Ashutosh Gowariker’s Lagaan completed 25 years since its release recently. The makers held a special event recently commemorating the occasion, and it was attended by several prominent Bollywood celebrities. During the event, a lot of stories and anecdotes related to the film came up, and one of those was that Javed Akhtar had found the script atrocious.
Lagaan became one of the biggest hits in Hindi cinema and even bagged an Academy Award nomination. Aktar recalled his initial reaction to the script and shared that the film challenged a lot of industry assumptions prevalent at the time.
He revealed what he told actor Aamir Khan back then and said, “I said, ‘What are you doing? The film you are making is not going to work at all. The script is atrocious.’ In other words, everything that shouldn’t be in a film is in it. People say films where the hero wears a dhoti don’t work anymore; times hae changed. We didn’t even let Gabbar Singh wear a dhoti. People say period films don’t work. You are making a period film. People say cricket is not cinematic at all- it’s such a slow game.”
He continued that he also did not like the situation of the songs in the film. “What is the situation for songs in your film? The first situation is that it is about to rain. The second situation is that it may rain. The third situation is, when will it rain? The fourth situation is -what if it doesn’t rain? These are your situations. What am I supposed to write songs for in all this?”
However, Aamir Khan’s faith never wavered. He told Akhtar that the film will turn out to be very good and it is going to work. Khan’s instincts were ultimately right because Lagaan became a huge success. Back then, it was the third Indian film to be nominated for the Academy Awards, after Mother India and Salaam Bombay!
It was also the most-awarded film at the 47th Filmfare Awards with eight wins. Lagaan starred Aamir Khan, Gracy Singh, Rachel Shelley, Paul Blackthorne, Suhasini Mulay, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, Rajendra Gupta, Raghubir Yadav, Rajesh Vivek, and Aditya Lakhia.
Also Read: Aamir Khan, Ashutosh Gowariker’s Lagaan to Re-release in Theatres for Its 25th Anniversary
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