Landscaping of Umrao Jaan

(Written by Muzaffar Ali)
I have a penchant for landscape; and architecture placed in landscape; and landscape seen through architecture. I see a great story in there, which is difficult to explain in words. An emotion, a spiritual experience. It is what nostalgia is made of. For a filmmaker it is what becomes the essence of Production Design and Cinematography. The last and the first sequence of Umrao Jaan had to be placed in such a landscape, a suburb of Faizabad. I went around Lucknow looking for such spaces. A space which could justify the terrible pangs of nostalgia, though filled with so much beauty, it wrenches the heart. It had found its meaning in lyrics...
Ye kya jagah dosto, ye kaun sa dayaar hai,
hadde nigaah tak jahan ghubaar hi ghubaar hai....
Now it had to present itself visually.
Driving around exploring the Awadhian landscape I came upon something of extraordinary beauty. A breath taking setting of an old haveli and a small adjoining mosque in a vast mustard field . I knew this would get into the bloodstream of the audience.

This was Amethi 15 kms from Lucknow. It was all that I was looking for. A cloud to sandwich the beginning and the end of the film.

Every morning we had to leave before the crack of dawn with my son Shaad, who I would bathe in a tub and get him ready for the shoot. He was also doing a small role as Umrao's little brother. As the location approached there was a huge speed breaker which I would invariably forget each day, but Shaad would remember and jump up before it came with a gleeful scream ' kal bataya' ... Meant I told you yesterday. We were shooting a bidai song in the old village haveli, and Shaad's role was that he was supposed to sit quietly in a corner and enjoy the happening. He began to get bored and became restless. He started slowly ripping apart an antique jazim spread out for sitting. I happened to notice half the jazim missing and Shaad discreetly pulling away whatever was left. I reprimanded him. He got very upset and sat and sulked in a corner. A little later he told my assistants that 'Main continuity mein phans gaya hoon varna main abhi chala jaata ghar.'

As the shooting came to an end the Maulvi who sat in Umrao’s last mujra, (whose close up nodding on a rhythmic interlude appreciating her footwork used in the song), was immediately sacked from the Madrasa. Next thing I came to know that my father's maternal grandfather, a great poet Mir Muzaffar Ali Khan Aseer after whom I was named, belonged to this very village.
As this came to be known, the Maulvi was honourably reinstated. Now that he is dead and gone he continues to nod in close up every time the arc light illuminates those frames.
Muzaffar Ali