The first Pakistani director to take his feature film Joyland to Cannes film festival, talks to BOLD in an exclusive interview

BOLD: Why is the film titled Joyland?

Saim Sadiq: Set in Lahore, the film Joyland is named after the eponymous amusement park of the city. Being one of the major attractions during our childhood days, the Joyland Park was a big part of our growing-up years, offering us some moments of joy as well as a deep sense of festivity and get-togetherness. In fact, Joyland harkens back the most pleasant-yet-funny childhood memories that have stuck with me over the years and the film Joyland coupled with its characters have a sort of a fleeting relationship with that theme park that can be seen in the film. There’s a kind of a metaphorical idea behind that same space which all the characters of the film are looking for –  a land for joy where they can exist and go after their desires without any shame or identity conflict.

Why didn’t you pursue a career in acting instead of film direction?

Pursuing a career is all about what your interest and passion is. I was always interested in telling stories and instead of being part of somebody else’s story, I wanted to be the one who is able to visualize and write the story and create its characters. So my interest has always been working behind the camera because I am keenly interested in people and love to see, examine and portray human emotions and psyche by using the camera.

Despite being considerably a new name in film direction, Joyland is another big thing that has happened to you. How do you feel about it?

Since Joyland is my debut feature film, I feel really good as it is the greatest thing that has happened in my life so far. Earlier, I did student films and short films only. At the moment, the film Joyland seems everything to me and I am hoping that now I can have an actual career based on the acclaim that I have been given from the public and thankfully I will be able to make films that I want to produce, instead of working in the industry on somebody else’s terms. Thanks to Joyland, I can hopefully do whatever work I can do but only on my own terms, which is the most important thing to me as a storyteller.

Direction is a tiring process which demands patience and perseverance. Do you lose your cool on set, especially when things start going wrong?

No. In general, film directors are too often allowed to throw a tantrum or go off the deep end. In complete contrast, it’s very rare for me to lose my temper and I just don’t like this attitude either.  The world of filmmaking is not such a field where everyone can easily make heaps of money. In a country like ours, filmmaking can only be pursued purely out of passion. I always feel indebted to the cast and crew who took out their time and did so much physical and mental labour for the film. Even if I feel frustrated, I get anxious, but I don’t lose my cool, never.

How do you think the people in Pakistan will welcome the release of Joyland in the country?

I believe the people will welcome the film wholeheartedly. There’s been a lot of buzz around the film but it’s all been because of its international appeal. In fact, the release of Joyland in Pakistan will be like a coming home for the Pakistani audience, and once they watch the film, they will be able to find at least one or two characters they can relate to. The film depicts Pakistan as it happens to be in this time and age and what its people are like. It’s neither an aspirational film with a moving song shot in Turkey or beyond, or is a commercial film, full of fun and entertainment. Joyland is a film that is very relatable, and I think that’s perhaps going to be the biggest takeaway for the audience here and whatever discussion and discourse that comes out of the film. With regards to film’s underlying theme, I think one of the leading objective of a film is to create awareness which, as a result, leads to an intellectual discourse and discussion. And that’s the ultimate point of cinema. Also, not everybody is supposed to agree with everything shown in the film, which is not trying to preach or publicise anything particular at all.

Why do you think there’s a need for the Joyland’s story to be told?

Joyland is based on a story that needs to be told, time and again. To me, there was a need to tell this story, engage with characters and to figure them out to make a film about them. I don’t think anybody should watch this film for the sake of watching. After all, Joyland is not a medicine or remedy; it’s a film. You should watch it because it is going to engage you and end up as an emotionally satisfying experience. For me, the need to touch on sensitive topics doesn’t come from sort of addressing any taboos and the like. It’s just that the story that came to me somehow happened to have a transgender character in it and I didn’t shy away from it. I accepted it, I owned it and tried to handle it as sensitively as I could. But at the same time, I think the primary responsibility of the film is to be engaging and I think I approached it from that end as well. Perhaps the unique selling point of the film, if any, and the need of the hour – if I was to diagnose our industry – would be to make films that are more accurate and realistic in terms of the portraying our people. Because I don’t know if we assume that only a Indian format or larger-than-life characters can only be entertaining. I think there’s a lot of people around us in real life who are very entertaining, interesting, and quirky and their stories matter too. And I think their stories on screen give us a sort of validation as people that we exist. That’s why the Western culture has marked such a footprint in the world and everybody knows what it is about because that is represented on screen. For our people watching the film will be more of cathartic experience as the film addresses some issues that we all can relate to as well. And those issues been presented in an engaging manner, hopefully.

To talk about the transgender a closer inspection of the affairs is always required. Do you have such experience of encountering a transgender man or woman or you just took the responsibility to raise the issue?

No, I didn’t approach the film like that. Again, the film is not about the issues confronting the transgender community. First of all, I think it’s a big misconception about the film. It has a transgender character and there are other male characters in the film, but you don’t say that the film is about the male issues. They are all characters; they’re people like us and and their gender is not necessarily what the film Joyland is all about. Secondly, I also feel like we sometime talk about transgender people as if they exist clandestinely and are not part of our society. However, they are on the street when we’re driving; they are everywhere. Thankfully, in today’s Pakistan there’s a newscaster who is a transgender person and there are many members of the transgender community studying in colleges and medical universities. They’ve always been everywhere, for instance, at our wedding celebrations or when a child is born. In fact, their presence has always been very mainstream in certain factions. We’ve never just bothered to look at them beyond their strange gender attributes and I think the film does that because it was a requirement of the story that there was a character that needed to be explored in all its layers. I wanted to do the same for Biba’s character, who is a transgender in the film. So it’s about how and why she gets angry so often, what are her ambitions in life and why does she feel insecure. There is a need to explore the burning issues facing the transgender people in everyday matters. I think that message is intrinsically ubiquitous in general. Today, everyone seems to agree to the fact that the transgender people re normal people and they must be given basic human rights that everybody else has. I don’t think we need to make a film to raise that basic sort of statement that is so basic that I don’t think there’s a conversation about it that the film needs to be made just to raise that issue. In addition to that, the film talks about other interpersonal things that I was interested in.

What message do you think this narrative will convey as there are many discussions about the community?

I don’t think the film has any message. I prefer films that don’t tell or force audience to do what is necessary or how should they feel after watching the film. I think the film tends to be a visual investigation and this story investigates the deep-seated patriarchy in our society and certain specific gender roles between men, women and transgender that we think they should be abiding by, and the dichotomy between that system and what human beings actually desire. People like you and I have also struggled with this. I think everybody struggles with those things, whether we dare admit it or not. Even the people who uphold patriarchy and our parents’ generation, they also seem to suffer from it in a certain sense. For me, the film was an exploration of these people and I don’t have any specific message to pass on to people who have a liberty to imbibe and take different things from the film from their own prism.

With popularity comes controversy too. While touching on a taboo subject, what was the creative thought behind it?

I don’t know whether I have touched on a taboo subject or not. Yes, there are not many films that highlight patriarchy or question gender roles in our country. The thought process was triggered by a story idea and it was important for me to make this film because I have observed patriarchy in my own family and everywhere around, and how men behave with women and how women behave with men and all that. For me, it was important to talk about that because I felt like I had carried out some sort of personal research on it.

We have so many stories but only a few of them are told through the art medium. What is going to be your next story?

I don’t know what is going to be my next story as it’s too early to talk about it. We just finished the film Joyland in May and we’re still two weeks out from its Pakistan release, so I need to release this one first and have it out of my system. I’m working on some ideas, but it’s too early to talk about them.

How did you decide the role for each character?

A different process was employed to select actors for every character. For Haider, the lead character, as many as 600 people went through the audition. In doing so, we discovered Ali Junejo, who is basically a theatre actor and just had the right approach towards the character which was very organic. Rasti is somebody that I know from the LUMS and have seen her performances. Having done a short film with her, Rasti was thus an easy choice. Sarwat is an amazing versatile actor but I don’t think we’ve seen her in the kind of role that she plays in Joyland. In short, it was exciting for me to make the most of her acting expertise in quite a different character. I know Alina through the short film, Darling. She made that short film before, and so even in the writing process I knew that Biba’s character would be played by Alina. You should ask Sania why she did the film! I think anybody would want to cast Sania in their film.

How was your experience in working with Ali Junejo and Alina?

It was amazing. They both have different backgrounds as Ali comes from the theatre while Alina is a new actress and is still figuring out the processes that work. To synch them with the film, we arranged a three-month workshop for them. For instance, Ali flew down to Lahore to get the dialect right since he is from Karachi. There was a lot of work involved and they both went the extra miles to attain perfection. The character Alina is playing is different from who she is in real life, but of course there are certain struggles that she would be able to identify as a performer. Alina is more instinctive and you have to get her in the mood. However, they both were very passionate about the film and so it was a pleasure working with them.

While showing every character’s perspective in the film, how did you connect to each character without enforcing your point of view or being judgmental as a director?

I tried my best to do that and whether I did it well or not, people will have to watch it and tell me.

Do you think the story has done justice to the basic idea?

You’ll have to watch the film and tell me if I did justice to it. I can’t be the judge of my own efforts.