Ali Hussain Khan, Mak Mansoor, Hasnain Qureshi, Zubair Umer and Shaggy had finally found a sweet spot to sit down, and plan the next couple of hours. It was a pity that their sweet spot was in the middle of an active set sprawling with extras, spot boys and cleaners with mops.

The boys, young and skilled, whose designations cover the entire gamut of producers’ credit in filmmaking, have had it tough for the past few days.

They were tasked to complete a feature length film that only had less than a month left for release — and more pressingly, on that particular day, wrap a shoot of a song before the studio’s rent ran into overtime.

When Teri Meri Kahaniyaan (TMK) runs in cinemas this Eid-ul-Azha, no one will remember the toils of the young producers and the many assistants, and the assistants of assistants that have been hired to keep things shipshape — nor would most know the reason behind the making of such a different little film.

Teri Meri Kahaniyaan, a fi lm about familiar human emotions, is a lavish production that started as a short fi lm before it became a collection of three very di! erent shorts packed inside the cover of a feature fi lm. Can it work?

Although it is primarily a story of familiar human emotions (ergo the title), or that Pakistani filmmakers seem to have the most experience working in such genres, TMK has much more going for it than what one assumes.

For starters, in my many years of visiting sets, I have rarely seen film production seem this effortless (thanks to the young crew) — or, given its origins, this expensive. But then again, if you ask Naveed Arshad, the producer of the film, it had to be.

TMK is a living, breathing example of putting one’s money where one’s mouth is. It is a lavish production that started as a short film and became, somewhat fittingly, an outright anomaly: a collection of shorts packed inside the cover of a feature film.

Call it an anthology, call them mini-movies — or since Naveed and his wife and producing partner Seemeen Naveed are the owners of the short-film label SeePrime that produces this film — call it a natural progression or karmic circumstance. But one thing is certain: a film like this has never happened before in Pakistan.

TMK is an eclectic mix of flavours even by anthology film standards — a supernatural comedy directed by Nabeel Qureshi and written by Ali Abbas Naqvi and Basit Naqvi; a happy-go-lucky wedding romance directed by Marina Khan and written by Vasay Chaudhry; and a heavy romance-drama directed by Nadeem Baig and written by Khalil-ur-Rehman Qamar (the titles are Jinn Mahal, Pasoori and Aik Sau Taeswaan, respectively). Such diversification goes against the rules of anthologies, which often stick to one theme and genre.

The ball was set rolling when Naveed and Seemeen wished to have Nabeel Qureshi direct a short film for their channel. The production, starring the husband-wife duo of Mani and Hira, reportedly, turned a tad expensive and clocked a little longer than the usual shorts on the channel.

Teri Meri Kahaniyaan is an eclectic mix of flavours even by anthology film standards — a supernatural comedy directed by Nabeel Qureshi and written by Ali Abbas Naqvi and Basit Naqvi; a happy-go-lucky wedding romance directed by Marina Khan and written by Vasay Chaudhry; and a heavy romance-drama directed by Nadeem Baig and written by Khalil-ur-Rehman Qamar (the titles are Jinn Mahal, Pasoori and Aik Sau Taeswaan, respectively).

A decision was made to turn it into a feature, which Nabeel, to his credit, declined, because the story didn’t have the necessary juice for a 90-minute film (its current run-time, I’m told is 55 minutes). The screenplay, however, added more scenes, shooting days, and a song to expand its original length.

This longer short, about a desperate family of squatters who come across supernatural entities, was padded by two more stories courtesy Nadeem Baig, who brought the screenplays and a director (Marina Khan in her big screen directorial debut) to the party.

Nadeem had told me that the mix of genres would be a refreshing deviation from the norm. The two of us had been walking on the platform at Karachi City Railway Station in the early hours of the morning before Sehri (this leg of the shoot happened during Ramazan).

It was the first of four days that I visited TMK’s set (unfortunately, I couldn’t make it to Nabeel’s set). Despite everything nearly happening like clockwork, one realised that to finish the scenes on the location the crew had to jump the gun to beat the clock.

The cast on the set were Mehwish Hayat and Wahaj Ali, who makes his film debut with TMK.

During the brief moments in between the speedy run of the production, I learn that Wahaj believes that there should be a clear divide between film and television actors, and that, perhaps, he isn’t suited for the big screen!

Looking at the way he carried himself on the monitor, one would beg to differ. Mehwish, of course, looked as captivating as ever — and, of course, a thorough professional who nailed her timing on every take. I’m sure, as dawn lingered close, those seconds she saved made a difference.

The two actors play one part of a story about love and infidelity. The other group in this conflicted story is that of Aamna Ilyas and Zahid Ahmed, and their setting was a house near Sea View in Karachi that was burning up with both the weather and the body heat of the extensive crew Seemeen and Naveed’s productions usually employ.

As reputed ad film producers, blame it on that practice, Seemeen once told me.

A few weeks later, I’m at a house that could compensate an entire television serial’s location, where, to my stupefaction, the headcount expanded by a factor of two, at least.

This segment of the story was being produced by Nadeem Baig and directed by Marina Khan. It starred Sheheryar Munawar and Ramsha Khan in her second film role (she joked that this was her first film, when in fact, it was Thora Jee Le), Babar Ali, Saleem Sheikh and newcomer Hurriya amongst many others.

The light-hearted plot centres on the hours leading to a wedding. Of the two days I go to set, I meet Sheheryar in a burqa twice (they had to take care of a scene’s continuity, I was told), and see him in a state of ridiculous undress (moments before his wedding, his sleeves are entirely torn off by a character).

While I only get to see Ramsha act in a few scenes and dance a lot, one can see that she has really matured as an actress. Although happy with her cast, when we talk Marina Khan tells me that this has been a learning experience for her. As per this writer’s observations, it took a while for her to adjust to the pacing of the shoot, and the compromise of vision that comes with film productions in Pakistan (it happens on every film, including The Legend of Maula Jatt).

Marina says that she would have loved to have lived with the script for a few weeks before they jumped into production. As it turned out, given the deadline for an Eid release — which, by the way, made sense for TMK given its extensive A-list cast — the actress-turned-director only had five days to understand and rationalise her creative inclinations before they dove headfirst into the shoot.

“I would have loved to have shot this sequence in an entire day, and not a few hours,” she tells Icon during a breather after a scene. The scene came and went as if it were running a marathon, with the actors doing their best to hit their lines, find motivation and deliver the emotion amidst goof-ups.

During the two days at the house, the entire narrative and a song had to be filmed before the production shifted to filming another song that was set up at Shamsi Studios a few days later (Marina’s segment has two songs, by the way).

That night at Shamsi, Marina was in awe of the dance choreographer Nigah Hussain. “He knew exactly what he wants and how he would go about it,” she says.

By now, one begins to question whether this diverse range in tonality would work in a feature film.

To discuss this aspect, Icon reached out to Nabeel Qureshi, who apparently is busy with projects. We unfortunately have yet to hear back from the director.

Like Nadeem said in the beginning, the diversity might just be the film’s trump card. You judge one film and the other one completely throws you off with a uniquely different experience, he says while on Marina’s set.

“Any story can be turned into a feature-length film,” he explains, “[however, the unique thing about these] films is that they were written to be short films from the start.”

According to Seemeen, second-halves of Pakistani movies almost always fall down on their faces, and the takeout at the end is often off-putting. With such an assortment, TMK is reaching out to audiences of every age group, be it teenagers, young adults or mature audiences.

Also, having a catalogue of 60-odd short films at their disposal, with most being produced by their short film label itself, Seemeen thinks this could be just the stress test they need before they jump on to making regular motion pictures.

A day before this article goes to print, producer Naveed clarifies a few aspects about the production on a phone call. “The reason why TMK uses the SeePrime’s moniker is that it is a collection of short films. If this were a feature film, it would have been a different label.”

Naveed tells me that while this is indeed a Pakistani-production — and a proud one at that — he considers his audience to be nothing less than two billion: ie. the Urdu-Hindi speaking diaspora that’s scattered around the world. To reach them, and give them bang for the buck, they have little choice but to go all out. That means big actors, big budgets — the entire works.

His next film, he tells me (which I am obligated to keep under wraps), will be quite a divergence in genre, with an even bigger budget and a fitting star cast.

When I ask him how he thinks the film will turn out, Naveed tells me that he has no idea.

“Fridays make or break filmmakers’ kismet [destiny]. We did our best. We didn’t cut corners. We put everything in like Raj Kapoor. Let’s see.

Teri Meri Kahaniyaan releases in cinemas worldwide this Eid-ul-Azha via the Distribution Club

Published in Dawn, ICON, June 11th, 2023