Rajat Kapoor – the wittiest of all – has finally tried his hand at a whodunit called “Everybody Loves Sohrab Handa,” which has finally been released on Zee5. The film is a murder mystery if you look at it from the outside, but if you intend to delve deeper, then you would witness a battle between different perspectives and worldviews in the most non-hypocritical sense, arguably, ever shown since Govind Nihalani’s “Party” (1984). However, separated from the Nihalani film, carrying not even an iota of the classic’s solemn mood, by an essential Rajat Kapoor wit, this film orbits around a guy called Sohrab Handa (Vinay Pathak) who perhaps has never known what hypocrisy is and how important it has become to cover the nakedness of individual bourgeoisie moving in an upper-class space.
His renunciation of everything valued in a bourgeois cultural system and an unapologetic attitude instantly create enmity with everyone present in a space pretending to be a civilized, cultured literati. Here lies the irony of the title. You will understand, as the film moves forward, that Sohrab Handa is not and has never been loved by anybody. His attitude towards the world is merely a coping mechanism to survive. Nevertheless, the film is entertaining and witty. It perfectly uses the whodunit genre as a vessel to channel its substance. On the occasion of its release, I sat with Rajat Kapoor to discuss this film and also had a brief chat regarding his filmmaking style. Below you will find our conversation:
Soumalya: How’re you doing?
Rajat Kapoor: Very good, sir! And how are you?
Soumalya: I’m fine! Rajat, my first question is, why is the title “Everybody Loves Sohrab Handa”? I mean, there’s clearly a pun involved, but what is it? I want to hear it from you.
Rajat Kapoor: It’s ironic. I thought it was interesting since in the beginning, you know that everybody hates his guts. So, I thought it would be fun to use that bit of irony.
Soumalya: I find the crux of the film to be a battle of ideas and perspectives. Could you tell me how you conceived the script?
Rajat Kapoor: Well, the idea was to make a whodunit. So, when you are making a whodunit, there have to be 15–16 people and a suspect. Then you start thinking what are their relationships with each other … what are their motives, aspirations, and then you find the characters’ story. What was interesting to me was to find their interpersonal dynamics and to portray them as real people … not just as ideas but as real human beings who are both good and bad.
Soumalya: Would you tell me about your intentions and motivations behind constructing such a unique character like Sohrab Handa?
Rajat Kapoor: Well, I thought it’d be interesting to have a guy whom everybody hates … a guy who is so obnoxious … who is such a bully … and in the film, if you see, everybody had reasons to want him dead. Then, in the writing, it became what it became. But having said that, I’d say I’m very fond of him. I like him very much … he is the least hypocritical man in that space … he doesn’t pretend … he says what he believes … also, he is very charming and, after all, he is a magnetic character. So, there are things to like about Sohrab Handa.
Soumalya: It appeared to me that he was the reason behind the outburst of ideas that we see in the film…
Rajat Kapoor: He provokes … his job is to provoke people. He provokes his father … he provoked the professor … he provokes his wife and everybody … he is the agent provocateur.
Soumalya: Rajat, I’ve always found the mise-en-scène in your films very subtle. I mean, they contain the exquisiteness of a theatre stage. So, what I want to know is, does your theatre persona influence you in certain ways when you make films?
Rajat Kapoor: Not at all … not at all … and I find it insulting when people say that my film mise-en-scenes are influenced by my theatre background. Because a film mise-en-scene is very different from what you do on stage … and I do a lot of both … so to create a shot in the film is done through a camera and not through the actors, and that’s a part people miss out, I think, while analysing the frame…
They don’t see what the camera is doing … and the most important character involved in the film mise-en-scene is the camera, and through the movement of the camera and through various lenses a shot is created in cinema … the chaos you see in a film mise-en-scene is created with the camera, with the help of editing and sound … so it’s very far from theatre or stage, and there’s no similarity at all.
Soumalya: Now I have a pretty complex question. I don’t know how to put it in the right manner. Sometimes I’ve traced a sort of intertextuality in your films. For example, there was an oblique reference to Hitchcock’s “Rope” in “Kadakh.” Similarly, I might be wrong, but it appeared to me that the soul of “Everybody Loves Sohrab Handa” is somehow connected with “Knives Out.” I’m interested to know how this happens. Is there a kind of cinephilia at work that makes you intentionally refer to other films, or does it happen subconsciously?
Rajat Kapoor: It has nothing to do with “Knives Out.” It’s a murder mystery, and murder mysteries carry similar tropes … there is a secluded place, 15 people are perhaps out there … one of them is the murderer … it’s a secluded place because nobody can come in, nor can they go out … so what has “Knives Out” got to do with it? Similarly, in “Kadakh,” people say that since the dead body is hidden in the chest, it is something like “Rope!” Where would you have hidden the dead body otherwise?
Think logically. Somebody comes into your house, kills himself, and now you have a dead body, and also you have a party … so where would you hide it? There are two options! One is in the fridge, and the other is in the chest of drawers. There is a film called “Super Deluxe” where the dead body was indeed in the fridge, you know … so now tell me, where is the connection with “Rope”? Just because the body is in the fridge? If you have to find connections, then there’ll be deeper connections than this obvious one … and in the case of “Everybody Loves Sohrab Handa,” there’s literally nothing common with “Knives Out.”
Soumalya: No, I was only talking about the structural similarities …
Rajat Kapoor: Well, it’s a murder mystery. What other kind of structure will you have? There’s a place, some characters are out there, a murder happens, a detective comes … and the detective has nothing to do in the film … he is the least effectual guy, he doesn’t solve the case, unlike “Knives Out.” And in “Everybody Loves Sohrab Handa,” the mystery is also not the biggest deal … it has got much deeper layers…
Soumalya: So, Last Question! Before we end this, we always ask our guests about their five favorite films, but since we’re called “High on Films,” could you share some movies that you believe represent the cinematic high moments, where you feel cinema truly reached its peak? What films made you feel that way?
Rajat Kapoor: “City Lights” (1931), “Modern Times” (1936), “8½” (1963), “Subarnarekha” (1965), and “Goodfellas” (1990).
Soumalya: Thank you, Rajat. It was lovely talking to you. I wish you all the best for “Everybody Loves Sohrab Handa” and for all your upcoming ventures.
Rajat Kapoor: Thank you very much, Soumalya, and I wish you all the best!
