September 1988: Writer/director Harvey Crossland forms Siren Films with producer Amarjeet Rattan in Vancouver. One of the ideas the two mull over is (eventually titled) The Burning Season.

While working with New Delhi filmmaker Jiten Varma on the cbc Family Pictures series, Crossland’s interest was piqued by the cultural challenges facing Canada’s East Indian community in their adopted home.

Crossland begins developing a script with Varma, intending it to be a cbc mow. cbc’s Jim Burt sees it as a feature. Varma returns to India.

September 1989: Crossland goes to India to submerge himself in the culture. By this time, the Indian portion of the story centres on a Rajput family – the traditional, imperial, warrior class. Travelling from Raj fort to Raj fort, Crossland finds his location…or so he thinks.

In Toronto, Annette Cohen and Pat Ferns form Primedia Pictures to produce features.

Spring 1990: Crossland and Rattan’s first choice as co-producer is Ferns, and they send the script to Primedia Productions. Ferns likes it; a second draft is delivered to Cohen.

1991: Cohen comes on as story editor to help shape this ‘woman’s story’. She collaborates on the third draft. The search for financing begins. With a spring ’92 shoot date in mind, India is to be the first location in order to get the longest days and be out before the worst heat.

May 1991: Cinephile makes an initial distribution offer.

July 3, 1991: A cbc broadcast deal is negotiated.

Aug. 15, 1991: The Cinephile deal collapses.

Sept. 26, 1991: A distribution deal with Brightstar is secured.

January 1992: The script is rewritten, shaped towards the shooting script.

Crossland begins casting. In India, Om Puri (City of Joy) is cast as the father-in-law, while in London, Eng., Ayub Khan Din, star of Sammi and Rosie Get Laid, is chosen as the Rajput prince with whom Sanda (the protagonist) falls in love at a North American university, then follows to India.

Crossland and Cohen also cast in Toronto and Vancouver, where they discover their female lead, Akesh Gill, an unknown.

February 1992: Armed with tapes and photos of the cast, an agenda that includes filming in a remote location in India and bringing the caboodle back to shoot in Canada, and a $1.75 million budget, Crossland goes to Telefilm Canada’s Vancouver director John Taylor, who takes a $735,000 leap of faith.

Location problems. The three families who own the chosen fort have a falling-out; another fort will have to be found. Crossland faces a difficult decision: postpone or move forward.

March 1992: It is agreed to plan a fall shoot. Because of scheduling, a new team must be put together. Serendipitously, dop Vic Sarin (who was born in Kashmir) is available, as is production designer Tamara Deverall (Masala), who Crossland originally wanted.

March 5, 1992: The Telefilm letter of commitment arrives and within days, B.C. Film’s commitment letter comes in.

May 1992: Brightstar goes belly up.

June 1992: A distribution deal with Astral is secured.

Crossland and Rattan go to India. Rattan and the new production manager, Ogden Gavanski, put together a service infrastruture in Delhi. Varma and Crossland scout for a new location, logging 2,000 kilometres in five days as they drive from fort to fort in 55 degree heat.

Recalls Crossland: ‘It was so hot you couldn’t hold the water container. And we got caught in dust storms.’ They find a fort that has all the right elements, but is quite dilapidated.

Intense negotiations ensue with the family who owns the fort. This time, Crossland is not leaving without a signed contract.

July 1992: Preproduction begins for the first leg of the shoot, now slated for Vancouver. Of the Vancouver crew, 18 key members will travel to India.

Mid-August 1992: The Vancouver shoot lasts two weeks. It is the last time they will see dailies. Sarin, Crossland, Deverall, first ad Blair Roth and costume designer Aline Gilmore dash off to India to prep.

Gilmore remains in Delhi with Delhi-based co-designer Dolly Ahluwalia, dying garments in the alleys, while the other four hop in jeeps and traverse rivers of mud masquerading as a road to reach the fort. The territory is rife with armed bandits (Dacoits).

Camped out in the women’s quarters of Pahargarh Fort, the first bouts of dysentery and the ongoing process of bat removal from the fort commence.

Deverall and her all-male Indian crew work around the clock restoring the fort. Painting continues throughout the shoot.

Mid-September 1992: Cohen arrives at the fort, discovers the director has scooped the best digs – a double-length grass hut with private bath and (non-functioning) shower.

Language turns out to be more of a problem on an administrative level than on a creative one. A translator is often required, especially one adept at interpreting the cultural inferences (how to make sure tomorrow translates as the next day and not some nebulous point in the future). Cohen learns that if she needs a miracle, she can count on it being made to happen, but routine stuff, like laundry, forget it.

In addition to overseeing construction of housing for the crew, working on the script, etc., a lot of Cohen’s time is spent on protocol – doing tea, liaising with the royals still living in the fort. ‘I felt like I was Lawrence of Arabia. It’s courtly.’

October 1992: Shooting begins and the Canadians arrive in India on a staggered schedule.

Rattan is in Delhi providing a link to civilization, supplies and cash. Through the auspices of their host, Prince Srivinder, the Dacoits are employed to protect the crew’s comings and goings from road dangers – like armed mobs.

Meanwhile, medic Paul DesRoches, in between saving lives, treating natives for cholera, typhoid and delivering babies, tries to protect the health of the rapidly succumbing Canadians.

They do 20 to 22 setups a day in over 30 degree heat under relentless sun. Working with the Indian crew, while large in numbers (a group of light boys is employed where in North America one would use sandbags), thankfully does not prove difficult; almost everyone speaks English and the Indian second and third ads can translate. Even the government censor comments he’s never seen such spirit. Crossland describes a typical experience, a one-shot deal with a lot riding on it:

4 a.m. ‘It was one of our money shots; we were trying to get the sunrise and everything in. The day before we had marked a pile of stones where Vic guesstimated the sun would come through. When we arrived there in the morning it was pitch black – and no one was there.’ Neither was the crane.

‘We’re ticking down to sunrise.’ Suddenly above the sound of nail-biting and teeth-grinding, many padding feet could be heard. ‘They were carrying all the parts of the crane on their shoulders through the pitch blackness. All of a sudden everything was there, set up by hand in the dark. They were dressing the location, lighting fires, camels were coming, the sun was coming up, almost like a matte. It was a tricky shot, everything had to fall together and… boom, boom, boom, boom… it was done in four takes.’

Mid-October: Many of the Canadians are ill. The lead becomes so sick she must leave for five days. The downtime, coinciding with an unseasonal monsoon, is turned to advantage: repairs are made to the camp.

November 1992: Production wraps at the end of the first week in November. Crossland flies back to Vancouver where it is bitterly cold. Wearing thin clothes and minus his house keys, he crawls through a window. A call from the airport informs him the last 10 days of film have just arrived. The editor originally working on the film has moved on to another picture.

Suffering jet lag and culture shock, Crossland immediately goes to work with editor Michelle Bjornson. He sees footage for the first time, screening on a Steenbeck.

Crossland gets deathly ill. Cohen comes out to help and spends the next six months in a hotel collaborating on the posting.

February 1993: At the rough cut stage, editor Lara Mazur comes on board and begins fine-tuning.

March 1993: Mazur works on her own for two weeks, adding flow, then spends two weeks shaping the cut with Crossland. A fine cut is ready by the end of the month.

April 1993: They screen, tweak and lock the picture, then begin the sound cut with sound designer Gael MacLean. adr starts mid-April. Rattan sends round composer Gordon Durity who does a demo tape. Crossland asks for a bit of reworking and plays it over the phone for Cohen. The piece ultimately becomes the opening music of the film.

June 1993: Music is produced, mixed. Neg goes to optical printer. Composite answer print is delivered.

July 1993: The film is screened for various festivals.

September 1993: The Burning Season is included in the Perspective Canada section of the Toronto Festival of Festivals and is also selected for the Vancouver International Film Festival.

Oct. 1, 1993: The Burning Season is one of seven features representing the Canadian industry at the Independent Feature Film Market in New York, screening as part of the New Voices program. Says Cohen: ‘We did go for it, we set out to make a film that was extraordinary.’