SVF

Commercial films will always be made!

Bangla film, Villain’s director Baba Yadav and actors Ankush Hazra and Mimi Chakraborty talk to Titas Chowdhury on their film, the relevance of commercial cinema and more

Baba, you are synonymous with thrillers. Is there any fear of being typecast?

Baba Yadav (BY): No, I feel I am the blessed one. Many people can direct romantic films because that is a relatively easier genre, but very few people can direct action films. (Laughs). I am very fond of action films. I love watching them. That is why I prefer making action films.

Mimi, this year we saw you in Crisscross, which was of a completely different flavour. Was doing Villain a conscious decision to add variety to your filmography?

Mimi Chakraborty (MC): In the beginning of the year I did a film called Total Dadagiri. It was a commercial film. Then I did Crisscross. When I was approached for it, I really wanted to do the film because it was a different genre. But when I got the script of Villain and I learned about the story, it really gave me a kick, because it was unlike all the commercial movies that I have done and that usually get made. It is not the story of a rich girl who is kidnapped and then the boy fights with the goons and rescues her. It is not the same old monotonous story. It had a different storyline. I have always said in my interviews that I want to do cerebral commercial films. I really liked the script of Villain. That is how the film happened.

Ankush, you are playing a negative character in Villain…

Ankush Hazra (AH): I had been searching for a role with grey shades for quite some time. This is a trend in Bollywood too, where the lead actor plays a negative character. It often happens in a film that one of the leads plays a positive character and the other, the antagonist. But in this film, I am playing both the positive and the negative roles. That is something that interested me. I really enjoyed working in this film. I have been meaning to play a ruthless character.

How is Villain different from your other action films?

BY: Shree Venkatesh Films (SVF) wanted me to do films with them. We were discussing the genre that we could attempt. My writer and I wanted to try something different. Action films are usually interwoven with a lot of comedy. But suspense-thriller-action is something that has not been explored much, even in Bollywood. That is why we thought of trying our hands at something like this. Villain is an action-suspense-thriller. There are a lot of twists and turns in the film. Villain belongs to a very different genre. Four of my earlier films had good stories, but action was the primary element in them. Here, action is laced with suspense and thrills.

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