'Euphoria `06' at NMIMS, Mumbai Screens 'Rang De Basanti' for Participants

As part of its Annual B-school Festival 'Euphoria `06', NMIMS, Mumbai, screened the movie 'Rang De Basanti' for all the participants at Fun Republic on the 9th of March. The event also involved an interaction with Rakeysh OmPrakash Mehra, the Director of the movie. The event was aimed at getting insights into the making of the film and the message it conveyed to its young audiences.

Following are excerpts from the discussion between Mr. Mehra and the budding corporate leaders: -

Q: Sir, where did the idea for the film come from? Did you intend to make a Bhagat Singh Movie, or was it about the youth only? How did the ideas converge?

Rakeysh Mehra: I was working on Documentary-Film, 'The Young Guns of India', which was more or less about the revolutionaries of the early 20th century, fighting for independence. Around the same time, 3 movies on the life of Bhagat Singh were released, and fortunately or unfortunately, both flopped.
Me and My team conducted a survey and carried out extensive research on why the movies flopped. We found that the connection was missing. Audiences did not want to be told what they had been told a hundred times before.

Q: 'Aks', your first feature film wasn't as commercially successful as Rang De Basanti, but was technically at par. What do you think went wrong with Aks and what did you learn from it?

Rakeysh Mehra: Aks was a flower we picked too soon. We didn't let it blossom. I had a hard-bound script, which I handed to Mr. Bachchan while he was boarding a flight, and as soon as he landed, he called me to confirm his willingness to be a part of the project and within 6 months, we were shooting. We didn't give the story any time to mature.
However, in Rang De Basanti, we put in 4 years of research and took pains to find what the audiences wanted

Q. Sir, don't you think it was risky for you to keep the assassination of the politician as the theme?

Rakeysh Mehra: Yes, that was a risk we had to take. We put everything on the line. Like today, I had interactions with many other audiences, and fortunately, not one person said that he was going to go out of the hall and get a gun and shoot corrupt people.

The message which finally came through was not to change the system outwardly, but to change ourselves because we ARE the system.

Q: Where do you go from Rang De Basanti? Do we go back to the usual Bollywood 'Boy Meets Girl' syndrome or will it be something as different and dramatic as Rang De Basanti?

Rakeysh Mehra: My next project will take time. I need to feel as strongly about the subject before I begin thinking on those lines.

Q: How do you plan to take forward the momentum generated by Rang De Basanti?

Rakeysh Mehra: It is not me. YOU will have to take it forward.