'Land of Gold' is coming soon to HBO Max, here's how it got filmed in Oklahoma

Like many cross-country American road trips, the cinematic story of a Punjabi-American truck driver and a 10-year-old Mexican-American stowaway might not have made it to its final destination if it hadn't made its way through Oklahoma.

"When we were thinking about, 'How do we capture an American road trip drama, and how do we do it on an independent film budget?' we were trying to think of the places in the country where we could see a lot of the landscapes of America. And that's where I pitched Oklahoma to our writer-director, Nardeep (Khurmi), and sent him some photos," said Pallavi Sastry, an actor and producer on the movie "Land of Gold."

"How pretty the state is and the big, open skies, it's pretty undeniable. So, we basically were like, 'OK, I think we can do most of the movie in Oklahoma.'"

Along with co-starring in "Land of Gold," the University of Oklahoma alumnus produced the drama alongside her sister, Keertana Sastry, who also worked as the movie's casting director.

Filmed throughout the Sooner State, "Land of Gold" follows truck driver Kiran Singh (Khurmi), a first-generation immigrant whose family hails from India's Punjab region, who takes on a last-minute cross-country job to Boston, leaving his frustrated 37-weeks-pregnant wife, Preeti (Pallavi Sastry), in the care of his overbearing mother (Riti Sachdeva). Along the way, the reluctant father-to-be discovers that Elena (Caroline Valencia), a Mexican-American girl, has stowed away in his trailer and has to decide what to do with the wayward child.

Khurmi's story was picked as the 2021 winner of AT&T Untold Stories, a multi-year program of AT&T and New York's Tribeca Film Festival that awards $1 million, mentorship and support to underrepresented filmmakers to produce their projects. The award allowed the cast and crew to film "Land of Gold" in Oklahoma, premiere it at the 2022 Tribeca Film Fest and get a first-look opportunity with HBO Max, which will begin streaming the movie on May 15.

"We call it the 'little film that could,' and for us to get a green light like that, it's a pretty huge deal. We're thrilled," Pallavi Sastry said of the film, which recently won the audience award for best narrative feature at the San Luis Obispo (California) International Film Festival.

The Sastry sisters talked with The Oklahoman about filming throughout Oklahoma and working in the new, state-of-the-art Cherokee Nation Extended Reality Studio, or XR Studio in Owasso.

Q: Can you tell me about where you filmed in Oklahoma?

Pallavi Sastry: Yeah, we really covered ground. As you know, coming out of New Mexico into Oklahoma, it's very desert-like — it's still bleeding into that red sand, Arizona and New Mexico feel — so we shot in parts of western Oklahoma. We filmed specifically at Truck Stop 40, which is the Punjabi truck stop in Sayre right outside of Elk City. Then, there's a beautiful canyon there that looks like Red Rocks. ...

We brought in just our core team, but basically, 85% of who we worked with was local to Oklahoma. Our department heads locally were really helpful in suggesting places, too. ...

For the most part, we were in and around Oklahoma City: We were in El Reno; we shot in Edmond. We were welcomed into a Punjabi family's home, to use their home, in Edmond. ... We tapped into the South Asian community in Oklahoma, and they were really, really kind to us.

Then, when we got out east, we worked with the Cherokee Nation and shot on their soundstage. We were the first film outside of the tribe to be welcomed into the studio.

Q: Can you talk about how the Cherokee Nation soundstage helped you to make a road movie on a limited budget?

Keertana Sastry: This film is not possible without the Cherokee Nation and without them allowing us to use their soundstage and their technology. ... A million dollars is a big, sexy number, and it is absolutely a boon for any independent filmmaker, for sure. That being said, because this is a road-trip film, because we have a semitruck that we're shooting with, because we have a 9-year-old on set, and because it's during the height of the pandemic, those are all complicating factors. So, I think what we realized pretty quickly is that shooting a film like this practically is ... next to impossible for a budget like this.

During the height of the pandemic, it would require a lot of insurance issues, safety issues, things that we just could not responsibly make decisions on when we had a 9-year-old as the second lead of our film. So, it was definitely a huge boon that the Cherokee Nation allowed us to come in and use their XR technology and their LED wall and be able to essentially shoot the rest of the the actual driving sequences ... in front of the wall using plates.

Basically, our VFX supervisor went out, and he had a 360-(degree) camera on top of his car. He purposely got a higher elevated vehicle to put it on top of so that it could reach the height of a semitruck. And he went around California and a couple of other Western states — Oklahoma, Texas — and basically shot plates for us that we could then project on to the LED wall. ... There's a lot of really, really fun stuff that we got to do because of their generosity and because they were gracious enough to want to work with us.

Q: So, it's a story about a Punjabi-American man and a Mexican-American girl made in part on a soundstage in the Cherokee Nation?

Pallavi Sastry: Yeah, it doesn't really get more American than that. It's a road-trip movie across America, with these hyphenated Americans, being told with the help of First Nations folks.

Keertana Sastry: For us, as a team with a lot of people of color on it, that just is something that we inherently want to do: We want to tell stories that are intersectional as much as possible.  We want to tell stories that are universal and relatable, but through different perspectives.

When you don't necessarily get to have certain experiences, or certain opportunities, right off the bat in whatever industry that you choose to be in, it only makes sense that you want to bring up the people ... that are in your community with you. So, it was, for us, a no brainer: The opportunity to be intersectional in our crew and our team and our film, we're gonna jump at that chance.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Oklahoma-made movie 'Land of Gold' heads to HBO Max after Tribeca Fest