On the whole, Bollywood people are very smart now to not appear tone-deaf. They know how and when to say the right things, courtesy of the right training. AC was saying the right things but he couldn’t escape sounding like a control freak which explains why he wanted a studio, he wanted to be in control.
The Romantics – Produced by YRF
It’s an objective-driven documentary, they wanted to put their own narrative out there. A glossy narrative at that. They needed this documentary to portray them as geniuses and maverick filmmakers but the truth is so far from that. But hey, whatever floats their boat! It seems for them and their egos, image is more important than anything else. Aditya Chopra can play the episode where they all gush about him whenever he feels down because there is nothing better than reminding yourself how much of a genius you are when you are feeling down and low!
Aditya Chopra spoke about the downs the company went through which made him realize that it was now up to him to give the company a successful hit film. For that to happen, he had to go back to directing. That’s how ‘Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi’ happened.
Anushka Sharma finally comes on screen since that film was her debut. She talks about how ridiculously quiet AC wanted her to be about this project even to her parents. Didn’t AC think it through? What will her parents think since they live together? Clips of the film are shown, AC said he was under a lot of pressure but being on the sets made him happy. Maybe it was because he was away from all the stress, the office stress, and personal life stress.
He is shown to be directing on the sets of the famous song from that film that featured a lot of heroines including his wife opposite SRK.
AC talks about the challenge of the film was to make the audience believe that Anushka’s character was blind enough not to see the difference between her on-screen husband and the hippy guy. The film being a hit proved he was successful in doing that. The reviewers, though, were not so blind:
From the online archives:
Mumbai Attacks
Right before the film was supposed to be released, the dreadful Mumbai Attacks happened. Clips of the attacks are shown so that you remember what Mumbai went through. But AC was like, his film was going to come out in 2 weeks and a lot of people were advising him to push back the film but he didn’t because he didn’t believe the film will not work. He believed hordes of people will flock to the theatre to watch RNBDJ. The movie did well and YRF was back on track!
Befikre – people didn’t get it
Now AC talks about the failure of ‘Befikre’ and it hit him badly. In this whole documentary, he tried to appear well-aware and knowledgeable but in this very moment, he tried to put across his reason why ‘Befikre’ was such a colossal flop and disappointment. Here’s his logic:
Bear in mind that the film lifted so many scenes from other films or should we say the film was inspired by foreign films that were accepted by the audience then and yet he thinks it didn’t work because the audience didn’t expect that from him.
From the online archives:
Would ‘Befikre’ have worked had Anurag Kashyap directed it? The audience expected better because of the way he packaged the product and sold it to them through its promos. As if it was a big deal he is coming back to direct. Heck, they even had the mayor of Paris launch this trailer! Clearly, he thought he did something exceptional.
Dum Laga Ke Haisha
AC and Maneesh Sharma talk about making this film. Obviously, because it was such a different film for them to produce and it did become a surprise hit.
Then AC talks about getting Bhumi Pednekar the role. She was Shanoo Sharma’s assistant whose job was to audition talent. Shanoo discovered Bhumi’s talent and asked her to go to the gym to lose weight so she can become an actress. When AC contacted Shanoo for the role in DLKH, Shanoo had her stop going to the gym and start eating.
This is the closest we are going to get to what it takes to be a YRF heroine.
From the online archives:
Back to Yash Chopra…
The documentary goes back abruptly to Yash Chopra and how his actors loved working with him. Shah Rukh Khan comes back on, and Madhuri Dixit and Anil Kapoor talk about their experience working with the late Yash Chopra.
Yash Chopra’s Demise
Everyone talks about the untimely demise of Yash Chopra. Obviously, everyone had their own stories but Uday was probably the most touching one. Karan Johar said Uday is still deeply affected by the loss of his father.
They showed all these lovely clips of the late Yash Chopra which got us thinking that he was always out there meeting and interacting with people. Now if they have to do a documentary about Mr. India aka Aditya Chopra, it would be hard to find enough clips to cover the first 10 mins.
We kid you not, the last shot of Yash Chopra had this picture in the background (see gif below) and we thought it was him and a young Rani Mukherjee but it turned out it was his wife a young Pamela Chopra! Then the next picture is that of the cast of ‘Veer Zaara’ with Yash. Kinda weird! Not so weird if you think about who Rani ended up with!
YRF in Hollywood – courtesy of Uday Chopra
They move on to Uday creating his own path by managing the YRF office in Hollywood. They also show clips of him being at the Cannes Film Festival with Nicole Kidman as the first film he took charge to produce had her in it and it was a huge disaster and disappointment. That doesn’t seem to affect the Chopras since money is never an issue!
Aditya Chopra’s Achievements so far…
So as this episode ends, Aditya is asked if he has achieved everything he set out to do. He said: 50%. Then he goes on to list his dream projects that include a theme park and bringing Broadway to India. And the biggest of it all: make YRF known in Hollywood. The last one might be hard since they keep copying their films so…Uday once mentioned his brother is dying to make a romantic film in Hollywood with big stars and Uday told him that no one knows him there, so none of the big stars will be at his beck and call like the Bollywood ones are!
Today’s dissection post is going to be about ‘The Romantics’, the Yash Raj documentary released on Netflix on Valentine’s Day this year.
If you have no idea what it is or have not seen it, here’s the trailer:
We have been planning this post since we saw the documentary because there was something about it…
Hmm, it gave us major narc or even megalomaniac vibes! As if they created a whole documentary to show or rather remind people (industry people + the rest of the world) how and why they are this powerful. It was as if the interview Anurag Kashyap did to criticize Aditya Chopra (AC) and Yash Raj Films really got to them to the point that Mr. India himself had to un-Mr. India himself and come in front of the camera to remind people who he was and what he is! Going by the positive reaction when this doc was released, it worked in reminding people what YRF is and how powerful AC is. Only a few saw it for what it really is!
But after watching all four episodes, it’s clear that this is not your usual documentary. If you have seen documentaries about Bollywood, as they did with the Jiah Khan case. It had both sides + professional opinions on what could have happened to her. In other words, it wasn’t biased and it didn’t glorify her situation. This documentary is clearly a PR exercise to erase all the bad decisions they have made that exist in the minds of the audience and their industry peers.
If it wasn’t for Adi’s nod, the project wouldn’t have happened. He not only greenlighted the project, he also personally supervised every aspect of the project. Smriti Mundhra is on board as the director of The Romantics. But it is Adi who decided what goes, and what not. SKJ Bollywood News
Obviously, it was disguised as an ode to the late Yash Chopra and his romantic films but it turned out to be a documentary glorifying YRF and letting everyone know that the man helming this big studio is super smart in case you get fooled by the films he green-lit.
Compared to other documentaries, this one is biased and produced by the Chopras which meant the big man himself had full control over what and who to show in the four episodes. He did the smart thing, though. His name is not credited as a co-producer but his brother and YRF are credited. The director herself, Smriti Mundhra, has connections with YRF as her father was the first man to bring Yash Chopra films to the States. He had his theatre there that showcased Yash Chopra’s films.
The Romantics – Episode 1
They do start with an introduction to Indian cinema but most of their clips and visuals are all from Yash Raj Films. The first episode is about that and how Yash Chopra became a director and his marriage and wife Pamela Chopra’s influence on him.
The details have already been out there in public for years as both Yash and Pam have always been vocal about their relationship. What is new here are the pictures and their wedding video which had to be re-processed by YRF to be presented clearly on video.
There are some funny stories about Sridevi and her mother. Rishi Kapoor talks lovingly about his equation with Yash. According to the director of this documentary, Rishi shot his part before he fell sick again. But he does look quite well in the video, so much so we thought they might have interviewed him at the ‘Jab Tak Hain Jaan’ premiere.
As the episode ends, they bring in snippets of Aditya Chopra by showcasing many unseen pictures of him as a child and young man.
It plays off as a big deal that he is finally going to be on camera, which is because the man is not social, or whatever you would call that. He has always been scared to appear on camera. His near ones always play it off like he’s that way ’cause he doesn’t want to be recognized when he goes to watch films and all that. But the man truly seemed scared of being photographed and he used to go to great lengths not to be pictured. As for being interviewed, it was said that he refused interviews due to the drama that happened with his first film.
The Romantics – Episode 2
This episode is about Aditya Chopra and everyone’s perception of him. Then they move on to how smart he was before he became a director and how he was always interested in working in films.
The story of Hrithik Roshan and Aditya Chopra always competing in dance competitions has been outed years ago, there’s no actual video of him dancing but it was told he won every dance competition against Hrithik. He was, after all at that time, the son of India’s biggest director so…#justsaying
They talk about this diary that he had as a kid about movies and box office collections. Anupama Chopra once mentioned this somewhere. He sounds like a kid who was obsessed with movies and nothing else but movies.
And then boom!
Aditya Chopra appears on camera voluntarily for the first time in years.
He talks about meeting SRK and how he approached him for ‘Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge’. Though he didn’t mention that he wanted a Hollywood actor for the role, Tom Cruise, his father shut him down and then he went to Saif Ali Khan but Saifu didn’t have free dates.
AC mentions how he didn’t want the couple in DDLJ to rebel and elope but wanted the boy to gain the trust of the father because that’s how he thought things should be, he grew up in a secure family environment, he said. Kind of funny when he did the same (rebel and move out) when his parents didn’t accept you-know-who.
Why not Kajol?
He spoke about DDLJ at length focusing on SRK and KJo but not really discussing why he chose Kajol in the film. Why was he also interested in getting Kajol for his other films? He never really got into that.
If you think about it, Kajol is mad and for someone like him to want her in his films, there must be a reason. There are fun snippets of Kajol annoying him, trying to get him to talk to the camera but he wasn’t having any of it. There are also fun parts of SRK joking around with Yash Chopra, who fully entertained him.
SRK takes credit for that fight scene at the end of the film. Strangely, we vividly remember watching the film and our old lady exclaimed: there’s no need for this action scene in this film, it ruined the flow of the film!
Moving on, everyone invited to talk in this series barring the senior actors, talk about the effect that DDLJ had on them. Basically, actors who get paid big money were asked their opinion about the first film of the man who pays them that big $$.
And Lily Singh. She gets introduced and she also goes on to talk about the effect DDLJ had on her. What about PC? Why was she not in it? She was so besotted with the character Raj that she almost got him years later. ?
Then they showed random clips of SRK getting mobbed to prove how everyone went crazy when the film was released. Some of these clips were actually from ‘Veer-Zaara’ promotions in France. ?
The long cinema run of DDLJ
You all know how long this film has been running in theatres. They make it a point to remind us every hundred years!
Here’s what we don’t get. The cinema owner Manoj Desai mentioned how when they stopped running the film, he got phone calls asking and threatening him why and how does he have the audacity to stop showing this film? Isn’t it strange he doesn’t question or tell us where these phone calls were coming from? Was it the underworld? This is the same man who appears in videos criticizing actors with no fear and he last spoke about how the overconfidence of Vijay Devarakonda destroyed his film. Vijay had to meet him in person and apologize. So we are wondering how come, this person can be scared of random calls coming in. So scared that he decides to keep the film running in cinemas at his own cost? Obviously, it’s not running houseful every day, so how does it cover the expenses? Does it make sense?
Or shall we go by the original story doing the rounds that Yash Chopra wanted his son’s first film to be historic, so their company pays this theatre to keep this film running? Kind of like how they are doing everything they can to have their latest release ‘Pathaan’ break records. Does this make sense?
Last public appearance of Aditya Chopra
According to AC, DDLJ winning max awards was a great thing but he stopped attending awards because he didn’t want validation from them and he didn’t want to keep on counting his awards. Yet, he had no issues proudly showcasing or rather showing off the other awards his production won in years after that. Whatever happened to you don’t believe in awards? His dad used to attend most award ceremonies, though, and pick up their winning trophies.
He makes no mention of the drama that occurred before that. How he didn’t give credit to the others who assisted him in making this film a reality, including Honey Irani who wrote the screenplay, and Javed Siddiqui who wrote the dialogues. Both didn’t appear in the credits at all as Yash gave his son sole credit for writing the screenplay and dialogues.
If you think about it, has AC on his own been able to recreate that DDLJ magic with his other work, his other films? To this day, he is still using DDLJ’s success to remind the audience what he made. The man recently recreated DDLJ into a Broadway story. He wouldn’t have to do that if his other films were big successes. So was he really solely responsible for its (DDLJ) success? Or was it with the help of seasoned industry veterans? Are these people crazy or greedy for demanding their share of credit?
We have noticed when watching a few Yash Raj films that they credit AC as the story writer. It’s quite something since he is running a huge studio and yet he has time to write so many stories. To be fair, most of these are ideas based on Hollywood films like ‘Bunty Aur Babli’, ‘Dhoom’, ‘Ladies vs Ricky Bahl’ and so on.
