She also wore make up to make her look darker than she is as the character demanded it. “Being a potter, my character needed to have a very sun-tanned look. So, although my make-up is minimalistic, I have donned make-up to look dusky,” added miss Rao.

The film was originally titled Mahadev ka Sajjanpur and it is about a guy who is one of the few educated young men from Sajjanpur and who makes his living by writing letters. It is a comedy film set in the fictitious small village ‘Sajjanpur’. However, it is yet to be seen whether it succeeds to entertain the Indian crowd.

Amrita Rao -An Uneducated Village Girl

Amrita Rao invites you to a one day fun filled trip to Sajjanpur . Come and meet a hilarious bunch of people. This is a kind of trip you will enjoy and surely don’t want to miss.

That is exactly what Amrita Rao is doing in her upcoming film Welcome To Sajjanpur . “We all invite you to Sajjanpur . It is a mad hatter town. We just want to invite the audience to come and have fun. That is the main objective. We are not here to preach. It is a funny film”, said Amrita.

For the first time in her career Amrita will play an uneducated village girl in the film. She plays a girl who does pottery. It is a role which is visually drastic in terms of get ups and the costume drama happening around it. She speaks Hindi in Baghelkhandi which has a very different dialect. She has never played a total uneducated gaonwali which she plays in this film.

Welcome to Sajjanpur is directed by Shyam Benegal and is slated to release on September 19.

Amrita ao does a Hot Item Number

Has Shyam Benegal been lured by the item song?

The legendary director of classics like Ankur, Nishant, Bhumika and Manthan will apparently feature Amrita Rao in what looks like an item number in his latest film, Welcome To Sajjanpur.

Initially titled Mahadev Ka Sajjanpur, the film also features Shreyas Talpade, playing a letter-writer in a village of uneducated people.

A set on Ramoji Studios in Hyderabad was converted into a small village called Sajjanpur. When the cast reported on the sets each day, they used to greet each other thus: "Welcome to Sajjanpur".

Talpade then suggested to Benegal that he consider renaming the film Welcome To Sajjanpur; the director agreed.

Amrita is said to feature in an item song, part of a dream sequence. Quite a change from the previous roles the demure lass has essayed and quite a change from Mr Benegal's films too!