Opportunity Kanks

-Joe Tornatore, stage right closes in on the heated action in Kank.

The plastic sealed DVD Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna sat untouched staring at me for three days. After being only an out of focus blur as a background actor in the final cut of the movie Invincible, I had zero expectations and little curiosity of seeing myself in the Bollywood blockbuster Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna. Opening on 1,200 screens worldwide, KANK(Never Say Goodbye) holds the record for the highest 1st week gross for an Indian movie and is already one of the biggest Bollywood film grossers in terms of revenue. It has been invited to be included in the Oscar library and I can safely conclude that I had little to do with its acclaim. Right before watching the movie, Freudian Slips struck me kind of funny when I picked a supermarket receipt off of our kitchen floor. It strangely boasted an advertisement BE THE STAR OF YOUR MOVIE NIGHT! I accepted the quirky ironic sign to commence watching the movie that I earned wages playing a train passenger.

I filmed for an entire weekend outdoors in bitter temperature at 30th Street station so my ego wanted something, anything really, to show for it. Let me just say, I continue to be amazed how the movie industry creatively pieces together film footage. Watching a finished product is a fascinating experience after being on a movie set. Shedding my cloak of invisibility in the movie Invincible, I actually appear in two of the most riveting scenes in Kank. At 3:02 and 35 seconds, I dart across the screen alongside a train in the climactic last scene of the movie. At 1:40 minutes into our love story, I appear for four seconds of stylish slow motion time-lapse footage. Crocodile-tear music and heart-tugging dialogue punctuate the scene. Mind you, I heard no music and I’m not the one delivering the line. I have only a mark and a footpath to follow. It is the scene where the stars, Shahrukh Khan and Rani Mukeric, accept their powerful love for each other as they steal a passionate embrace at the train station. Fleet of foot, my meager part involved me stepping around the star-crossed lovers. My left shoulder grazed the tangled duo and clever editing nixed the blooper take where Rani’s pocketbook inadvertently swung to nail me in the family jewels. The final cut shows me walking in and out the scene. The take conceals the pedestrian extra whose wielding broom almost impaled me in unsavory fashion.

To whom it may concern, my pedestrian face is discernible on film. I am carrying a backpack and a newfond crush on the elegant mesmerizing Rani Mukeric. I felt her hot breath and the swoosh of her hourglass body as she jumped into the proud arms of Shahrukh Khan in the climactic scene teetering between farewell or beginning. Time Magazine once named actor Shahrukh Khan as the most recognizable face on the planet yet I had no idea who in the world I was standing next to at the time. In a still frame, that is the Forrest Gump angled story of my life.

Irony aside, I turned out not to be the star of my own home movie but anyone who knows me should be able to recognize me with a laser pointer and freeze frame technology. Out of the hundred or so movie extras, I am as close to the closeup action without getting lipstick smeared on me. Not stopping to gawk at the beautiful Rani when she outpoured affection is fine acting worthy of mentioning here. I have so many wonderful memories of shooting this film that it makes bit acting a bit worthwhile for a while. Namely, I kidded Shahrukh Khan in between takes that he really knew how to pick his parts. He sheepishly smiled at me before an assistant applied eye drops to keep his peepers moist then rubbed his shoulders warm as I stood dry-eyed in the freezing cold elements. I did not need eye drops, however, to appreciate the tearjerker I was seeing. I wanted to nudge Shahrukh Khan out of the way on the next take and accept Rani’s loving arms in the stud’s stead…you know as any warm-blooded wannabe actor standing out in the cold would do.

*For more details about filming KANK, click on the link above to read my original blog story Hindiana Jones.