After making a debut on the big screen with Abbas-Mustan’s ‘Machine’ Eshaan Shanker is all set to make his debut on the digital platform with director Ajay Sharma’s short film ‘Jolly 1995’. The short film was recently released on Disney+ Hotstar Digital and the audience reaction to it is excellent.
Set in the 90’s the short film draws light on two different love stories, one that of a sweet budding romance between 2 young high-school lovers while the other speaks about the end of a long marriage.
The short film is directed by Ajay Sharma, who has previously worked as an editor for Anurag Basu on films like Jagga Jasoos, Barfi, Ludo etc. He has won a Zee Cine award as the Best Editor for the film Jagga Jasoos as well.
When asked director Ajay Sharma about why he chose this story to make his debut as a director he explained” “If you ask me I always wanted to make a love story. I grew up to the stories of YRF movies like any other true blue filmy lover. Personally, I think romance as an emotion resonates with everyone. So here, I was getting a chance to make a love story in short film format & I took it instantly.”
This 15 minute mini movie is no less than a 2 hr classic love story. The short film has a song, drama, romance everything that one would expect from a film, “I think music has got nothing to do with short or long format content. Growing up, all cult romantic films have their music which stayed with me forever. Moreover, romance & music go hand in hand as a genre. Hence making this one without a song was unimaginable.”
“I have known Ajay for nearly 8 years, I met him in Dharma productions where I was an assistant director and he was an associate Editor, we had an instant creative connect and I knew someday we will be working together, we think alike and we have a similar approach towards cinema. We are thrilled with the response we are getting for our short film, we are planning a feature film together”, stated Actor Eshaan when asked how his experience working with director Ajay Sharma was.
When asked about his digital debut (from Feature film to a short film for digital platform) Eshaan explained, “When Ajay narrated me the story, we mutually decided to make this story in a short film format. The only concern we had was the reach, once we started pitching the movie, OTT’s started showing interest and we knew we were doing the right thing. Honestly nowadays it’s all about the right cord you connect with the audience, format and platforms are secondary.”
When asked director about his experience of working with Eshaan he exclaimed, “Eshaan has grown as an actor. The transformation I have seen in his craft after his movie machine has been tremendous, he has evolved. Jolly is 70 % musical and without dialogues. Eshaan has expressed his feelings without dialogues so easily. I was very impressed the way Eshaan he has played his character.”
The short film stars Eshaan Shanker & Nida Chakraborty in the lead. The song ‘Rozanna’ is composed by Milan Harish and Anamik Chauhan & sung by Shivang Upadhyay and written by Atiya Sayyed. The short film is produced by Actual Movies Production and co-produced by Shadab Khan.
