Soon after 'Dil Dhadkne Do' in which he played Priyanka Chopra's misogynist husband, Rahul Bose went off the radar for 13 months. One assumed that he was busy with the cinematic adaptation of Mohsin Hamid's 2000 novel, 'Moth Smoke' but despite an extension, he lost the rights three years ago because he couldn't raise funds for the beautiful but emotionally wrenching journey. For the last year, the actor, who returns to direction 15 years after 'Everybody Says I'm Fine', has been quietly working on another movie, his first home production, 'Poorna'.
His `closely guarded secret' is the inspirational story of Malavanth Poorna, a poor adivasi girl from Telangana who created history on May 25, 2014, by becoming the youngest girl in the world to scale the Mount Everest. She was just 13 when she pitched the Indian flag at 6 am, followed by Sadanapalli Anand, another 17-year-old tribal student from the remote Khammam district, a couple of hours later. Both were students of the Andhra Pradesh Social Welfare Residential Schools, mentored by its secretary Dr RS Praveen Kumar who Rahul is playing. Aditi Inamdar, a Telangana girl from another impoverished family, chosen after he'd auditioned 109 girls, including a few tribals brings Poorna's superhuman feat to screen.
"I bought the rights from Poorna's father and Dr RS Praveen Kumar, but knew how easy it'd be for someone to change the names and come up with a 'me too' film. But now that Poorna has been shot and will be ready to be screened for a studio in six weeks, I can talk about it," says Rahul, who has yet to show the film to Dr Kumar or even Poorna, but plans to take it to her village where they shot for 11 days.
He describes Poorna as being at the other end of the spectrum from his 2001 directorial debut, 'Everybody Says I'm Fine'. "It's not as dark but it's just as emotional. We can be obedient sons, but we can also be rebellious boyfriends. It has no jhalak of Bollywood, yet makes you cry. That's because Poorna is one of the most remarkable people I've met... Focussed, disciplined, thoughtful yet fun-loving. She has Malala's strength, determination, optimism and desire to change society by joining the civil services. Her story needs to be told to the world," he says.
Rahul is equally impressed with the man he plays on screeen, an inspiration to the 1,000 kids in tribal schools, having made it possible for them to live, study and eat there for free from class 1 to 12. "Poorna calls him her God. This is the first time I played someone living and that made the task more daunting. Hopefully, he will be happy with my portrayal," admits Rahul thanks to whose efforts six kids from the Andamans, now 22, are studying in colleges, another six from Kashmir, at 16, are tense about their ICSE exams and six more from Manipur have entered the New Era School in Panchgani. Did he climb the Everest literally? "The film is faithful to every single geographical punctuation mark in Poorna and Anand's journey," he says.
Was he rusty returning to direction after 15 years? Rahul for whom directing was always more satisfying than acting, admits that since the film was shot on digital and not film and had lots of vfx, he ended up learning 20 per cent more of the technical process from his DoP Subhranshu Das. He also admits that this time the first two financiers he approached, were ready to give him 75 per cent of the funds, the third he went to for the remaining 25 per cent heard the story and agreed to finance it completely. "We're confident of its boxoffice potential but while its pleasant to make money, that's not the reason for making Poorna. It's a story that every girl child from a backward community should see and also every privileged child. In fact, it's a film for everybody because what these two kids achieved was staggering," he asserts.
Rahul who has worked with three Telugu dialect coaches and one who helped him with the dubbing has signed on another lead role as an actor and promises to make many more films, both as a producer and a director. He is planning a sequel to one of his most popular films under his banner but won't reveal more.
