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Tia Bajpai, the petite little young woman, who made her debut with a 3D horror flick ‘Haunted’ not too long ago, couldn’t quite taste similar success with her next release Lanka. It was a dramatic outing and though she acted ably, the film as a whole didn’t succeed. However, Tia continued to find herself firmly placed in the Vikram Bhatt camp, what with her third film also coming from the same production house. With 1920 – Evil Returns, yet another horror film of hers, all set to release, Tia can be seen chirping away from nineteen to the dozen.
1920 – Evil Returns is just your third film and this time around you are playing a girl who is possessed. That must have required an entire body language change as well as shift in attitude, isn’t it? After all, in a horror film, a slight miscalculation can well lead to it turning into a comic outing.
Honestly, I stopped thinking about how I had to approach the role. See, when you think so much on these lines, the end product gets spoilt. In fact during the making of the film, Aftab (Shivdasani) really helped me a lot and so did (director) Bhushan (Patel). Whenever something that I did looked funny, they used to tell me there and then that it was not happening.
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So what did you do to make things happen?
(Says immediately) I started observing a lot of animals. In fact I actually saw a lot of videos on YouTube where these cats, lions and tigers fought it out with each other. If you notice my act in the film, quite a few expressions of mine have come from these deadly animals. The way they growl or the look they give when on the hunt or their faces turning really scary with narrowing eyes and all; all of it makes for an unpleasant sight. This is what makes my character as well and you can say that these animals have actually helped me perform for the film. Resultantly, I developed an animal instinct.
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How about observing some real men?
(Smiles) Yes of course, I closely followed manly walk and gestures as well. In fact in the film, my body language is very manly. So due to animal instincts and a manly behaviour amalgamating, you would see no Tia Bajpai in the film. On the contrary there would be this badsoorat sa aadmi jo kisi ko bhi khatam kar sakta hai.
Now that’s quite a shift for you. After all, in ‘Haunted’ you played this tormented soul which was wandering for decades and hunting for redemption. Even in ‘Lanka’, you played a young doctor who was oppressed by local Mafia don (Manoj Bajpai). So in ‘1920 Evil Returns’, it must have been a guilty pleasure for you to pick up the mantle and scare people around you, right?
(Laughs and says animatedly) Yes, the evil has returned with me this time around and I am in troubles more than just one. If losing my memory wasn’t bad enough, I also get possessed. There are mysterious circumstances in which Aftab finds me near a lake and it is only after bringing me home that he realises that he had a possessed woman at his disposal who had also lost her memory. Uske baad main kya dhamaal machati hoon, woh aap khud picture mein dekhenge!
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