A new Calgarian with a lengthy Bollywood resume is heading to the Toronto International Film Festival this week to promote his most recent film.
Vije Bhatia, who relocated from Mumbai to Calgary in June, is attending TIFF to promote The Saint of Varet, a 2022 film he starred in.
The Saint of Varet is a drama that tells the story of a despondent alcoholic writer who flees Bollywood for Varet, a farming village, where he experiences a kind of miracle that helps get his life back on track.
One thing leads to another for the writer, when he is transformed into a kind of local prophet who is fasting in the hope of producing a miracle – rain – to help save the drought-stricken farmers in the community.
Bhatia was confronted with an acting challenge, namely how do you play someone who is fasting and dropping weight every script page?
“I decided I had to fast too,” he said. “So for 25 days, I subsisted on 500 ml. of water per day.”
Remarkably, he said he still had energy and was able to sleep at night despite having a time-and-energy consuming side gig as a creative producer on the film, meaning he was first on the set and the last to leave every day.
While shooting The Saint of Varet in India, Calgary-based actor Vije Bhatia fasted for 25 days in order to realistically portray the lead character, a depressed Bollywood writer who gives up show business for an ascetic existence as a prophet in a drought-strucken farming village. (Photo: Vije Bhatia)
‘More opportunities for her’
It turns out that something else was driving Bhatia, who worked in Bollywood film and television for 25 years, during the shooting of The Saint of Varet.
“The plan to move to Calgary was already underway,” he said, “So The Saint of Varet was my Bollywood farewell, of sorts. I wanted to leave with my head held high.”
Bhatia said he relocated to Canada as much for family considerations as professional ones.
“I have a daughter,” he said. “I feel India is not the best place to raise a daughter and that there will be more opportunities for her here.”
The other thing that drew him to the North American film and television industry was the feeling that in Bollywood, he was typecast – as an actor in an industry where he has performed a multitude of roles, including as writer, producer, director and even social media and marketing (he is the author of Social Media Etiquette for Dummies).
“I have come here to with the definite aim to make a positive contribution to Calgary’s already-thriving film and television industry,” he said.
Veteran Bollywood actor Vije Bhatia, who recently relocated from Mumbai to Calgary, in the film The Saint of Varet, which is screening at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival. (Photo courtesy Vije Bhatia)
Presently, Bhatia is working part-time with a Vancouver producer on Season 2 of a series called PowHER Talks, which is about female empowerment.
That led him earlier last week to the India Film Festival of Alberta, where he participated in a seminar with Indian actress Shabana Azmi, one of the county’s most acclaimed actors.
Meanwhile, his 13-year-old daughter started school a week ago in southwest Calgary.
“Schools here are very different,” Bhatia said. “The education system is different. The first day, she was afraid – she knew no one. She was feeling a bit not ready.
“But the first day was good,” he added. “The teachers made her feel comfortable. Now, after a week, she has made a couple of friends.”
At first, he would accompany her on public transit to school, from the family’s Beltline apartment, but then something happened.
“She said, “Dad, I can go alone. I’m fine.’”
As far as the possibility of The Saint of Varet receiving an Alberta screening? Once Bhatia learns that southern Alberta farmers have just as much anxiety about being drought-stricken as farmers in India do, he says it only makes sense.
“Now that you have said we have a similar situation in Alberta,” he said, “it makes sense to show the film here as well.”
The Saint of Varet screens at the Toronto International Film Festival on Sept. 12.