It was an evening filled with fun. Music. Laughter. And stars so newly minted, the shine was glaringly brilliant. The brightest star of all was a young, US-returned, environmental consultant, who had chucked everything he had worked for to enter the glittering world of films a year or so ago. His directorial venture, a budget-strapped film called Hyderabad Blues, was shot at a burning pace of 17 days. Which was how he not only carved a niche for himself, but also entered the record books... Nagesh Kukunoor's Hyderabad Blues became the largest grossing, low budget Indian English film ever made! His second film, Rockford, deserved more pizzazz. So the music release was held at the Wayside Inn, a restaurant located at the heart of Bombay's business district by Sony Music, who have bought the music rights of the film. Rockford is a humorous look at the growing up pangs of a young boy studying in an Indian boarding school. Or so the whispers say. And the music release promised a sneak preview of the video for Aasmaan ke paar, which would be followed by an interactive session with the Rockforders. The Rockforders? Yes, of course. How else would you classify Nagesh Kukunoor, Gulzar (who's provided the lyrics), Rohan Dey (the protagonist), Shankar Mahadevan, Ehsaan Noorani, Loy Mendonsa (the composers) and KK (who lent his voice)? The invite said 3.45 pm, so I was there on the dot. As were the Rockforders. So we sat down and waited for the rest of the press... who arrived comfortably late as usual! This was the perfect opportunity for me to chat up the cast. I chose 13-year-old Rohan Dey -- around whose character the film is centered -- as my first victim. He looked like he was expecting the standard questions -- you know, something like "What did you learn during the course of this film?" or "Why were you selected for this role?" Instead, I asked him if there was anything he hated doing during the course of this film. "Welll..." then came a longish, thoughtful pause, "there was this one scene... I didn't exactly hate it," another looonnng pause, "but I was a little uncomfortable. It was a bathroom scene in which we were all in our underwear. There were women in the production team, you know." We moved on to more pleasant matters, like the very first scene he shot for the film. He was asked to enter the classroom and introduce himself to the teacher. "My mom was with me then," he recalls. Shankar Mahadevan, it was obvious, was pressed for time. He had to leave for a recording as soon as the press conference got over. So we moved on to him. Shankar, apparently, had a great time composing the score and thoroughly enjoyed working for Kukunoor. "Basically, I like to do music. Whether it is a commercial film or a movie like this, it is okay with me." By now, journalists had kind of trickled in, so the press conference began. Officially. Sony Music's managing director, Vijay Singh, began the evening by pointing out that Sony Music has always been associated with young talent. Which is why Rockford came into their picture. "The music is very youthful. A lot of passion has gone into the making of the music." Each member of the Rockford team then spoke about how they absolutely enjoyed making music for the film. "We had a blast." "I simply loved doing music for the film!" More comments followed in this vein and I began to feel a little uncomfortable. Wasn't this getting a little too mushy, guys? Thankfully, all the gushing stopped when the lights dimmed and we were treated to a video preview of the title track, Aasman ke paar. And a very well-picturised video it was. This one song seemed to kinda tell the whole story of the film (I know, I know, I'm the one doing the gushing now... But the video was good!) The video went something like this -- Shankar, Loy and Ehsaan play the grown up versions of the three young boys in the film who meet at their 20th Rockford reunion. The three boys are also shown in the video. "The song," said Shankar, "has a very travel kind of feel to it." Then the lights brightened, everyone blinked, smiled and said good-bye. This was Kanchana Suggu's first press conference.
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