Knowledge is Great and there is no age to learn something new

90 % of my generation is living with the greatest irony of life. We have an aptitude of X and we are doing y. We love to do A and we are slogging with B. We would have done miracles if we were P but we are miraculously doing Q. 

How many of you have ever repented about your career choices? How many of you feel like quitting your job everyday? How many of you want to start their own business? How many of you dream of slapping a resignation at your boss's face often? And how many of you feel like you are living a donkey's life with the same monotonus routine everyday? I think we all know our answers. And for something or the other we are all stuck up with our jobs and choices in life. So when I was asked what would I like to study/specialize, where and why, I shortlisted a few things I would want to do with myself and out of the few I will write about one I would really love to do someday.

Lets start with a little bit of drama to this career choice...

"Ek chutki sindoor,,Ek chutki sindoor ki kimat tum kya jano Sunil babu!!" and the whole audience is all emotional and gullible. Especially the ladies clad in shiffon sarees and heavy jhumkas looking straight from the Karan johar movies are all sobby about it.  

The other category, the Dabang types are all larger than life, dance and drama movies.Or some with the same hero and villan classified in good looking and evil looking men. Very few like LIFE IN A METRO, Page 3, Lunch Box qualify to the REAL WORLD CINEMA in India. 

So by now, you might have guessed that I am talking about studing film making. Learning to write, direct, produce, act, edit, execute, choreograph, cinematograph and every graph of cinema. At the end of it, I want to be capable of telling my story to the larger audience. To be on/behind the 90 mm screen expressing myself in a way I want to through the medium of cinema. 

So after the What question is answered, let me take you to WHY film making? 

I have not even a slight connection to film making and I guess not in my dreams would I have ever thought of film making as a career if it was not for the hunger in me to see good cinema. Indian culture, Indian movies, India television and all the modes of expression in India, always displays hero's to be so idealistic, courageous, larger than life and in the realms of society and the not so idealistic ones as the evil, bad guys who at the end dont survive. Do we really have such disctinction between ourselves in real life? Dont we all have a good and bad guy in us? Why is the girl smoking and drinking showed as a prostitute or a spoilt gurl? Are the extra marital affairs reality of today? Can we have one asthetically done romantic scene which we can be proud off? Are the working mothers not part of our society yet? Where are the children movies gone? Did we have even one "Baby's day out" or a "Harry Potter" in India? The special effects and animation which is developed in India is purchased by Indians from the foreign distributors. Why are we still not ready for bold cinema? Infact what amazes me is the difference between theater and Indian cinema. We have such brilliant genere in theater. But cinema, it still in a very premature form. I have that hunger to know the technicalities of it and contribute towards it and hence, film making.

I am told by few that I am a good story teller, I can weave real life stories and connect to people with my stories. So learning cinema would be a baby step towards learning to narrate my story better. I believe that passion for something is only useful when you channelize it to a proper purpose. And to channelize it, I need to know it. Knowledge is indeed great. Only passion, or only aptitude will not make you the best. You need to learn the tricks of the trade. We have a very famous saying " You need to dirty your hands in the code". It means to create magic, you need to know the nitty gritty of things. If I dont know with what emotions the writer wrote and I am directing it, it will turn out to be another CHINESE WHISPER where the soul is lost. Similarly, if I am great at technical editing but I dont know what is the essence of the scenes, I can never be great at my work. So film making involves learning all the sub fields of movies. Its like learning physics without knowing mathematics for an engineering student. 

Now coming to where I want to study FILM MAKING?

Given a chance I would choose to do a Film Making in LFA. It would be a 1 year full time diploma in Film Making.London Film Academy has one of the best team of faculty. Veterans from the film industry like DAISY GILI, ANNA MACDONALD are few to name it. They partner with the biggest names in the industry like Cannes, London Film festival, Kodak etc. Their courses range for few days to months to years and the cirriculum devised would make sure you know the trick of the trade well. Its said that you learn best when you are on the job, and to make learning on job a reality, they put you with best in industry talent to learn and absorb. They have a very impressive track record and references to their kitty. http://www.londonfilmacademy.com/about-lfa/default.asp

After a lot of head hunting for good film schools and courses, I had shortlisted LFA for the soul reason that you are not there for the degree they offer. Ironically, the degree from LFA is enough to earn the mulla everybody aspires of. But they not only offer you the degree, they also impart the necessary skills in each of their students. As some aluminus have pointed out, "There are no shortcuts in the LFA". 

So when at this stage of life, I am given a chance to learn and learn in the place I wish. It would be definitely LFA. 

This post is written with the intention to participate in the Knowledge is Great contest on Indiblogger.in