MUMBAI: Creative minds, Imtiaz Ali and Ekta Kapoor have definitely opted to tread on a completely unconventional route for their upcoming passion project- Laila Majnu. To begin with, they decided to cast fresh faces as opposed to established actors for this intense love story, and now it is learnt that the film is also shot in an interestingly unusual manner which truly states this film is for the crazies and by the crazies.

 Laila Majnu, directed by Sajid Ali, is entirely shot in a backward order, i.e. the film’s shoot began with the last scene and proceeded forward in a reverse chronological order.

The film, which is a contemporary version of one of the most popular love stories of all times – Laila Majnu, depicts how consumed by the emotion of love ‘Kaes' turns into a mad ‘Majnu’; and for this drastic transformation, it was crucial that the film is shot in this pattern.

 “We have different looks and transitions in the film for Majnu. The story about him gradually losing his sanity in love and transcending into madness is the most significant part of our film and this is seen through his physical transformation for which he had to shed almost 12 kgs in a short span of 17 days along with  his beard and hair growing long for over 6 months. It was quite challenging because once we trimmed his beard and hair we couldn’t have taken the same shot again and we were very certain that we didn’t want to use artificial beard for his look as we wanted to keep it real and raw".

'What was interesting to see was his Journey from Majnu to looking like Kaes and shooting it in the backward pattern, I gave him just a weeks break and he came pumped up on set looking like the suave and charming Kaes'

Laila Majnu is presented by Imtiaz Ali, directed by Sajid Ali and produced by Balaji Motion Pictures and Preety Ali’s Pi films.