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Its always a numb feeling when one finishes a film. Although it is supposed to be my work, my profession, the last day of shoot is akin to the thrill of a ‘walk on the razors edge’ having come to an end.

It is like Robert Duvalls character in “Apocalypse Now” where he makes his way to bomb the battlefields of Vietnam to the accompaniment of Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries not knowing whether he will come out of it alive , he walks on the battle scarred land, looks around him and comments “ I like the smell of ‘Napalm’…it smells of victory”.

One goes through gruelling schedules, days and nights of pushing oneself beyond all limits, setting up daunting goals, fighting against time all the time . But like a soldier who is truly breathing only when the smell of ‘ Napalm’ is around him, …

I must say I did not know it would be so long before I wrote my next post. But I have been extremely tied up wrapping up “Bhram” and starting up the three new projects which are to go on the floor soon. “Bhram” has had its share of problems but that is part of the process and I have enjoyed every minute of it. There were times when I cursed the circumstances, but looking back I know I would gladly do it all again. For it is all I know how to do. My ‘life’ is on pause when I am not working on a film. Television keeps me sane. At least I am doing something that resembles what I love doing most.

Sometimes in quieter moments, I wonder would it not have been wiser had I looked …

Dear friends,

I had intended my next post to be Bhram –An Illusion(2)..But once again life has proven that to imagine we are controllers of a designated plan, is an illusion by itself.

To say that I have not been disturbed by the events of the past few days would be hypocritical. I was pulled into a situation not of my making.It is not my place to question, delve, presume motives or assign causes. What is in my control is to view it as yet another milestone in my journey, where I have to live by the adage’Experience should make man better, not bitter”…I have to consider it an event destined to occur , but which too, shall pass.

On my part, I have only praise for what I have read of Anurag’s articles here and I think we all know his caliber as a writer from the films he has …

‘Film’ is an optical illusion. Life, an illusion as well… Maya. I like illusions…They help me survive. I like films more than I like life. Sometimes even when they don’t have a beginning, a middle and an end. I prefer ones that have a middle then a beginning again the middle and then the end…
I often prefer the films of others to my own. But then I don’t know if their makers intended them to turn out the way they finally happened to. Or did they too like them better while they were still unborn… Yet in the stage of conception, holding promise of greatness, lovingly, carefully crafted, virgin, on clean sheets of white paper.
I like the films I make much more, before I begin making them. Then the problems set in and the energy that comes on, as if includes deception, …

“I know exactly what is going to happen…my films are going to be hits…one after the other….producers & directors will be chasing me….I,ll sign bigger films….with all the big heroines….I’ll be loved….and hated….admired….and criticized….more hits…I,ll buy a sea-facing bungalow…several big cars…become a producer….produce my own films….maybe even direct!”

All that was more than a decade ago. But I did,nt say it. Though I wish I had, because it all came true. They were the words of a man who had an uncanny sense of where he was destined to go. Another time he said to me: “ There is a lot I have to claim from this city….a lot I have to get out of it…in fact …everything!” And he did get it. He got it all. He is Shahrukh Khan. Some call him King Khan, some Badshah of Bollywood and others SRK.