The usual target

Soon after the attack on Sanjay Leela Bhansali and his crew in Rajasthan by a fringe political outfit protesting against his depiction of history in Padmavati, the movie that he was shooting for, a lot of Bollywood personalities came out condemning the incident.
Among them was Karan Johar who tweeted, “Am appalled at what has happened with Sanjay Bhansali....this is the time for all us as an industry to stand by our people and fraternity!!”
He then followed it up with another tweet, “Having been through many instances of turmoil during a film shoot or release...i understand Sanjay’s emotion at this point...I stand by him.”
The incident that Karan was talking about was when he was forced by a regional political party into making an abject apology for casting the Pakistani actor Fawad Khan in his movie Ae Dil Hai Mushkil. But, now, after the experience of the Padmavati crew, there arises the question of what exactly was Bhansali’s stand when Johar was under attack. He seems to have not said anything at all then and therein lies the nub of why Bollywood continues to be a soft target for venal politicians who get easy publicity by rounding up a few people and indulge in such tactics because anything connected to the film industry finds enormous resonance among the public and the media.
But this same influence over the millions is never exercised by actors and film personalities to come out aggressively and defend anyone else. Superstars who have themselves been targeted suddenly go mute when the same thing happens to one of their peers.
Their fear is that they would invite trouble onto themselves if they got involved in a political issue. The only person who does come out swinging every time is Anurag Kashyap, unafraid of repercussion. Even this time, he took to Twitter, saying, “Can once the whole film industry come together and take a stand, and refuse to be a pony that all bullshit and bullshitters ride on??”
But, otherwise, even the condemnations were guarded. Like Anupam Kher, known to be close to the ruling party at the Centre, who said, “I condemn attack by goons on #SanjayLeelaBhansali. It is unfortunate & shameful. But to give it a communal angel by some is equally shameful”.
With Bhansali deciding to not shoot anymore where the attack happened, it indicates how vulnerable and cautious someone like him is when making a movie.

Change worked

In interview after interview, Shah Rukh Khan repeats the line that Raees is set in a small town and a rural milieu that he doesn’t understand and so he had trusted his director Rahul Dholakia and done as he was asked to.
He also is prone to saying that while the character of the gangster that he plays is a bad man, there are shades of good in even the evillest person. These two statements, the need to defend his choice of role, are telling in how difficult it must have been for him to let go of his image to play a gangster.
But with Raees becoming a hit, the risk has now been worth it. After a few years when things were not going so well for him, this movie has once again catapulted him to the top bracket.
Perhaps the message for Shah Rukh is that superstars who become prisoners of their own image and end up only taking roles that they think befit their stature, find it difficult to keep the audience interested in them. Aamir Khan shows something new of himself in each of his movies and that is why his movies remain the biggest revenue generators.
Following Raees, Shah Rukh will also hopefully now be seen in roles that do not typecast him.

10 million and counting

Karan Johar recently came out of the closet about his sexuality when in his autobiography he, even though never uttering it directly, spoke about himself as being gay.
His caution in not doing this over the many years that most people already knew the truth, was vindicated by a reaction that he got recently. When Anurag Kashyap wrote that the attack on Padmavati was Hindu reactionary forces stepping out of Twitter into the real world, someone put up a nasty tweet to him, “hey buddy let me give u free advice ‘stop sleeping with @karanjohar’”. Karan jumped into the exchange and tweeted caustically to the person, “Let me give you some better advice!! Start sleeping with someone!!!” He also abused the tweeter calling him frustrated.  But a few days later, despite all that he had been subject to on Twitter, Karan put up a tweet celebrating 10 million followers on Twitter. He put up an image of himself with these words superimposed, ‘A Big Thank You, 10 Million Times Over’.  There was also an accompanying tweet, “o this crazy place called @TwitterIndia ....thank you for all the love ...I forgive you for the hate and I appreciate your indifference!”

Busy times

There is just one case left for Salman Khan to deal with and it has to do with killing two blackbucks on a hunt 18 years ago when he was shooting for Hum Saath Saath Hain.
He had taken along a number of other co-stars like Sonali Bendre, Saif Ali Khan, Neelam and Tabu. They had all been allegedly caught at that point and cases registered.
Recently they all had to come to court to record their pleas and unsurprisingly all of them averred to be not guilty. But when the judge asked Salman how the blackbuck died, he is said to have to replied that it was due to natural causes.
In all probability, given how the evidence has been found wanting in all his other cases, Salman should be safe on this one too. Along with this case, his life has recently been quite a roller coaster ride, with him working on his next movie Tubelight and hosting the reality show Bigg Boss.

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