LUNCH WITH BS: Ram Gopal Varma

Fire and brimstone

The maverick director talks about his decision to remake one of India's timeless classics and why logic should not get in the way of cinema.

It isn't exactly the perfect setting for a Lunch with BS. Ram Gopal Varma walks in half-an-hour late and his body language is tired. On top of that, Varma says he appeared recently for a breakfast show on TV with two other directors, but kept quiet throughout as he couldn't quite figure out why anybody would be interested in watching him talking while eating, write Shyamal Majumdar and Aminah Sheikh.

Amitabh Bachchan, who plays the role of Gabbar "" sorry, Babban "" Singh in Ram Gopal Varma Ki Aag, looks menacingly at us from a poster in the tiny room at his office "" RGV Film Factory "" on the second floor of a crowded shopping complex at Andheri. Varma wanted to host the lunch and had invited us to his office which is full of people busy preparing promotional CDs of his most ambitious film due for release this Friday.

But we soon figure out all is not lost as Varma says he is hungry today and won't mind talking. He helps himself with the tandoori chicken which arrives seconds after he settles down. The food tastes like typical Punjabi dhaba fare "" understandable as two of them are located on the ground floor of the same building.

The last few days before a film release are always like a candle flickering before the light extinguishes, Varma says, perhaps giving an explanation for his swollen eyes. But he is happy that RGV Ki Aag is finally set for release after going through endless delays because of the controversy over the film being a copy of Sholay, the 1975 classic which Varma thinks is one of the best films ever made anywhere in the world.

The 45-year-old filmmaker, an acknowledged Bollywood master at making gangster movies, is no stranger to controversy "" be it making a Lolita-esque film or remaking a Bollywood classic. He raised conservative eyebrows early this year with Nishabd "" a flop film about love between a girl and a man old enough to be her grandfather. The film courted controversy, but Varma says he honestly doesn't care about it.

He also doesn't give a damn about the murmurs about his creative bankruptcy as none of his films are original. The reason why he wanted to remake Sholay is simple: the film, to him, is like a beautiful girl in ghagra-choli, and he wanted to see her in T-shirts and jeans. In any case, he thinks no idea is original and the novelty lies in the treatment.

So where does he get his ideas from? News channels, pat comes the reply from the director who has explored the gory mob world and dabbled in the supernatural "" roughly everything except the so-called candy floss films which he finds excruciatingly boring.

Varma takes a large helping of rice and chicken curry (we restrict ourselves to roti and tandoori) and says news channels were his inspiration while directing Bachhan in RGV ki Aag. He remembers the smirk on George Bush's face when he was condemning the Bali bombings (the smirk was that of a man who is actually happy that such incidents justify his attack on Iraq). Osama Bin Laden's eyes, which reveal so much about his hatred for America, also helped him to add some spice to Bachchan's character in the film.

Varma, who made his directorial debut in 1989 and has directed 27 films after his initial struggle as a video library owner, also thinks it's pointless to try and figure out what the audience wants, as the days of formula films are over for ever. "Our job is to offer a package and hope the audience would like at least parts of it," he says. For example, as a student, he saw Himmatwala (a super-hit film in the eighties) 10 times just to watch Sridevi's legs. But quite a few of his friends saw it the same number of times because of the music, while many others thought the film had a great story.

Varma is a civil engineer but, for the first time, sounds a bit defensive in admitting that. He spent more time in the theatres than the classroom "" a habit which invited solid tongue-lashing from his mother. But he had belief in his power of story-telling. "I can narrate a story, talk about the camera angle, show how the dialogue needs to be delivered "" all at the same time," he says. Some rejections were inevitable but Telugu superstar Nagarjuna was impressed by the young man's extraordinary talent and gave him an opportunity to direct Shiva, an action flick.

The rest is history as Shiva went on to become a huge money-spinner, though many criticised the film for its illogical twists. But logic is something Varma isn't too bothered about: "Did anybody ask how the Thakur in Sholay survived after his hands were cut off by Gabbar? Was he taken to the hospital by Gabbar's men?"

He chose the name Aag for his latest film as it's a very conventional commercial title associated with the vendetta films of the '70s and '80s, but added "Ram Gopal Varma" to the title as an after-thought. "I will at least become a household name even if the film flops," he says with a smile. He doesn't want to discuss the cost of the film, except saying it has been co-produced by Adlabs and doesn't have an ambitious budget as the entire shooting was done in Mumbai. The film will be released with 700 prints.

We have finished our food but Varma is still in the mood to talk. The filmmaker is also donning the hat of a CEO for his company and is enjoying every moment of it. His brand equity ensures that the money flow is no longer a problem though being famous has had its effects on returns. For example, Rangeela was a super-hit but he made much more money from a film like Daud which was considered to be a flop. The reason is simple: money was scarce during the making of Rangeela as very few were willing to back a relatively unknown director. By the time Daud happened, money was chasing him.

He will make his company public next year and plans to produce six films a year "" four of which will be directed by filmmakers handpicked by him. He admits he doesn't understand much about business but is confident of putting together a team that can take care of these things. "A CEO doesn't need to be an expert in everything," he says.

As he walks us to the exit door, Varma says he sleeps barely four hours a day "" that too not at a stretch "" and feels he would be dead if he wasn't making films. "Seriously, I cannot imagine my life without films," he adds. Even Babban Singh can't quarrel with that.