Richie Mehta's next to be a musical

Indian origin Canadian filmmaker Richie Mehta is currently working on his next film which will be musical.

Richie says his yet-untitled film will be a cross between Indian literature and old music.

"I am working on my next film which would be an Indian musical. It's in a very different style. I would say it's a cross between old Indian literature and old Indian music. It's trying to explore and utilise what makes mainstream Indian films so beautiful, so accessible," Mehta told PTI.

"It will be an Indian story. All actors will be from India. I am still writing it so haven't locked the cast yet," he added.
 

Richie is known for directing critically acclaimed films like "Amal" and "Siddharth".

He recently teamed up with Ridley Scott and Anurag Kashyap for Google, as the executive producer for the documentary "India in a Day", which was screened at the 47th edition of international film festival of India (IFFI).

Despite living abroad, the director's films have always been rooted in India. Richie says the reason why filmmakers like him, Deepa Mehta or a Mira Nair tell stories rooted in India despite not living here is because they are fascinated with what they see here in the country.

"When you're abroad, day in day out you're seeing different lifestyles. Then when you come here, it hits you in the face. You notice everything and because we are not from here, we don't take it for granted.

"When you're from here, in your day to day work you might ignore a lot of things. But when you're here for the first time, you don't. It will appeal to you. When filmmakers from outside come, they see around and find several stories."

The director says while his projects have mostly been off-beat he did try the mainstream space.

"I have worked in some mainstream films but they didn't see the light of the day. They were in pre-production or development stage but couldn't go forward. They weren't masala films but they had musical component and were more mainstream.