two years ago when filmmaker anand gandhis tumbbad released no one knew the level of technical brilliance the film had achieved rarely does it happen that a horror film goes past the usual tropes and leaves the audience with a feeling of eeriness that lasts the film which took a while in the making was appreciated for its technical excellence among several other aspects anand gandhi spoke to bombay times about the film and why his journey with genre is not over yet though there may not be another tumbbad in the offing excerpts tumbbad is considered to be a piece of excellent craftsmanship especially in the technical departments what was the journey on that film like for youwith tumbbad i was determined to create a new standard for indian excellence on the world stage we approached every facet of the creation screenplay art cinematography costumes with an aspiration to surpass the previous ceilings of our own imagination the path was a grueling one but fortunately we were awarded with a result that we can be proud ofwhat had really excited you to even attempt a film like that with that scaleafter ship of theseus i was determined to push the limits of my craft i wanted to work on something that provided me the opportunity to dive deeper into philosophical questions of identity ownership theft and orders of oppression while painting these ideas on the broad canvas of a primal human drama with intense emotions and awe inspiring images with tumbbad i was keen on creating a motion picture event on the lines of the ones that had inspired me all my lifeyou were relatively new to the hindi movie industry at that time why did you run such a huge risk as a filmmaker to back something so challenging so early onfrom the vantage point of the bollywood industry standard tumbbad could be considered a risky production it is an uninhibited exploration of the psyche that unfolds through its theme cinematography structure and performances instead of star power and romantic clichs as a producercreator however it was always a no brainer for me i reject the notion upheld by the gatekeepers of culture that audiences are looking only for a certain kind of cinema create something that moves that inspires that awes and audiences will welcome it wholeheartedlywhat was the most difficult thing to put together in tumbbadsome of the worlds most iconic period films have been brought to life with massive budgets of millions of dollars the single biggest challenge in our journey of tumbbad was achieving the same quality and scale at a fraction of the cost all of us suffered in its making and it took us years to reconcile with our struggles there were endless challenges in sustaining the project over the years it took to make it but every members commitment to the dream remained unwaveringhorror films generally have a set of tropes which were all missing in this film how did