The ambitious driver for a rich Indian family uses his wit and cunning to escape from poverty in Director Ramin Bahrani’s crime-drama, The White Tiger.
Based on the New York Times bestseller and 2008 Man Booker Prize-winning novel Bahrani’s film follows the epic and darkly humorous rise of a poor Indian villager who wrangles his way into a job as a driver for a wealthy couple who have just returned from America. After making himself indispensable to his rich masters, he is cruelly betrayed and realizes the corrupt lengths they will go to trap him and save themselves. On the verge of losing everything, he rebels against a rigged and unequal system to rise up and become a new kind of master.
On February 3, Bahrani discussed the making of The White Tiger in a DGA Virtual Q&A moderated by Director Scott Cooper (Hostiles).
During the conversation, Bahrani spoke about how creating an atmosphere where his actors felt free to take risks paid off during a pivotal scene where the protagonist is confronted by a beggar woman.
“So the actor playing Balram came to me and said, ‘I had this idea I want to try.’ I would say, ‘Don't tell me don't tell me, just do it. I believe in you. I want to witness it at the monitor like I'm an audience seeing it for the first time. Surprise me. So, we got rid of the whole crew, just the operator and sound and a totally live environment in the most crowded part of Delhi. I went to the beggar woman and said, ‘I don't know what he's gonna’ do,' — in the script is just supposed to shoo her away — ‘whatever he does, just keep asking for the money. Just keep repeating it over and over again. Then he did what he did where he just gives a gift to you as a filmmaker and the audience because he pulls the entire street into the movie. It's better to just create an environment of total freedom — your crew has to be on that page — that the actors know they can take risks. If they risk and fall it doesn't matter. I will pick them up and they can risk again.”
Bahrani’s other directorial credits include the feature films Fahrenheit 451, 99 Homes, At Any Price, Goodbye Solo, Chop Shop, Man Push Cart and Strangers; and episodes of Treadstone and Futurestates and the documentary series Independent Lens.
Bahrani has been a DGA member since 2015.
You can listen to Bahrani's Q&A by clicking the podcast episode embedded below. You can find more DGA podcast episodes here.
About the DGA Virtual Q&A Program
Mirroring the ever-popular DGA Membership Screening Q&A program in the virtual space, DGA Members can now learn more about films directly from the filmmakers in this series of livestreamed conversations.
