'Chintu Ka Birthday' written during US-Iraq war: Directors

MUMBAI: Writers Satyanshu and Devanshu Singh, whose directorial feature "Chintu Ka Birthday" is set to have a digital release later this week, have shared how they made the film with the help of filmmaker Vikramaditya Motwane and comedian Tanmay Bhat.

"The script was written when I was 21. Back in 2007, Satyanshu was training to be a doctor in Pune and I was a media student in Mumbai. We knew that we wanted to make a film one day and wanted to be filmmakers, but didn't know it would be this film. Without any professional training, Satyanshu came up with this incredible idea with a war backdrop. The US-Iraq war was ongoing at the time," Devanshu recalled.

(Also read: Director Satyanshu and Devanshu Singh speak about Chintu Ka Birthday)

Satyanshu added: "This film is a story, a fable. (It is about) How a Bihari family gets trapped in Baghdad, as it rains bullets outside, and how everyone is affected. We have grown up in a family with such amazing people around us and a lot of love and affection. We tried showing the same in the film too, but with a 'tadka'.

"The 'tadka' is the unique setting of the film. Vikramaditya Motwane is our mentor and he read our script while he was making 'Udaan', and he somehow felt we could write poems in the film. And Satyanshu wrote those beautiful poems," said Devanshu.

After five years of working on the script, the duo finally locked the final draft in 2012.

"Later, we got a chance to write a song in 'Ferrari Ki Sawaari', so this script of 'Chintu Ka Birthday' worked as our calling card. Everyone encouraged us to direct this film. We finally locked the script in 2012, after 5 years of hard work. We knew we had something different, something unusual, and we had to wait to make it happen the right way. We were telling a rather unusual story, and we needed someone to back us with the right reasons, and we found Tanmay Bhat and his team. I used to work with them and they were smitten by the script. We had a ready script, so Tanmay said why not make a film now and that is how it all began. There was no creative interference, only love and support. It felt like a family coming together and making a film," Devanshu shared.

"Chintu Ka Birthday" revolves around a six-year-old child named Chintu, who is stranded in Iraq with his family around the time of Saddam Hussein's fall. The film accounts the dramatic course of events that take place on the little boy's birthday. It stars Vinay Pathak, Vedant Raj Chibber, Tillotama Shome and Seema Pahwa.

The film is scheduled to release on Zee5 on June 12.

(Also read: Chintu Ka Birthday: AIB’s feature film set to release on ZEE5)