King Khan

King Khan is here, there and everywhere, especially now when his next release Chak De India is ready to hit the theaters in August.

I am not very keen on sports movies and was rather surprised to know that Shahrukh Khan (SRK) was doing a hockey movie with Ab Tak Chhappan Shimit Amin.

Now I have seen the promos (see the video above and below) and can see why. It looks like a clever movie, targeted at the youth of India, with a huge all India appeal (there are 16 new actresses of all zaat, biradari and municipality of India). There is SRK in the lead. And there is London in it (if I'm not wrong). How can this film not succeed at the box office, both at home and abroad?


Isn't this guy, SRK, clever? Anupama Chopra, his biographer, vouches for it and reveals how influential SRK has been for Bollywood and for Hindi cinema:

... SRK is fiercely intelligent. He reveals only what he chooses to reveal. He will only tell you what he wants you to know. There are spaces in his life in which someone like me would never be admitted...

I think SRK has shaped Bollywood enormously. I think his presence and the work he did with Karan Johar and Aditya Chopra structured 90s Bollywood. Dilwale Dulhania Le Jaayenge was a watershed moment in terms of the overseas market, stories and how characters were shaped. Then he picked up Karan Johar who was Aditya's assistant director and they did Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, which was another watershed moment. Kuch Kuch Hota Hai transformed the style, the costumes, the look of Hindi films. Shah Rukh is the face of New Bollywood. When I first started reporting on Bollywood even in the early 90s, most of the directors were men in their 50s. It was still a cottage industry and quite unprofessional. SRK and the directors he worked with had a lot to do with changing that.