What Went Into the Making of ‘Vaghachipani’ (‘Tiger’s Pond’), the First Kannada Film to Screen at the Berlinale

The first Kannada-language film to screen at the Berlin Film Festival, Natesh Hegde’s sophomore feature Vaghachipani (Tiger’s Pond), was part of the Forum Section at the 75th edition of the annual festival. This section reflects “on the medium of film, socio-artistic discourse and a particular sense for the aesthetic”. Vaghachipani is right up the alley of this broad mandate, set in the village Hedge grew up in, shot in 16 mm with his trademark patience that allows a moment to loiter, to suppurate. If films emerge from stories, Vaghachipani’s story emerges from the film.

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Characters proliferate — there is Prabhu (Kannada actor Achyuth Kumar), a businessman of questionable morals who is trying to win the local election with the help of his faithful right-hand man, Malabari (Malayalam film director Dileesh Pothan), an immigrant who holds his outsider status as a permanent chip on his shoulder; there is Basu (Gopal Hegde, Natesh Hegde’s father), an outcaste who challenges Prabhu’s authority; there is Prabhu’s wastrel brother, Venkati, that Natesh Hegde plays himself; there is also, centrally, Pathi (Sumitra), a mentally challenged servant figure who gets tossed around and on whose body is inscribed the drama of this film.

The film is produced by Hegde, Ranjan Singh, and Anurag Kashyap, who are looking to bridge the gap between independent cinema and commercial, theatrical releases. “The moment you say it is a festival film, most people think, Oh, it’s not for us, it’s boring. I think that boundary has to be crossed,” says Singh, in a conversation with The Hollywood Reporter India. They are hoping for a theatrical release. “I always create cinema for the big screen. I don’t know about the fate of it, but the intention is to create a cinema for the big screen,” Hegde notes.

In a conversation, edited for length and clarity, Hedge speaks about the process of making Vaghachipani, and his relationship to hope. 

You have a unique style, easily describable, easily identifiable — the slow and precise movements of a story set in the village you grew up in. Is the slowness coming from the village setting or is just how you want to make cinema?

Natesh Hegde: I am making films from my imagination and my life experience, and also my headspace. I think this slowness is coming from all of these. 

Why do you keep returning to the village as a setting? 

NH: Because that is the only life I know. I have been there throughout my life. Only last year, I shifted to [Bengaluru]. So, when I write stories or make films or even design a poster, this element of village life comes out.

Can you talk about growing up in this village? In your films, there is a deep suspicion about village life. There is no nostalgia, for example.

NH: It’s not about village life. It’s about humanity itself — this suspicion you speak of. See, I had a very traumatic childhood. My father used to be an alcoholic. With that, your position in society and the way people treat you — everything changes. From that situation, I got the courage to stand up and tell my story — it comes into your personality; you don’t fear anything. 

When did cinema enter your life, then, as a medium of expression? 

NH: When I was doing my graduation, I read about Close Up by Abbas Kiarostami. When I watched that film, it stuck — that if this kind of a life can also be a film, then my life is also worthy of a film. And because that character looked like my father, [laughs] that gave me an idea to cast him in Pedro.

And in a very strange way, Pedro was therapeutic for our relationship. It healed our deep wounds without speaking to each other, this cinema. Only me and my father knew where this or that scene was coming from. He also re-lived his bitter life and I also witnessed it. And after that, he literally became like my son, dependent on me. 

Tiger’s Pond is a very different film from Pedro because Pedro is character-based, this is a place based, throwing in multiple characters. Can you talk about this decision to broaden the scope of the film? 

NH: In Hindustani Classical music, if you listen to a raag, it evokes a particular emotion. With the film also, even if you are going with different characters, the tone of it and what it evokes through image, sound, music and how we edit it — that feeling is constant in both the films. 

It becomes about that core emotion of it rather about the setting or this thing. I always liked this kind of quality in any art. That’s why I love the novel Pedro Paramo.

Your film takes its own time in introducing characters — there is no “efficiency”. Characters are introduced 30-35 minutes in. Are these concerns you bother yourself with?  

NH: When we start following these norms of commercial filmmaking, we start creating toothpaste, not cinema. We can introduce characters even at the end of the film — no worries. This is all a very literary sense of creating art, giving all the backstory, characterization. I am not relying on that. For me, it is images. The problem is we don’t think about the form as much as we think about the story.

And the desire to shoot in 16 mm? 

NH: That is a completely different practice. I do not like this coverage-kind of films, with multiple camera set-ups. For me one scene is one shot. 

You can do that in digital also, though? 

NH: But, you know, then in your mind you have this freeness about it. Like you can shoot anything and edit mein dekhenge. (We’ll take care of it on the edit)

You don’t want to feel free?

NH: Haha, it is the complete practice of it. It feels like a living thing — film stock where a photochemical reaction is happening. And you can’t see the monitor. You have to trust your DoP and that film stock — that nothing happens to it, it will be safe and create an image. 

Talk about the presence of the goddess in the film. She looms over the film, but never enters it. 

NH: Mari is not a Vedic goddess. She is a discarded goddess. In these villages, when tragedies happen, they create this goddess and put it outside the village so that the bad omen goes out. That is the way this goddess is worshipped or celebrated. In my mind, the character of Pathi is this goddess. We start with the procession and end with the god submerged, much like with her character. 

Casting wise, this is one of your biggest films. How did you bring them all together?

NH: Everything is thanks to Pedro. Dileesh Pothan loved the film, so when I thought about casting him he said he will do it. Achut Kumar, too. Father toh apna hi hai. (Father is ours only) And I used to act before. Voh chaska phir se laga — act karne ka. (That desire to act came back.)

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What about working with non-actors? 

NH: For some you have to give instructions. But the core thing is trust about your intention. It’s a very vulnerable position to be in front of the camera.

What is your relationship to hope in cinema? In both your films there is this helplessness, if not hopelessness. 

NH: At least I think I am more hopeful than any other filmmaker. That is why I am creating this kind of story. It’s a bitter pill. That doesn’t mean we are hopeless about humanity. Maybe it’s a fever dream.