Irrfan shoots on the Sly!

Come June and Irrfan will be in town to shoot for Italo Spinelli���s Choli Ke Peeche.
The film, which has been adapted from Mahasweta Devi���s work, was in the news recently, after Nandana Sen turned down the offer to play a tribal woman as she wasn���t comfortable with frontal nudity. Though the makers shortlisted 10 actors for this role, including Deepal Shaw, Pauli, Tirtha and Trina Nileena Banerjee, the final call will be taken soon.
Shooting for the six-week schedule of the film begins on June 1.The project is being shot by Blasco Giurardo, the Cinema Paradiso cinematographer. Giurardo���s lens will zoom in on the streets of Kolkata, Victoria Memorial and Rabindra Sadan before the unit shifts to Purulia during the monsoons. What���s even more flattering for Kolkata, is that the makers insisted on shooting here, despite options of recreating Kolkata in Mumbai or even, in a faraway town in Sri Lanka.
Co-producer Vinod Kumar says, ���The film is about the urban-rural divide. Italo and I went down to Kolkata twice, in December and January. He fell in love with Kolkata���s haunting quality. It���s not easy to recreate its essence. We were given the option of either braving the May heat or getting drenched in the rains, while shooting in June. We���ve opted for the latter. Giurardo is excited to shoot the film in Kolkata. It will be a treat to see how Giurardo shows Kolkata through his lens.��� Choli Ke Peeche will be an English film, though a couple of versions could be released later. The film is supposed to be the first Indo-Italian co-production to be getting an official nod from the I&B ministry for its Indian shooting schedule.
Ask Irrfan how it feels to play a photographer who shoots a breast-feeding tribal woman on the sly, and he quips, ���I���ll come to know once I shoot her!��� Though shooting in the heat wasn���t exciting, the news of Sunday���s showers is heartening for Irrfan. ���It���s great to hear that it���s raining there now.���
Apart from Irrfan, who plays a wildlife photographer, Samrat Chakrabarti, Tilottama Shome and Seema Rahmani have already been cast. While Samrat will play Irrfan���s assistant, Seema has been pencilled to play his wife. There were talks of Irrfan recommending South Indian actor Sriya Reddy for the part of the tribal woman, who is surreptitiously photographed nude. ���Tilottama will be playing the lady who helps the woman. We auditioned South Indian actors too, but are keeping our options open, as we���d like someone who is familiar with the dialect spoken in the outskirts of Bengal. I don���t understand this issue being made about ���nude scenes���. The scene shows a woman breast-feeding her child. From which point of view would one call it nudity? Such inhibitions are
ridiculous,��� Kumar avers.Sahana Goswami had been offered the role, but couldn���t take it up owing to date problems. ���I���ve no problems with such scenes. The dates got pushed and I couldn���t adjust my schedule,��� she says.
Trina, on her part, isn���t comfortable with full-frontal topless nudity. ���It���s not a morality issue for me. A shot from the back or a trick shot from the side could be considered,��� she says.
Though Pauli hasn���t heard anything concrete as yet, she says, ���I���ve watched international films and I don���t have such inhibitions. If my character demands it, I have no problems doing such scenes.���
With time running out and all the short-listed actors having a busy schedule, the makers are expected to freeze the cast in a day or two.
Check out Irrfan Khan���s pics