Bollywood Looks NORTHEAST

Mumbai creators are making a beeline for the region, eager to showcase a different landscape as well as a fresh perspective

- By SUHANI SINGH

In THE WORLD OF ENTERTAINMENT, James Handique is someone you’d call ‘hot property’. Well-connected with deputy commissioners, director-generals and superintendents of police in the Northeastern states, the Assam-based line producer can procure quick permissions for film shoots in the vast, unexplored region. From Kangana Ranaut’s Manikarnika Films, which shot portions of Emergency (2025) in Kaziranga and Chandubi in Assam and also in Meghalaya, to the upcoming season of the popular Amazon Prime series Family Man (2019-), which recently wrapped up a shoot in Kohima, Nagaland and Assam’s Karbi Anglong and Kaziranga, Handique handles crews of hundreds and ensures the show goes on.

Handique’s busy schedule is proof of how the Northeast is becoming a go-to destination for Mumbai-based studios. With locations like Kashmir, New Delhi and Lucknow overexposed, Mumbai-based creators are discovering the unexplored charms of the Northeast. And not just as exotic location with colourful cultural motifs (Jewel Thief) or picturesque backdrop to a romantic number (Shah Rukh and Madhuri Dixit-starrer Koyla) but with a narrative and characters all its own. Hence the new culture, language, costume and environs viewers are seeing in Season 2 of Prime Video’s Paatal Lok, which travelled to Nagaland as the lead characters investigated a local politician's murder.

A WHOLE NEW WORLD

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