Filmmaker Imtiaz Ali shares that despite several actors and filmmakers expressing interest in having their projects screened at international film festivals, he has never aspired to taking his films to any. His movie Highway (2014), starring Alia Bhatt, remains the only film that ever made the rounds at an international film fest, the Berlin International Film Festival.
Ali confesses that he has never really thought about taking his films to any film festival. He says, “I never thought about it. I know a group of people that make movies that would go to a film festival, but I don’t think like that. I [essentially] want to make movies that people would want to watch; if they make it to Cannes, it’s fine.”
He adds, “I want all my movies to have a large global audience, but I’ve never aspired for any of my movies to be at a film fest. I don’t have much knowledge about it (film fests) either. But maybe I should think about it.”
Ali, who was in Delhi attending Kathakar International Storytellers Festival and has had a long association with the festival. Hailing the art of storytelling he said, “The urge to tell a story is very compelling. It’s like hunger or+ thirst we can’t do away without telling stories. As a filmmaker, the reason for making a movie is a story that you have thought of. My trick with Kathakar is not knowing what to say, I don’t prepare anything. And then things come up there are very surprising and interesting.”
Ask him if he takes the same approach as a filmmaker and he is quick to add, “There are many stories within the story of a movie, all of which combines together. On the day of the shoot you can have a plan. but the best plan is to not take that plan seriously either. There is an intend of a scene we shoot but things happen while we shoot, something new and real can happen. I want to keep that window open.”
{{/usCountry}}Ask him if he takes the same approach as a filmmaker and he is quick to add, “There are many stories within the story of a movie, all of which combines together. On the day of the shoot you can have a plan. but the best plan is to not take that plan seriously either. There is an intend of a scene we shoot but things happen while we shoot, something new and real can happen. I want to keep that window open.”
{{/usCountry}}Ali’s last movie was Love Aaj Kal (2020), which was the successor of the 2009 film of the same name, also directed by him. Ask him when the audience will get to see him making magic on the big screen again and he says that he is gearing up for “many” future projects, but he “can’t talk” about them at the moment.
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