When you see Saif Ali Khan-Rani Mukerji-starrer Ta Ra Rum Pum, don’t believe anyone who says the movie’s race car sequence is a special effects blitz.
WASHINGTON, DC: Next year, when you see YashRaj Film’s Saif Ali Khan-Rani Mukerji-starrer Ta Ra Rum Pum, don’t believe anyone who tells you that the movie’s race car sequence is a special effects blitz or stock footage. It’s not. Producer Aditya Chopra has pumped in upwards of Rs2.5 crore to shoot a live grand prix-like race in the US run by the Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA).
The sequence, involving Saif, was shot with the help of leading American race car consultant Andy Hillenburg, who is also a former stock car race champion. Hillenburg built the car for the sequence, and then ran it in at a major auto race in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, a state located in the American Midwest to get the footage.
“This is the first time since the 1990 Tom Cruise-Nicole Kidman movie Days of Thunder that a race car used for movie production participated in a major auto race,” said Hillenburg, whose most recent work was for the hit racing comedy Talladega Nights starring Will Ferrell.
Chopra and Ta Ra Rum Pum’s director Siddharth Anand (who earlier helmed Salaam Namaste) filmed some shots at an ARCA race track, and then went on to Milwaukee to get the live footage. “We had a specially designed two-seat race car that gave us an edge while working with Saif,” said Hillenburg.
“It is pretty easy to see why Saif is the star that he is, because he was willing to get right in the middle of the action with us. His work ethic really inspired all of the crew to make every scene as perfect as possible.”
Chopra’s initial plan was to get live footage from NASCAR, America’s largest motorsports body that sanctions over 1500 races every year, and has annual merchandise revenue of over $2 billion. Even though negotiations were on, NASCAR refused, given the budgetary constraints of the Indian film crew. That is when Chopra decided to move on to ARCA, a slightly smaller version of NASCAR.
To make this happen, Chopra approached the Washington, DC, based group US-India Business Alliance (USIBA), which is co-chaired in India by journalist and former disinvestment minister Arun Shourie and former foreign minister Salman Khurshid, to help negotiate license fees and tax issues with ARCA. USIBA then worked on behalf of Chopra to get the necessary permissions.
Although Chopra was not available for an interview for this report, he released a statement that said: “It would have been difficult to get to shoot on American racing tracks. This is also a sign of how India and the US are getting closer to each other not only in terms of business, but also creativity and off-the-beaten-track filmmaking.”
Hillenburg said, “Working with YashRaj Films was exciting. Sid (Siddharth Anand) was an excellent director and explained the shots he was looking for very well, which made our jobs so much easier. I really believe Ta Ra Rum Pum will have some of the best racing scenes and action shots of any feature film in recent years.”
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