DhakaLive’s Nazir Hossain reveals more about Nader Chowdhury’s first film through a recent interview.         Excerpts follow:

Would you please tell us about the plot of your film?
It’s a story about the life of inhabitants and communities of char and their everyday life, joy-sorrow, love-affairs. There are many families- who were landlords once upon a time, but lost their lands and lost almost everything in river erosion. Now to live their lives, they take different professions. Among them, a few families turned into fishermen and their foremost belief is that their much-anticipated day will come soon, when the lost char will rise again. And that day they will get their land back again. Each of them has various colourful dreams centring the rise of char.

Among them, did anyone have any special dreams? Could they fulfil their dreams?
Yes, there is a couple (Milon and Mohona Mim), who cherishes a special dream. When the char is about to rise, they start climbing upon their own dream of getting married soon and will start a fresh life on the fresh soil of the char. They also dream of getting their land back again. Even everyone of the char has their own dreams like this couple.
But their dream has been interrupted by a money-lender named Talukder. As the char rises, Talukder demands most of the lands as his own property and breaks the couple’s dreams cold-bloodedly as well as the dreams of many others into pieces.

What’s the main theme of this film?
The conflict between ‘much-anticipated dream of general inhabitants of the char and ‘disturbance created by the money-lender Talukder while grabbing the lands mercilessly’ is the main theme of the film.

Who are the casts of ‘Lalchar’?
The main cast of the film includes Anisur Rahman Milon, Channel i Sera Nachiya Mohona Mim, Shahiduzzaman Selim, Masum Aziz, Jhuna Chowdhury, Kazi Shila, Monjurul Islam Nantu, among others. Even I myself have acted in a role of the film. The film involves more than 400 people in different roles.
Where did the shooting of the film take place?
Most of the shooting took place by the bank of the river Padma, including Bikrampur area, Bhober char, Daudkandi.

What’s the latest update about the film?
The shooting of the film has already been completed and editing of the film is almost done. It will be submitted to the film censor board at the end of this month.

Who are the other important contributors in this film?
The screenplay of the film is written by Kamrul Ahsan and me, while the background music has been done by Farid Ahmed. Besides popular singers Andrew Kishore and Dolly Shayontoni, novice singer Nakib Chowdhury (who is my son) lent vocals to the songs of the film. Sojan Mahmud is in camera and national awarding-winning Mohammad Ali is in makeup.

When is the film set to be released?
We have primary plan to release the film during Eid-ul-Azha; if we can’t, it will surely be released in November this year, which is the deadline.

Is there anything more to add about the film?
Though the film’s name is ‘Lalchar’ and it’s about the life of people of the char, at the same time it’s a romantic love film as well. We will release the film in countrywide cinema halls and I hope that the audience will appreciate the film.