Stealing Vows filmmaker Bobby Singh Brown beats the odds with determination, community support, and outstanding actors

The closing film at this year’s Vancouver Asian Film Festival demonstrates a few things. One, it’s possible to make a slick-looking, amusing, and emotionally captivating heist film on a low budget. Secondly, there are hordes of talented actors of Indian and Pakistani ancestry in Canada. But most importantly, Stealing Vows shows what can be achieved if a filmmaker never gives up.

That filmmaker is Toronto-based Bobby Singh Brown, who produced, directed, edited, and co-wrote Stealing Vows. It centres around four colleagues in the wedding industry—a chef with a gambling problem (Ali Hassan), a substance-abusing emcee (Fuad Ahmed), a neurotic decorator (Anand Rajaram), and a super-cool photographer (Gia Sandhu). They come up with a clever but illegal plan to enrich themselves.

Hassan, the host of CBC Radio One’s Laugh Out Loud, co-wrote the script, which includes a huge number of wedding-party guests and hosts.

“We were told by many people in the industry that you cannot do this,” Brown tells Pancouver over Zoom. “So, we said, ‘Okay, watch me.’ And we set out to do it ourselves.”

Brown describes himself as a Hollywood kid who grew up in a Bollywood house. His dad was the oldest of five siblings and on weekends, about 40 cousins would show up for parties. Three to five Bollywood films played nonstop at these gatherings.

However, Brown was more influenced by Hollywood filmmakers, such as Stephen Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, James Cameron, and Jerry Bruckheimer. Brown also grew up on hip-hop.

“When you were Indian in the ’80s and ’90s, you either took on white culture or Black culture to survive,” he says. “You were not accepted as being Indian back then.”

Co-writing Stealing Vows with Ali Hassan

Brown adds that it was only in the late ’90s that it became cool to be of Indian ancestry. He recalls using money from his paper route to buy tickets to see Spielberg’s E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial more than a dozen times. As a teenager, all Brown ever wanted to do was to make movies.

When Brown became an adult, he began working as a producer. His company, BSB Films, created movies, music videos, and wedding videos. According to Brown, he spent about 10 years “trying to break through the glass ceiling of the film industry”.

By 2018, he had written several scripts but couldn’t get them financed. He was ready to do something else with his life.

“I came home one day after being at the bar with a couple of friends,” the filmmaker recalls. “I looked at my kids in the bedroom while they were sleeping. And I thought, ‘How do I tell them to pursue their dreams if I quit now?’ ”

The next day, he talked to his wife. She told him that he could spend the next two years on his film career. But if things didn’t pan out, he would have to figure out a way to make some money.

“So, I hit what I like to call the ‘F-it button’, and I went for it,” Brown says. “A magical thing happens when you hit the F-it button: the universe goes, ‘Okay, you’re serious now.’ And doors start to automatically open.”

The next week, a budding comedian sat at Brown’s table at an event in Toronto. It turned out to be Hassan.

“I had never heard of him before,” Brown says. “He went up and he did a set. And I was pissing myself laughing.”

Actors were eager to participate

Later, Brown went out with Hassan for pizza and beers and convinced him to co-write two features. Over the next few months, they met at a Starbucks, hammering out ideas. The first required a $1.5-million budget. The second script was for Stealing Vows.

In the past, Brown had shot videos for wealthy clients whose kids were getting married, so he understood the wedding industry. He also had plenty of contacts with owners of banquet halls, florists, decorators, and others in this business. They also recruited Qurram Hussain (“Q”) to co-produce the film’s soundtrack.

“We set out to do it ourselves,” Brown says. “I used my own money to shoot one scene.”

He figured that he needed a budget of about $250,000, so they launched a crowdfunding campaign in 2019, using the one scene to entice investors. It initially raised $11,000. Brown then persuaded a couple of brothers-in-law to kick in $50,000. And he used these funds to shoot a wedding scene with Bollywood-style choreographer Manpreet Toor, hoping it might lure future investment.

Big breakthroughs came in casting Ahmed, who provides a dynamic opening to the film, and Sandhu.

“The camera just loves her,” Brown declares. “She’s got a lot of depth. She can just stare into a camera and you feel something. I’m getting goosebumps just thinking about it.”

As word circulated about the film, he was approached by actors of Indian and Pakistani ancestry who were eager to participate. B.C. choreographer, director, dancer, and actor Krystal Kiran plays the decorator’s former fiancée. Her character’s appearance kicks off the crime spree.

Everyone pitches in

Brown thought that Rajaram, who plays the decorator, was out of reach because of the budget. But Sandhu said that she would call him because she knew him.

“Then I got on the phone with him and I’ll never forget what he says—’I was actually very upset you didn’t ask me in the first place,’ ” Brown says. “I was like, ‘Oh my God!’ ”

Rajaram adds comic relief.

To rein in costs, Brown worked out a deal with ACTRA to use friends and family members as extras in the background in large wedding scenes.

“We would sell tickets for $25, which was for a full open wedding buffet and an open bar,” Brown says. “And you get to be part of a movie and you get to go to a dance party.

“We would shoot our dialogue and scenes in the same décor that had already been set up the night before,” he continues, “and then invite everybody, and then shoot all the wides and masters on the day of.”

That helped him raise another $190,000 to meet his budget. His co-producer, Jeremy Hood, secured about $100,000 of free camera, lighting, and grip gear to make the movie. So, in January 2020, they started planning a shooting schedule, with two weeks of indoor scenes that month and two weeks of outdoor scenes in May 2020. But then, something completely unexpected occurred.

“Nobody told me that they were going to drop a pandemic on my head,” Brown says.

By the time they were allowed to shoot again in August of 2020 under COVID restrictions, the budget had been blown to bits.

Watch the trailer (above) for Stealing Vows.

Framestore adds VFX for free

Meanwhile, Sandhu, who plays the photographer, was working on a Disney gig and was unavailable for shooting. Rajaram, who plays the decorator, broke two ribs after falling off a bike.

Brown resumed shooting in October but Disney would not release Sandhu for fear of her catching COVID on-set. So, Brown had to make this part of the film with a body double for one of the wedding scenes. Then, the following January, Sandhu did this section against a green screen, which would be inserted in post-production.

By then, Brown still couldn’t put 200 people in a room. Plus, the producers had to pay for COVID testing, which wasn’t cheap. He wondered how he was going to finish the film because he still had two more wedding scenes to shoot.

Then, using his imagination, Brow secured high-quality, 4-K wedding footage from a company in Brampton. The bride and groom signed off on this.

“We matched the décor and the dropped our actors into the same décor and then cut it together,” he says.

By 2022, Brown finally had a film. But there were continuity problems that needed to be addressed. And he didn’t have the money to fix them.

Fortunately, the musician Hussain had a friend who worked in visual effects. And she worked at BAFTA- and Academy Award-winning Framestore. In what can only be described as a miracle, the company donated £82,000 of VFX expertise to Stealing Vows. This was done in between other projects, so it added a year to the process.

“They believed in the work and I’m forever grateful,” Brown says.

Finishing Stealing Vows

He still needed some money to finish the film but he didn’t want to approach Telefilm Canada, which had refused to fund it at the start. But his wife told him that he should swallow his pride and ask for funding. And the federal agency said “yes”.

“So, we took the finishing money to do the colour and sound and packaging,” Brown says. “That’s why their name is at the end.”

It’s been a long, difficult journey, but with the help of the community and the support of his loved ones, he managed to succeed.

“Everybody that’s been on this film is now my family,” the director declares. “We all go to each other’s weddings. We all go to each other’s barbecue.”

He’s planning on launching Stealing Vows next year. This will be prefaced by the release of the soundtrack to build up some hype.

“I almost feel bad that we didn’t do a behind-the-scenes documentary on the making of this film,” Brown says. “But I want people to know what’s possible when you’re determined to do something.”