Ayan Mukerji on Brahmastra’s success and towering above the boycott trend: My whole idea was to focus on the positives

“A decade of dreaming, four coming of ages,” reveals Ayan Mukerji in an exclusive interview with Firstpost about the success of Brahmastra- Part One: Shiva. The filmmaker’s body language is far more relaxed than it was prior to September 9. “Sometimes, projects like these are unsafe,” rightly confesses the 39-year old man brimming with childlike demeanour as his vision has brought the nation back to cinema halls. It has sent jitters to the social media pests that tried their best to boycott this piece of work that has taken almost eons to take shape and form.

It now stands on its feet, tall and giant. The globe is reciprocating to the magnanimity of the idea and celebrating its success as if it was their own. Art imitates life, for Mukerji, life has been inspired by art. Love has conquered all. And in this interaction, the man of the moment that dared and how, speaks about Brahmastra’s success, why majority of the Hindi films have failed, the idea behind Shah Rukh Khan’s name from Swades, and what he plans for part 2, titled Dev.

When you thought of this very ambitious theme and scale, were you always confident there would be curiosity and excitement among the audiences?

If I have to be honest, I did feel we were on to something that would excite the audience. This feeling was there, the instinct was very strong. It was a very new, unformed kind of a film. I always felt this fantasy story with very interesting visuals, VFX action, taking inspiration from mystical, spiritual India, I felt the subject had some potency and I always felt the audience will come in hoards to watch this film. And since we are talking now after the release, I feel pretty good that it actually translated because a lot of people make films and you come to know there’s something about a film that will pull in the audience. Sometimes, projects like these that are unsafe, when they release, people feel the vibe was missing. I don’t want to take names of other films but you realize on Friday only the film is not working. Brahmastra has delivered that pull. So I feel very happy about it.

When Wake Up Sid happened, Ranbir was 27, during Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani, he was 30, and now with Brahmastra, he has turned 40, but his characters in your films are still discovering themselves. Do you feel there’s no age for coming of age?

Enough of Ranbir’s coming of age na? To be honest, when we started the film, I didn’t know Ranbir would be 40 by the time we release it. I didn’t know I would be 39. I was 29 when Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani released and thought I would be 33 or 34 by the time I have my next film. Who would’ve thought it would be 10 years? Coming to your question, there are two answers to it, one, this coming of age arc, I also need to move away from it in future, it’s an arc we have played with a few times. But I think actors can keep coming of age endlessly because in life, we are always coming of age. While making Brahmastra, I have gone through four coming of ages. We are always growing. What is the meaning of coming of age? You’re always learning something new, so that the journey never stops. Actually, I’ll take back my first thing, even if you give a different angle to a story, some characters always come of age.

Who’s idea was it to call Shah Rukh Khan Mohan Bhargava in the film? A nice ode to Swades.

I worked on Swades. To give you a history, Swades was my first film as an assistant director and I’m credited as the writer also. Swades is directed by Ashutosh Gowariker who’s my brother-in-law. So I’m very close to Swades. Even in this film, the character of Shah Rukh sir is that of a scientist. So I thought I’d put this in the Easter egg from my first film, so I decided to call him Mohan Bhargava.

In the final scene of the film, Amitabh Bachchan says there’s no bigger weapon than love. Are you proud that this film has towered above all the boycott calls that were happening against the industry and this film?

Very honestly, I’m happy that the film is doing well. It has brought the audiences into the cinemas. When a big film comes out, it becomes a culture because everyone is discussing that film over the weekend. I had also forgotten that feeling and how important it is for our culture. So I feel really good about it, I don’t feel good about towering over or above anybody else. My whole funda from the making to the release of the film was to focus on the positives. This messaging is ingrained in the film’s DNA that love is the greatest Astra. I wanted to fill the DNA of the film with light. So that’s my approach towards the marketing and release as well that just focus on the positive, send out positive pulse. My hope and wish is everyone gives the film a chance at least.

There are a lot of people who feel that the content is going wrong and not social media hate. Because all your films have done well so far, what do you feel Hindi filmmakers are lagging in terms of their work?

I feel that we are not going wrong, firstly. Movie making is the most commercial art form, so there’s commerce to art. Art, by its nature, is a little subjective. Yes, there have been misfires recently but if you see, there will be a month when four films fire together and you’ll feel like everything is fine, it’s a very natural flow. No industry can make only hit films. There are different creative people that work over here so yes, we have made some films that the audiences haven’t liked and we will make films that they will. It’s all good, that’s my feeling.

The one major hurdle we all faced collectively was the pandemic. How did you and your entire team stay strong and optimistic when people almost declared the end of the theatrical business?

We kept working on Brahmastra. I’m sure you also face this; when you have a goal and your mind is very focused on achieving something, you’ll focus on that. Whatever the outside factors were, we knew we had to deliver the film and believe me, it was a very difficult film to do. It was a very challenging film for us to make. The pandemic gave my team some time to rest because prior to it, we were continuously working on the film for 3-4 years, so we regained our energy. We also made a lot of decisions that I feel made Brahmastra better, so I took the pandemic in a very positive way, to make my film better.

The three pieces of Brahmastra have been described as pizza. The members of the Brahmansh call it a club. Was this mix of modernity and mythology deliberate?

Yes, it was deliberate. It’s a modern tale. The film is unfolding in today’s times to allow it to intersperse it as well. If you see some films of Marvel, you’ll see they also use some funny one-liners throughout the film, so that was my attempt.

All three films that you’ve made have been successful and there have been critics as well. How open are you to criticism?

Very open. I’ll tell you something about Brahmastra as well. I can tell there’s some feedback going around about the dialogues, even within the people who have liked the film. To be honest, I have not been able to absorb everything because it has been just four days since the film released. The journey of my film in the world has just started. I showed my film to a lot of people while we were running up to the release, took a lot of feedback and used it to improve my film. Even now, we make films for the audience. I will take note of everyone’s feedback and absorb it, and whatever makes sense to me, we’ll try and improve it in part two.

And lastly, how far are you pushing the envelope for Part 2 that is Dev.

So to be honest, even while we were making part one, it was the foundation film of the Astraverse and the Brahmastra trilogy. While we were making part one, we were trying to establish a lot of things. Now, I don’t need to establish anything, now, I just need to tell the story. I say this with a lot of humility that the story of part two is very juicy, very dramatic and very interesting. We can expect a very very juicy character from Dev. In terms of what we want to achieve with it, we want to make it much faster. We want to produce the film much faster, and we are planning to create much more in terms of visual spectacle and also the dramatic storytelling. Now we really want to juice it up.

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