Filmmaker Shakun Batra reflects on Indian romance and why it has failed to connect with the younger generation in recent times. While international shows viz Off campus And Sterling Point Having found a loyal fan base among the Indian youth, Bollywood romances somehow still fail to strike a chord.
Shakun Batra, which recently portrayed a complicated romance between two people in their 20s. Kama’s Tales 3, told HT City“I believe you can’t put yourself in someone else’s head and think how they’re going to see it. If I have a point to make, I’ll say it, and if I’ve done my job right, if not today, in a year or two, they’ll understand and accept it, and that happened to me when I grew up watching movies.”
The director added, “As a director and a storyteller, what you’re doing is presenting your most authentic self, and not figuring out what that person needs to see. If you’re doing that, you’re doing work for hire, where you think I need to make this person feel good,” explaining why he can’t do that.
“I need to express what I’m feeling and what I need to express and hopefully I’ve made it simple enough that someone else can get it,” Shakun added.
Talking about why he feels filmmakers are failing to connect with the younger generation, Shakun believes directors need to make something out of what they feel. “I’ve been in a lot of meetings where they’re like, ‘It is running (It’s working).’ But he is not there for me (But I can’t do that), and so I’ve taken quite a few breaks in my career. If someone is flipping up and down and it works, I can’t do it. I would do it so badly, and why put myself through it?” he said.
The filmmaker also shared that the Bollywood romance shown over the years is also a reason behind this disconnect. “You meet this person who is your soul mate, and then life is amazing, but it never is,” he said, adding that the romance portrayed in Bollywood films is still far from reality, and that’s why it fails to connect with the audience, especially the younger generation.
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