(MENAFN- Khaleej Times) City times spent two days on the sets of anees bazmee?s welcome back
City times was present on the sets of welcome back at margham desert near al ain and exotic cars shaikh zayed road spending two days with the cast and crew. it’s a film that uae can describe as its own considering 90% of the film is being shot in the country.
At margham desert the entire cast was present on the set shooting for the climax scene that will take up eighteen minutes in the film. producer firoz nadiadwala had taken charge that day conceptualising and executing the stunt scenes featuring two choppers ten hummers 200 camels and three other fancy cars.
Two pilots were closely following nadiadwala’s instructions as he explained the climax shot to them. while talking to city times nadiadwala said “it’s a choreographed aerial stunt scene. we need to understand the intricacies of the scene as we are shooting on a big scale with five cameras two choppers ten hummers and many other cars. how to capture the scene stunts and sounds requires a lot of pre-planning. once that is in place filming is very easy. you need technique to extract the work. the aerial action stunts were just mind-blowing. one of the lady pilots christine was the pilot who flew for fast and furious. she did some stunts and all of us were amazed with her clarity.”
John abraham added “i love dubai. it is a lovely place and i love shooting in the dunes. i think it’s a very big climax and it’s a very big budget film. firoz has used his connections in dubai to get the best of all the services.”
John has been frequently travelling between mumbai and dubai completing his other commitments as well. recently his wife priya joined him in dubai for around five days.
We have learnt that nana patekar dimple kapadia and anil kapoor are the life of the set. every time they are together it’s only fun and laughter around and rightly so since they have been co-stars for a long time.
When we were present on the sets the ladies and the gentlemen were relaxing in separate vans. shruti hassan was in the vanity van with ‘dimple ma’am’ as she fondly calls her rehearsing her lines.
Nana patekar is always the jolliest person on the set. he often packs lunch for some members of the crew when they are busy working; he even offered some delicious cookies to our team.
While we were present on the sets at margham desert the scene that was being shot had naseeruddin shah in the helicopter chasing john anil and nana who have kidnapped shiney ahuja.
Shiney ahuja was seen roaming around the sets. apparently his family was in the city for a few days. this is the actor’s first big project in two years since he got embroiled in the police case. firoz nadiadwala told us that shiney is like any other actor in the film and everyone treats him like they would another co-star.
On sunday afternoon at the exotic cars showroom a scene was shot which displayed a range of premium cars like bugatti aston martin bentley bmw ferrari lamborghini maserati mercedes-benz porsche range rover rolls royce amongst others.
A scene was being shot with nana patekar dimple kapadia and ankita srivastava. “in the scene nana patekar is at the car showroom with dimple and ankita but both the ladies are eyeing the gorgeous 2014 edition rolls royce phantom but frown because they cannot afford the dhs1900000 car. nana patekar jumps in and tries to hand over the key to the young ankita but her mother grabs the key. it is a comic scene.” explains firoz nadiadwala.
The crew is shooting in dubai till this weekend at waldorf astoria palm jumeirah jumerirah zabeel saray and the montgomerie golf cub.
The last schedule will see the cast and crew back in dubai in may when they will shoot at burj khalifa and burj al arab.
We bumped into stuntwoman geeta tandon who can be seen in khatron ke khiladi these days. she has worked in movies like chennai express hasee toh phasee ek thi daayan ragini mms 2 singh saheb the great de dhana dhan as a body double for deepika padukone parineeti chopra konkona sen sharma amrita rao neha dhupia and sameera reddy etc. while talking to us she said “in this film i am a body double for the second lead ankita. i had a great time working in khatron ke khiladi because normally i do stunts for actors but this time i was fighting for myself. it’s nice when so many actresses recognise us when they meet us for other assignments. i once had a spine injury while shooting for a movie where i was a duplicate for zeenat aman (that movie eventually got shelved). after that accident everyone gave up on me but i did not and now i am back on my feet and doing stunts again.”
Local crew on the set
“movies do help in contributing towards the tourism aspect of the country because bollywood has a big reach. we have shot with an excess of two hundred and fifty local crew during our desert schedule at al ain. at any given date we employ over hundred people daily for our shoot.
“since we are shooting more than ninety per cent of this film in the uae the total number has been huge” said firoz nadiadwala.
While talking to city times line producer abdelsalam badran a jordanian who has worked in many hindi movies shot in dubai told us “i worked in ghajini race mr and mrs khanna partner and dabangg before. welcome back is being made in dubai on a huge scale. we have become like one big family now.
“this film is big for us because there is a lot of local crew involved in the production. normally any movie shooting happens here for fifteen days maximum but over here it’s not just songs and scenes but action as well.
“i have a lot of responsibilities because i have to arrange for a lot of permissions and handle the legal aspect of it as well especially for the location. i arranged for the location in margham desert i arranged for an action director. it is a pleasure to work with mr nadiadwala and mr bazmee.” arti?khaleejtimes.com
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