ELEMENTARY, MY DEAR WATSON!

SUNAINA BHATNAGAR

"ELEMENTARY, MY DEAR WATSON!"

“Unless you've been an AD, you'll never really quite know how deep the madness goes and what it really takes to make your favourite film'”

What does it take to make a film?! Everybody in the world has an opinion on films when they come out and everyone is vaguely familiar with the process or think they are anyway. But unless you’ve been an AD, you’ll never really quite know just how deep the madness goes and what happens behind the creation of some of your favourite moments. I've talked in great detail about what an Assistant Director does HERE in the 'finding your way in' section but for this blog I'll briefly repeat some of it. An assistant director is not someone who comes with the best ideas, or is the most creative. A great assistant director is great at execution, not necessarily the best thinker. Their job is not to invent the wheel, but to make sure the wheel is turning. For the most part, an assistant's job is to make sure that everyday on set works flawlessly, exactly like the previous day and as close to the director's vision as possible. For achieving that end, he/she has to do the exact same tasks over and over again.

I know of several AD's who would disagree with me, but spiritually I'd like to believe that an assistant director's primary work is to guard the vision of the film for the director. I'll always remember sitting on the steps of Adlabs with Imtiaz Ali and the rest of the team in the early hours of the morning dog-tired waiting for the final copy of Jab We Met. Imtiaz looked at us and said, ''ultimately the film begins and ends with the five of us". I remember carrying this sense of ownership for each of the films I assisted on and that feeling became my north star as an assistant on days where I felt lost.

Okay, what else is there to know? Maybe you're curious about the roles/jobs that AD's are assigned to on a set? Let's talk about a few of them. You've probably seen pictures of these, but don't know what they are exactly.

First up, lets talk about the clap board. The clap board is perhaps the most unpopular jobs amongst the AD’s and is usually assigned to the junior most assistant which is ironic given how important the job of a clap is in post-production. Any screw-ups here can cause severe delays on the edit!! The slate of the clapboard is used to mark out the different takes of a particular shot and the sound of the clap is used to sync the audio and video of the footage together in post production.

So it’s quite a technical job because you need to know the lens used by the cinematographer so that the clap can be in focus. It also often puts you very close to the actor and if you get close to the clapboard. I hated picking up the clap board, and tried my outmost best to never be giving the clap!

I don’t care what you have heard, on set managing the actors is one of the most critical parts of the job. The rehearsals, instructions and nuances given by the director are the backbone of the scene. Do all actors rehearse before a scene? Some more than others. The director adapts his style to fit the actors techniques. The more work that’s done before the camera rolls, the better the scene turns out. But there have been exceptions to this rule. Being part of the rehearsals gave me perhaps some of the best training in direction that no fancy film school could ever offer. If you can learn how to effectively communicate with your actors, that will automatically set you apart from the crowd.

A very under appreciated job on set is that of the script supervisor. His/her job is to follow the dialogue delivery during the takes and to ensure that every line has been spoken, and every improvised line has been brought to the attention of the director. Treating the script as the guiding bible on set is a must for all departments, but following the lines of the script is especially important because it can mess up the edit of the film.

The beating heart of the set, where everyone comes together is the playback monitor.The monitor is the playback device where the entire crew gathers to watch a shot after it is done. All the AD’s gather here to review the take, along with the director, the actors and very often the producers. The director looks at the shot in its entirety and tells you if any corrections need to be made for the next take. The continuity supervisor has a very critical role at the monitor. It is his/her job to ensure that the actors maintain continuity, i.e. flow through the same actions consistently through every re-take. This extends to all departments; the costume team makes sure the clothes remain consistent, prop supervisor ensures the same prop is used again and again etc.. Sounds simple, doesn't it?

LEARNING THE ROPES

One of my messiest and most embarrassing chapters as an assistant director revolved around how I managed the continuity sheets for the edit of Jab We Met. Back then, there were only three AD’s on the film and so each of us had multiple jobs on set. Ignorance made me take the continuity sheet the least seriously since it involved just scribbling down some take numbers and a sentence of description in a log book. What a lesson that was! When the continuity sheets arrived in the edit room for the editor Aarti Bajaj, she was rightfully furious because none of it made sense. Even I could not make sense of what take was marked and what wasn’t; and I wrote it! Watching the footage in the edit room and struggling to identify what take was ok, was really when I understood so much of what I had been mindlessly doing on the set. I remember being furious at my silliness, and spending a week red-faced off set, slowly sorting out all the footage as the enormity of my mistake struck me. But looking back, I’ll always be grateful for that goof up which unintentionally gave me face time with the most brilliant editor Aarti Bajaj who in later years has been a rock solid, friend, ally, mentor and one of my most favourite people in the film industry.