This Friday, Nushrratt Bharuccha headlines Akelli, a gritty thriller inspired by real-life events which shows a young woman being caught in the middle of war in Mosul in Iraq and surviving every obstacle in her path to make her way back home to India. t2 chatted with Nushrratt on Akelli and more.

Akelli looks like it’s going to be a very different watch compared to what we have seen in recent times....

The two words that have come out strongly from all the reactions so far are ‘intriguing’ and ‘gripping’. From within the movie fraternity also, I have had people calling up and saying that the trailer had them hooked. They are curious about the film and what is going to happen to her (Nushrratt’s character Jyoti). What has been heartening for us is that while the thriller aspect of the film has made everyone curious, they are also interested in the human side of the story. Eventually, Akelli is a human drama.

What were your primary reasons to want to do this film?

I hadn’t done a film like this before. Honestly, even I wasn’t sure whether I could do a film like this. Doing a film like Akelli requires a certain sensibility... one needs to say it right. In a film like this, one needs to be responsible about what one is saying and what one is not. A light rom-com or a horror film or a thriller almost always tends to be fictional and one can do a lot with it. But when you talk about a war-torn situation or about female foeticide, then one can’t be frivolous about it. It has to be done true to the context and to the cause and to the story that one is trying to say. Nothing else matters but that.

The story really intrigued me. Come to think of it, we are blessed that we live in a country as safe as India. This film takes place at a time when the situation was precarious for people in Iraq. It was under constant attack and people lived in perpetual fear for so many years.

The film shows how my character goes to Iraq from India for a job opportunity and then finds it impossible to come back. Her fate hangs in the balance... she has no idea whether she will make it out of this alive. It’s inspired by a real-life story. This story really took me in. A similar thing happened when the Taliban took over Afghanistan, and that was pretty recent. It makes one wonder how people out there are living now, and what has happened to their right to freedom.

This is a film that called out to me. I have been a fan of this kind of human drama all my life. On OTT platforms, I mostly end up watching these kinds of survival stories. I get drawn to these kinds of stories, and also horror films. If there is a new horror film, I will be the first one to watch it.

As an actor, in what ways did you have to push yourself to play this part in Akelli?

This role really pushed me, and it wasn’t for just one particular scene or moment. It’s a very pacy film because everything happens very quickly... from the moment the place is attacked to when she goes through a harrowing time to her finally being able to reach a safe place... it all takes place within two-three days. We shot these two days over 40 days. I had to do it every day.

There were, of course, some scenes which were very, very traumatic, but it wasn’t that the others were easy, either physically or emotionally. Every time I did a traumatic scene, it stayed on with me even the next morning. I carried all of it till the end of my journey with this film. I deliberately had to keep all of that alive within me in order to feel what this girl was feeling. For 80 per cent of the film, I had to carry these very heavy emotions within me... of being scared, of being abused, of being traumatised, of constantly trying to find some courage and hope in the face of all of this. What she goes through, it’s almost impossible for someone to survive. But she continues fighting. The whole thing was damn tough.

Nushrratt in Akelli, releasing in theatres on August 25

Did the film stay on with you even beyond those 40 days?

These kinds of films don’t go out of the system very easily. They affect you wholly. My team was trying to get me to events and award functions during that time... and I just couldn’t. My friends would call me over and I would tell them that I just wanted to be at home.

In the industry that I work in, there is a large section of it that is more or less always socialising and the other section is simply showing up for public appearances... awards that you are committed to attending or invites to parties that you can’t say ‘no’ to (smiles). It’s constant, you know. When someone doesn’t show up, the people here don’t understand that it could be because of a very genuine reason. If you have had a bad day, you may not want to go to a get-together at night. But we have very little choice to say ‘no’ because we are already committed to it. And honestly, that takes a toll, you just can’t do it.

Once I came back from the shoot of Akelli, I had some time before I plunged into Chhorii 2 and I had some time to prep. And I didn’t go anywhere. If you look back, you would have seen that I made zero public appearances last year.

You jumped from one intense film to another, with Chhorii 2 which is a social horror film. That must have been tough....

Once you watch both films, you will invariably ask me how I did them back to back. I was so exhausted! Forget about getting out of bed, I didn’t even want to open my eyes. I was so drained... physically, emotionally, mentally.

Such experiences, conversely, are also tremendous highs for an actor....

Oh yes, completely! For me to be able to come home after a day’s work and just think of everything that we managed to put in the can that day, was so satisfying. To see a film translated from our heads and minds into a physical form is the best thing ever. That feeling of having performed and of having created something tangible is incomparable. That’s a very different kind of high.

There are moments when you genuinely accomplish a scene and then there are some when you know, as an actor, that you have faked it. And when the latter happens, there is no sense of satisfaction. Something keeps making you restless till the time you go back on set the next day and redo that scene.

There have been instances where I have gone back and asked a director if I could reshoot a scene and they have allowed me to because if an actor is not satisfied, then it shows up on screen.

Are you increasingly, organically or otherwise, looking at headlining projects? Akelli and Chhorii have been prime examples....

It’s just come to me. I wasn’t looking for Chhorii or even Janhit Mein Jaari (2022). Janhit... was offered to me before the lockdown and I found it to be a great idea (of a woman, played by Nushrratt, working as a condom salesperson). Ideas are always great but a film is of two hours and one needs to sustain that idea and interest over that period of time.

Akelli also just came to me and so did another film which is another female-centric film. That’s how things are happening for me. If someone asks me to do another Pyaar Ka Punchnama film, I will do it. And if I am offered a female-centric film, I will do it. I am very much that, and I am very much this too.