Anurag Kashyaps Sister Makes A Short Film Thats Sweet Mischievou

The cellphone is the one technological invention of the post-computer decade that has completely changed our attitude to love and relationships and redefined the space that love relationships occupy.

Dorothy Parker to whom debutante director Anubhuti Kashyap's short-film Call Wait is dedicated, wrote a short story A Telephone Call.It was a collage of frantic introspective ramblings of a young girl who had met a man the previous day and was waiting for him to call. There was a touch of hysterical paranoia in Parker's story . This was a girl on the verge of meltdown in anticipation of her affections being reciprocated .

Anubhuti's short-film is a lot more fun, much lighter in tone and far livelier in the telling of the story as the young girl (Sayani Gupta who played Kalki Koechlin's blind lesbian friend in Margarita With A Straw) goes through a gamut of meteorological mood changes for that awaited call .

The story takes the girl through a series of locations in just three minutes. She is in a train. Then she is an auto.The phone remains the centre of her attention. Images of a bustling sprightly Mumbai city define her sense of agitated ecstacy as all she wants, dear God, is that phone to ring and that magical name Ankush Garg to flash.

Most of the 3-minute film has Sayani Gupta describing her edgy state of mind in a frothyvoiceover that could mean one of two things: either the girl is an incorrigible flirt, or she is love for the first time. The delectably defiant response when the much-awaited call happens confirms the growing belief that this girl likes the element of fun in her intense affections .

She loves. But she doesn't forget to stay above heartbreak

Call Wait is an endearing ode to the first crush. It's frothily filmed and injected with an infectious joie de vivre by Sayani Gupta's one-actor one-spoken-line("I can be fun") performance.We need to see more of her and the short film's director.

Maybe a feature film together?

Says the supremely spontaneous Sayani, "This short film happened pretty randomly. Producer Guneet Monga had messaged me saying there was a short with a great script thatSwati Bhattacharya who is currently the first woman CCO of FCW Ulka, in India, has written and Anubhuti Kashyap will direct and if I would be interested. So I read the script and jumped at the opportunity."

Sayani says the film was shot in record time. "We shot this in a day, they finished the post in four days and this is what we have now."

Sayani who made her presence felt alongside Kalki Koechlin in Margarita With A Straw is no longer clutching at straws. She is doing a lot of good work. "I have been busy with some feature films and the ad work that I keep doing. But I also try and take up short films once in a while, when the story or script interests me."

Is the short film the future of independent cinema? Sayani admits she is doing lots of them. "I did one called Leeches directed by Payal Sethi just premiered in Finland this month and now is going to IFFLA. Had done two other short films called Bubbles andStars last year and some more. I am also part of the Shah Rukh Khan starrer Fan . Very excited about that since it's my first foray into blockbuster territory."