'Laapataa Ladies', Editor, Jabeen Merchant

0:00Jawad MirWith Lapata Ladies, I mean, the concept is pretty interesting and scary at the same time, right? Like a man who gets married, then he's on the train going back to his village, and the bride is in her outfit, and there's a bunch of other married couples with similar bri… bridal outfit, and they get switched on the train, and you don't find out until you get to the village.

0:20Jabeen MerchantI do not sure how often it happens, but it has definitely happened. I mean, there have been newspaper articles. In certain parts of North India, this is the custom that, you know, the bride is,.. The wedding always happens at the bride's house. And this thing that the bride always has to have that long veil, which is only lifted once she gets home. You know, this idea of, the veil covering the face, which is typically associated with, Muslims, is actually, very common in India in all communities and in, non-Muslim communities. You know, it's a cultural thing.

1:08Jawad MirWhat a great little film, which is…

1:10Jabeen MerchantThank you

1:10Jawad Mir... Lapata Ladies, directed by, I always forget her last name, Kiran…

1:18Jabeen MerchantKiran Rao

1:19Jawad MirWhich one? Rao.

1:20Jabeen MerchantRao.

1:20Jawad MirKiran Rao. Yeah, Rao. And, now available on Netflix, an amazing film. I had seen the trailer a while ago, and, you know, because there's just so much stuff out there, it was just something kind of that went off radar. And then one evening my wife and I were trying to figure out what to watch…... And it popped up. And as soon as we started watching it, like, we just couldn't let go. An amazing film. Thank you so much for making, being part of it.

1:49Jabeen MerchantOh.

1:49Jawad MirI mean, you know, huge part of it.

1:51Jabeen MerchantIt's... No, it's great to... I… actually, the reactions have been unreal to this film. The kind of responses we've got from audiences, it's really special. I mean, it happens very rarely.

2:06Jawad MirWell, I think the reason it happens very rarely, and I'm gonna be a little bit blunt about this, is, very rarely honest films are made, not just in I… India, in Hollywood as well, everywhere. And it, this came from the heart

2:20Jabeen MerchantYeah

2:20Jawad Mir... Right? It was just very genuine and a very... Another film this year that I saw, I'm a huge fan of Vidhu Vinod Chopra, very similar, 12th Fail. You know…

2:29Jabeen Merchant12th Fail

2:29Jawad Mir... That actually did really well, too, because it's a common man's story, and it's t… told with such an honesty and purity. And it's family. Like, that's another thing, right? It's a family viewing film. Like, you cannot…

2:40Jawad Mir... You don't have to worry about anything, and so people appreciate that, and the simplicity of life…... And everything.

2:48Jabeen MerchantSo as ... I have this, very good filmmaker friend who would always, tell me that a film has to be deceptively simple.

3:00Jawad MirA film has to be what, sorry?

3:02Jabeen MerchantDeceptively simple.

3:04Jawad MirOkay.

3:04Jabeen MerchantIt looks simple, but, it isn't of course, in the way we do it, so.

3:09Jawad MirYeah. Yeah, of course. I mean, when I say simple, the amount of hard work that goes behind it is uncanny.

3:15Jabeen MerchantYeah.

3:15Jawad MirNot just from a production, but pre-production, post-production. I mean, it's every stage is just amazing. And I, and I think one of the things that really got to me were the performances of these actors, and that's a testament…

3:28Jabeen MerchantYeah

3:28Jawad Mir... To the director as well, right? That they're not A-list actors, but, you know, they were amazingly real, as real as they can get. Just, you know, tell me about how you got on board on this film, the initial journey of you getting a call or whether through your agent or directly through Kiran.

3:51Jabeen MerchantSo, yeah, it was directly Kiran's office. So, I, as an editor, I mean, I've, I've been working for many years, but I've kind of, you know, ended up in this, space that, I mean, it's tagged as indie, right? I mean, I'm, I very rarely work on these big blockbuster films, you know. So, and I'm happy in this space. I like working, you know, on these sort, the sorts of films that have come my way. And of course, a lot of the directors I really admire, luckily for me, are here also making these kinds of films. So, you know, you have a wish list, people you really want to work with, and…

4:35Jawad MirYeah

4:35Jabeen Merchant... Kiran has always been on that list. I've always, I mean, I know she made just one fiction feature before this, but she has done…

4:44Jawad MirYeah

4:44Jabeen Merchant... A lot of other work, and she's been part of the film industry, for a very long time, and she's always been somebody I would, I have wanted to work with. So it was great, you know, to get this call and say like, "Look, Kiran's making a film, and I agreed to work with her," so yeah, that's how it, started.

5:02Jawad MirHer other film was, I think, Dobaighaat, right, if I'm not mistaken?

5:06Jabeen MerchantYes.

5:06Jawad MirYeah. I have to rewatch that. It's been a while since I watched it. But that one, I remember when I watched it was a really good film, even at that time. It's, it's been a while. So, but with Lapata Ladies, I mean, the concept is pretty interesting and scary at the same time, right? Like, this is, just to kind of, for the audience, you know, it's basically, a man who gets married, then he's on the train going back to his village, and the bride is in her outfit, and there's a bunch of other married couples with similar bri… bridal outfit, and they get switched on the train, and you don't find out until you get to the village. The, I'm assuming this happens quite often. Is it, would it be right to assume?

5:49Jabeen MerchantI do not sure how often it happens, but it has definitely happened. I mean, there have been newspaper articles. You know, it's been in the news. It's not very common, but, I mean, yeah. In certain parts of north India, this is the custom that, you know, the bride is, the wedding always happens at the bride's house, and then, the bridal party goes back to the groom's place. In this case, the bride and groom, like, the rest of the party has left, and they are going back on their own after finishing some prayer. So, yeah, and this thing that the bride always has to have that long veil, which is only lifted once she gets home. You know, this idea of, the veil covering the face, which is typically associated with, Muslims, is actually, very common in India in all communities and in non-Muslim communities. You know, it's a cultural thing.

6:50Jabeen MerchantSo it happens a lot, and yeah, the red, dupatta is always the same. You know, it's, it's this red, golden, tinsel-y kind of thing. So I mean, of course there's, creative liberties taken…

7:07Jawad MirYeah

7:07Jabeen Merchant... To make the story work. But yeah.

7:12Jawad MirRight. Yeah, a-a-and in terms of your role on the film, were you there on the set at any time, whether it was just for observation or whether it was cutting dailies, or your kind of part came after everything was done?

7:32Jabeen MerchantSo normally I do, get involved in the films that I work on as far as possible from the scripting stage itself. I start reading and, you know, I start interacting. But in this case, the project came to me after it was already been shot.

7:48Jawad MirOkay.

7:49Jabeen MerchantSo they had finished shooting the shot, I think towards the end of the kind of COVID, once the lockdown had lifted, but, you know…

8:00Jawad MirRight

8:00Jabeen Merchant... People were still in masks and stuff. And, they shot the whole film. They had an on-location editor, and, there was a cut that, I think that, so the editor who was originally supposed to work on it kind of opted out. So it came to me after that when there was a kind of, I wouldn't say a, an edit, but, like, it was a kind of full lineup of the entire film, all the scenes kind of roughly cut together. So there was a lot to watch, and it was extremely long. And, Kiran called me in, and we watched it together, and she said, "You know, I just feel like it's not landing, and, so it needs to be reworked." So at that stage I said, I mean, I agreed. I said, like, "I feel like every cut needs to be changed." So I told her, "Give me a couple of months. I'm going to take, go back to the footage and cut it from scratch and give you another, you know, interpretation of it."

9:00Jabeen MerchantSo I was given all the time I needed, and, I made a full cut. Then that was, like my first cut. Then Kiran and I sat together and basically wrestled it to the ground. You know, she is a very hands-on director. She herself has come up through the ranks. She started as an assistant director herself, so she has a very granular understanding of, you know, filmmaking, and she's very interested. So it was like everything we looked at through a magnifying glass. There were every take, every line, every cut. It was wonderful, you know, truly collaborative. It was, really great.

9:46Jawad MirThat's amazing. Working with Kiran Jabbe, you know, she obviously is a very talented storyteller. I mean, it shows in both the films that she's done. I mean, you said collab… collaborative, and that's a very must thing for cinema, I mean, a-and even in a company, like, you know, when you succeed as a company. But in cinema it's such a collaborative effort. What were, what is the... You know, there's so many emotional scenes in the film, whether they're funny or whether they're, you know, sad or somewhere in the middle. What sort of drives her based on how much interaction you had with her in telling the story that she wants to do? Like, what are some of the pieces that she want, emotion that she wants to evoke, or is she trying to es… evoke a certain emotion during the cut? You know, because the film is writ… rewritten in the editing stage. Just working with her, what is she trying to get at? Like, what's her end goal from what you saw collaborating with her?

10:49Jabeen MerchantI think that…

10:49Jawad MirBesides making a great film…

10:51Jabeen MerchantYeah

10:51Jawad Mir... Of course.

10:53Jabeen MerchantYeah. Yeah. Yeah, no. I would say that, the goal, the attempt at what we were working towards was, to tell the story, and it's a story that, you know, means a lot of things. It's not just funny or just entertaining or just to make people cry or just, not just a romance. There's a lot of, I mean, for lack of a better word, I'll say messages, but they're not to be delivered as messages.

11:19Jawad MirYeah. Preachy, not preachy.

11:20Jabeen MerchantThey're,.. Yeah. So I think to keep that light touch, was the, was very important. It's one of the things for sure. And, yeah, just, crafting it in great detail. I mean, it's, it's so personal. But, just to hit each note correctly, you know, to make the funny scenes really funny and to, you know. I think that this was not just a process in the edit, but it was something that had begun much earlier in the shooting and probably even when the actors rehearsed their lines. So, it was kind of a following through in the edit or something that was already kind of cooking.

12:19Jabeen MerchantYou know? I, it, I didn't get the sense that we are struggling. I got the sense that we are kind of, just mining the footage for the right moments to, you know, make the story work.

12:36Jawad MirRight. When you were editing it in those two months, right? I made this mistake once. I mean, I try not to edit my own films now. Just, you know, the beginning I did. But it's, during COVID, I was, kind of helping on my edit with an editor. Like, I was just kind of guiding, you know, giving her all the notes, and she was guiding me, and we were working together. And one of the things that I did during COVID was, because everybody was in that zone of, you know, being locked in, I watched a lot of terrible movies. When I say terrible, I mean, like, you know, without a plot and, you know, just kind of like, just escapism.

13:18Jawad MirAnd I didn't realize that it actually had an impact on the work that I was doing, because I started, you know, translating all that into the work. And then I, you know, I…

13:29Jabeen MerchantWhich, I mean, that's not always a bad thing, Iraj.

13:33Jawad MirNo, but it was just, it j… the films were very serious. They were human rights…... You know, like, in a dire situation…

13:42Jabeen MerchantYeah

13:42Jawad Mir... Life and death.

13:43Jabeen MerchantYeah.

13:43Jawad MirAnd I'm watching movies like Fast and Furious and, you know, stuff like that. But then I saw, like, obviously then I started watching Breaking Bad and, you know, like, really good narratives, and that had an impact in the other way. So then my question is, in those two months when you were editing, did you not watch anything, or did you try to ins… get the inspiration, or did you go outside, y… you know, in the trains or villages or just to get some inspiration? How was, what was that process like, if there was anything like that?

14:16Jabeen MerchantNo. I mean,.. So it, I mean, two months was just when I did my first cut. We spent, like, the better part of a year editing the film after that. So, it was a very long process. But, I mean, you watch what you watch, you know? It's not, I don't,.. I actually avoid, you know, other references. I'd like to just, get into the material and, you know, treat it for what it is. Like, what are these rhythms? What is going on in this frame? What is this allowing me to, say?

14:56Jawad MirRight.

14:56Jabeen MerchantRather than, how somebody else has done it. I think how somebody else does things just kind of seeps into your brain anyway. We watch so much.

15:06Jawad MirAnyways, yeah. Yeah, that's true too.

15:07Jabeen MerchantYou know? It always does. The other thing that happens with me is, I cut a lot of fiction. I also cut a lot of documentary films, and very serious political documentary films and, you know, activist films sometimes. And, I found, this is why I'm saying it's not such a bad thing, because I found that the energy of one kind of crosses over into the other, and it, you know, there, because, you know, fiction has a certain kind of crafting. And in documentary you're, you are crafting it, but you're also concerned with themes and bigger ideas and what people are saying, how they're speaking, how they're represented, you know, so many things. So I find that it plays together.

15:54Jawad MirInteresting. That's, that's an interesting angle. Maybe I would need to try that down the road one more time. You said you did, have done documentaries and, narratives as well, right? So from what I know personally, but not that much, but I've read that it's very difficult, not impossible, it's very difficult to come from the documentary world. No, to g… go from the narrative world into the documentary world, and it's easier to come from the documentary world into the narrative, because narrative is very scripted and, you know, it's kind of, concise.

16:27Jawad MirAnd documentary's kind of, like, everywhere, with a vision, of course. How, what was, what is your experience like in doing both?

16:37Jabeen MerchantYeah. Fiction is much easier, narrative, like you say.

16:40Jawad MirYeah.

16:40Jabeen MerchantIt is much easier.

16:42Jawad MirThat's right.

16:42Jabeen MerchantAnd, yeah, it can be so much fun, as I said, that kind of crafting. You know, just, like, just trying a lot of fun stuff, which, yeah, documentaries don't. But, in my case, so I went into film school where most of my, and it w… many years ago, I finished in 1995, where most of my training was working on narrative fiction films.

17:14Jabeen MerchantAnd as soon as I left film school, I ended up with a bunch of friends who were all making documentaries. So I kind of cut my teeth on that. So I've kind of always managed to do both. It, I've never looked at it as a, you know, problem.

17:33Jawad MirNo. That's really good that you were able to do both, because they both are interesting. I mean, I say this to people when they ask me about documentaries, that I, you know, for me it's like I know where the story starts. I know where the ending is gonna be likely. You know, obviously not sure if it's gonna be the way I would like it to be, because it's, it's a real story and real time. But how do you get there excites the hell out of me but scares the crap out of me at the same time.

18:04Jabeen MerchantYeah.

18:04Jawad MirLike, that whole journey.

18:06Jabeen MerchantAbsolutely.

18:07Jawad Mir'Cause a story is going this way, that way, and you don't know which way to hook. And it's, it's fun at the same time. It's exciting.

18:14Jabeen MerchantSo I think that, you know, this kind of stru… playing with the structure, flipping scenes about, it is something that we do with fiction all the time. Lapata Ladies, I mean, if you see the script as written on paper and, the film that is finally out, we did quite a bit of that. And I've done that with every fiction film, every fiction feature that I've edited, where, you know, you kind of, you are saying, "Okay, this is how it's written, but this actually doesn't work if it follows from here." And often if it's too long, then you're like, "Okay, we need to get rid of this scene, but then the next scene doesn't connect up, so can we put it somewhere else?" And, the songs in Lapata Ladies, we changed the placement of the songs…

19:00Jawad MirOkay

19:01Jabeen Merchant... Many times. You know, played with a lot of stuff. So I think that, in that sense, yeah, all filmmaking, is storytelling and, you end up having to kind of, use all these, skills.

19:17Jawad MirYeah. Tabin, how did your journey be… start? Like, what was the catalyst in you becoming who you are? Was it a movie that you saw?

19:31Jabeen MerchantIt's a good question. I,.. Well, I started, wanting to be a writer, like a journalist, not…

19:41Jawad MirOkay

19:41Jabeen Merchant... A film writer, but like a, you know, master. Yeah, and I even worked briefly in a newspaper. But, somewhere along the way, I just, I felt that cinema is more my thing, and I went to film school. But, you know, editing is something that requires a certain kind of, personality. Like, you have to have this ability to, you know, sit alone in a room for hours, look at the same thing over and over, or you make sense of it, kind of, have the head to patiently tease out structure and, you know, cut little bits out, put them somewhere, save them somewhere. It's, it's like you have to have that brain, right? That organizing brain. I found that I have that and I enjoy that much more than being a director running around on a set yelling at 10,000 people, like, or whatever it takes. You know, like a general marshaling troops, right? That's what directors…

20:41Jawad MirRight

20:41Jabeen Merchant... Have to do. I mean, the best of them, however nice they are as people. So yeah, that's, that's not me.

20:48Jawad MirNo, that makes sense.

20:50Jabeen MerchantSo

20:51Jawad MirBut what was the movie that you may have seen that took you towards cinema? Like, was there a s… fil… film that you saw or an interview you saw or heard?

21:02Jabeen MerchantSo I actually,.. So I did my BA, in English literature, so always, you know, narrative in that sense and that world of the imagination.

21:16Jawad MirStorytelling. Yeah.

21:16Jabeen MerchantYou know, you read a book and you know,.. So that has always been very close. I mean, I've always been very close to that, you know, in my head. And, I actually went to media school first before I joined the FTII. I did this kind of mass media course. It's an excellent full-time one-year course. It still, happens in Bombay. It's called, it's at the Sophia Polytechnic.

21:43Jawad MirOkay.

21:43Jabeen MerchantSo that has various components. Journalism was one component of the course, cinema was another. And, every week, once a week, we used to have a film screening, and these were like the classics of world cinema and also Indian films. There was a 16 projector in the classroom. All the curtains would be drawn. They would get prints, 16 prints from the National Film Archive of India, you know. So all the, like, textbook Cinema 101 films, I actually watched them. And, they would also invite various contemporary filmmakers, to come and screen their films and have conversations with us. So I think by the end of that year, I was, like I said, "Okay, this is actually much more my thing."

22:37Jawad MirRight.

22:37Jabeen MerchantIt's just a world that opens up. There also used to be a lot of film societies in, Bombay at that time. So, you know, like, you go to the Russian Cultural Center and, you know, watching Kozintsev's Hamlet and, you know, Andrei Rublev and so many things, you know, you... It was great. And this was all on the big screen, right? Film prints. This was like in the '90s.

23:00Jawad MirOf course. Yeah.

23:00Jabeen MerchantOr '80s. Late '80s. So it was great.

23:05Jawad MirThat's awesome.

23:05Jabeen MerchantYeah.

23:05Jawad MirWhat, who's one of... Who's a director that you admire, whether it's in Hollywood or in India, that you would love to work with, even if it's a far-fetched dream?

23:16Jabeen MerchantWell, I mean, I'm very timid about such things. I wouldn't dare, like…

23:21Jawad MirOkay

23:21Jabeen Merchant... Want to work, like... I wouldn't go so far as to say love to work with. I don't know. But

23:28Jawad MirOkay

23:28Jabeen Merchant... A lot of,.. I'll tell you…

23:33Jawad MirI mean, purely from storytelling aspect, like some, you know, Kiran Rao is an amazing storyteller. I'm not talking about status and celebrity and all that. I'm just talking about purely storytelling.

23:44Jabeen MerchantSo I think, you know, like, watched, which was, like, really shifted something in my head. So one of them was, Palkhathil.

23:55Jawad MirOkay.

23:56Jabeen MerchantWhich

23:57Jawad MirPalkhathil

23:58Jabeen Merchant... Really when I watched it at that time, you know, it again, in the cinema hall on the big screen, and, you're really like, "Okay, wow. I didn't think a film could be like this." I mean, I was very young at then also. But, you know, some things really change something in your head and you, go from there. It's possible to do certain things. So, yeah, the other one that really I think some of Spike Lee's work w… really…

24:30Jabeen Merchant... Yeah, really connected, I really connected with. Again, you know, it's themes and how they are kind of, worked out in a script.

24:43Jawad MirRight. I think with Pulp Fiction, one of the greatest things for me was the wa… the final scene, how it got connected to everything else. You know, the one in the, in the…

24:54Jabeen MerchantYeah

24:54Jawad Mir... In the, in the diner. Like, from an editing standpoint, I mean, that's…

24:58Jabeen MerchantExactly. Structure

24:59Jawad Mir... That's, that's an…

24:59Jabeen MerchantStructure, right?

25:00Jawad MirIt's so beautiful. Yeah. It's so beautiful. I mean, you come to like, "Oh, okay, that makes sense that you could tell a story like that too instead of, you know, being chronological." and, you know, going back to Lapata Ladies, was there... You know, there's always stuff that you want in a film, but you have to take liberties to take it out because it doesn't connect with the pacing. It could be a great standalone scene because of the performances or the dialogue. Was there one or a few scenes like that didn't connect, but they were great scenes nevertheless that could have gone in?

25:39Jabeen MerchantThere were a couple of scenes. I don't, I mean, you know, it's, so let me put it this way. When at the, at the preview, the premiere screening of the film, right? There was this very lovely, you know, occasion when a lot of invitees were there, and the film was screened and very well received. And then somebody asked Kiran and I were, you know, standing around together, and somebody asked us, "So, you know, when you release the, will you, will you have those deleted scenes w… you know, when you kind of release a, another version on DVD?" And both of us looked at each other and I mean, we really cut a lot out of the film, yeah? But we looked at each other and then we said, "No, actually, there's nothing we'd like to put back. This…"

26:22Jawad MirYeah

26:23Jabeen Merchant... "this is fine. We like this. This is our film." So, I'm very satisfied with, what is in there. But, yeah, there was, there were a lot of, a lot of the scenes were longer. There was this, and the opening had much more. The journey of the bride getting to, you know, leaving her home, her m… her, in, and feeling really sad. It was actually very sad when we started. Now it's, like, really peppy and, you know, happy or excited.

27:00Jawad MirRight.

27:00Jabeen MerchantBut, it was this sad moment where she's crying. She's left her family. She's going off into the unknown. You know, she's this sheltered child, nay, but you know, young woman.

27:13Jawad MirYeah.

27:13Jabeen MerchantAnd, you know, there's this scene where, before they catch the bus, where, you know, they sit on the roof of a bus at one point and travel.

27:19Jawad MirRight.

27:20Jabeen MerchantSo there was a scene at the bus station where, there are these, you know, these typical louts hanging around. There's this group of young men, who are, you know, Deepak tells her, "I'll get you some water," and she's sitting there on a ledge with her ghungat. And, Deepak has gone off to buy some snacks and water for her, and these boys start singing, you know, a song, to kind of, you know, like tease her or, you know, and she is petrified. And, there was a shot where you could see her. It was a close-up, and you could see her from inside the veil. The veil is covering her head, and you could see her kind of terrified eyes inside and, you know, and just she really doesn't know what to do. And you also get the sense of how unsafe certain parts of, you know, the country are, or maybe certain parts of the world are for women, you know, what you think.

28:21Jabeen MerchantSo yeah, that was actually a really nice moment, and that song was very funny. That's a b… I mean, it wasn't meant to be funny, but it was kind of a very amusing kind of, ditty they sing. So yeah, those things were nice. There was a extended song sequence on the river.

28:42Jabeen Merchant... I mean, in another film all that would have been beautiful. But, yeah, eventually we realized, also through a process of a lot of, screenings to get feedback from audiences before

28:58Jawad MirYeah

28:58Jabeen Merchant... You know, locking the edit. So, we realized, what's working. You know, sometimes the story tries to do too much, and, that's kind of its undoing. Like, then you're not effectively saying one thing and you're…

29:19Jawad MirYeah

29:19Jabeen Merchant... You know, trying to say 10 different things. So we kind of were able to narrow it down, and it was a collective kind of thing. So yeah.

29:31Jawad MirNo, I genuinely felt, even now that I think about it, like I never felt that the scene is dragging, 'cause they were very… ... Concise and to the point. And one of the things that I loved about the film, that I'm not gonna give away the ending, is, the arc of the policeman, the guy who…

29:51Jabeen MerchantOh, yeah.

29:51Jawad MirRight? And then I did not, because I was so invested in the characters and the movies, and that's a testament to the film, that I did… I totally forgot about, I thought the protagonist was the girl who was not in the village, who was at the other location. Like, that's what I was thinking…

30:10Jawad Mir... That, you know, she's the main protagonist. But the way Kiran and yourself, you guys turned the story on its head in a sense that it became about her. But when it became about her, it made sense that it was always about her Not that, not to take away from any other characters or performances. I'm just saying that it was just, I felt because she was like the road to the freedom, right? Like, how the story unveils. So I thought that was really beautifully done. Again, I'm just making these comments. I absolutely love the movie, and I've been recommending it to everybody among my friends and family circle that…

30:48Jabeen MerchantThank you

30:49Jawad Mir... Watch it with your kids because it's... The, even aside from the story, the simplicity of it, you know, just the way the world is, it's... You don't see that nowadays, right? Like, everything is like a rat race, and you're going, and you're not figuring out where you're going. So it was really cool to see that. But yeah, it was... Thank you so much for being a part of it. I'll probably check it out again in the next couple of years just to refresh.

31:15Jabeen MerchantWonderful. Please do.

31:18Jawad MirAwesome. What's next for you now? Are you working on anything or something in the can?

31:25Jabeen MerchantYeah, I ju… I actually just finished another, fiction feature, but, it's a very small film. It is having trouble finding a release. That's the story of my life mostly.

31:38Jawad MirWelcome to the club.

31:39Jabeen MerchantAnd there's a documentary film which is going to take a while.

31:44Jawad MirYeah.

31:45Jabeen MerchantAnd, yeah. So, yeah, doing stuff. I,.. I mean, there was some personal reasons why also I decided to take it a bit slow. But, it's just,.. I mean, this is a lot. Lapata Ladies has just,.. It's, it's a lot to kind of... I'm happy to enjoy this.

32:09Jawad MirYeah. I was actually just looking at your IMDb. So did you work on Khamoshi with Sanjida Bensafi?

32:18Jabeen MerchantI was the assistant editor. It was my first job.

32:22Jawad MirThat was a wonderful film. That was a wonderful film.

32:26Jabeen MerchantThat… And I learned so much back then.

32:30Jawad MirI'm sure.

32:31Jabeen MerchantYeah.

32:31Jawad MirI'm sure you did. You know, it's been, it's been, it's been great, and I truly pray and wish you the best. And I would love to chat with you again if there is any film that you'd wanna talk about that you feel very, you know... I mean, they're all your babies, but at the end of the day, if there's something that you wanna, talk about, I would love to have you on again because I truly enjoy talking to you.

32:55Jabeen MerchantAbsolutely. Do you do documentaries as well, or is it just, fiction feature? But it has… ... To be something that's released in the US so people can watch it, right?

33:04Jawad MirSorry, what was the last part again? Can you repeat that?

33:06Jabeen MerchantYou do films that are released in the US so people can watch it, on…

33:11Jawad MirThey're actually, they're actually... I mean, the… they're on different platforms. Some platforms are geographically restricted, but there are some… ... That are international. But the films that I... I've always wanted to get into narrative, and somehow I ended up doing social, political, human rights narrative documentaries.

33:31Jawad MirLike, you know, where you follow a protagonist's… ... Journey in real time. These are the posters, like, of two of my films, In Search of My Sister and Citizen of Moria. But they are available on, Vimeo on Demand to watch it outside of Europe and, U… North America. So if you're interested in seeing them, I'd be more than happy to send you a link.

33:48Jabeen MerchantPlease do. Please do. I would love to. And yeah, I will get in touch with you. Let's keep in touch if,.. Maybe we'll talk again.

33:56Jawad MirFor sure. Absolutely. Thank you so much for your time, Jeene. Thank you so much for being part of this.

34:00Jabeen MerchantThanks. It was a pleasure.