1997 Audio Songs
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More news →"I managed to attain the status of Nagarjunas chamcha" - RGV
In 'Sarkar' Selvar Mani says 'Jiske paas power hai uska wrong bhi right ho jata hai'. I believe it's not so much because of power alone but it can also be due to your own personal attitude towards life. Somewhere in this blog I mentioned that whenever life decides something for me, I immediately take a decision on top of that so that I always managed to make it work for me one way or the other. Once I decided to start my video library 'Movie House' at Ameerpet, with the Rs.20,000/- capital I got, I went about trying to buy quality types of video films and in the process I trusted a friend's father who deals in it and he sold me faulty tapes worth Rs.10,000/- which either don't play or get stuck in the video players, thereby reducing my capital to half even before I started. So by the time I started my shop I barely had a 100 workable tapes. Also every one concerned told me that it was a very bad idea to start a shop in the Ameerpet area as it's predominantly a lower middle/middle class population who lives there who cannot afford a VCR. And also that it can't compete with a library called 'Fantasy' which used to be on the Punjagutta Road as the rich Banjara Hills crowd only patronize that library. Once it started my library became so successful within a month and Fantasy went out of business in a few months. Now the same theorists said that these days everybody owns a VCR. Also 'Movie House' has a better parking space than 'Fantasy' etc. So the point is we can have a theory for anything after the fact. If it didn't work they would have said 'we told you so' and if it works they give a new theory and also they will conveniently forget what they said earlier. Likewise even for my film decisions from the beginning till today I keep getting these expert opinions and advises of what I should do and not. They told me 'Daud' will be a blockbuster because it's Sanjay Dutt after 'Khalnayak', Urmila and Rehman after 'Rangeela' and they advised me to shelve 'Satya' on the basis of who wants to see sweaty looking faces in dirty locations. The same people advised me not to do 'Aag' and my other failures too and today they will all remember what they said about 'Aag' etc and conveniently forget about what they said about 'Daud' and 'Satya'. It's not that my beliefs went right either. Apart from my trust in my friend's father I trusted on about 20 people I knew who had VCRs who I was sure will give me business. The business went to 100 cassettes per day but the 20 never came and if some did come they didn't pay money on account of their closeness with me. So eventually what worked is neither their belief nor mine. Random things keep happening completely out of your control but still your control can be in what you can do in an out of control situation. My real success I believe is in my ability to make decisions and implement them super fast. Anyway coming back to the video library, I used to narrate the story of each and every film to my customers depending on what taste they have. In due course of time they became so addicted to the way I present a story, quite a few of them used to say that my narration was better than the film. So I sat behind the counter of the shop for about 8 months doing a fantastic business financially, and with just one high point of being arrested and put in the Punjagutta Police station lock-up for pirating Amitabh Bachchan's 'Aakhri Raasta'. That was my first stint with how the Police were up close and i made friends with them and studied their psychology and later put that understanding to use in my cop films. Incidentally if anyone who lives in the Ameerpet area is interested about my 'Movie House' shop in Ameerpet center which I gave up when 'Shiva' started, now runs as 'Rajdoot Sweet Home'. Coming back to the 'wrong is right' story one day I overheard my father telling someone that Venket the brother of Nagarjuna is looking a for a story for a film as they have K.Raghvendra Rao (of 'Himmatwala' fame) signed. Surendra his brother-in-law was a customer at my shop and through him I managed to get an appointment with Venket. I told him the story of Raatri (Raat) which he said won't work in the Telugu market and asked me if I can write a story for a hero to be told to Raghvendra Rao. So I went back and in about an hour I wrote a one-line order of 'Shiva' borrowing from my own experiences in college and also liberally from Govind Nihalani's 'Ardh Satya', Rahul Rawail's 'Arjun' and Dilip Shanker's 'Kaalchakra'. Venkat liked the story very much and he took me to narrate it to Raghvendra Rao. Mr.Rao said it sounds like an experimental film with no drama in it. I thought maybe he knows what he is talking about since he is so highly successful and asked him if I can rework on it. As I was trying to rework it, I happened to see his film 'Kaliyuga Pandavruh' and I suddenly realized how he must be seeing 'Shiva'. I immediately gave up the idea of being a story writer and went and told Venket the same. I also told him that I would like to assist some director if they all feel it is so important to do that to be able to direct. Surendra with whom I have become a little close by then was starting a film with director B.Gopal called 'Collector Gari Abbayi' starring Nagarjuna and his dad A.N.R. So I formally joined as a 5th Assistant to B.Gopal who was very very busy in another film which he was finishing. So I started attending script sessions with 2 writers Komannapalli Ganapati Rao and Suryadevara Rammohan Rao on the script of 'Collector Gari Abbayi'. In the course of overhearing their script discussions with Surendra I used to come up with ideas and suggestions which visibly had an effect on all three of them. Within a few days Surendra started sending a car to pick me up which was a huge jump from my bus and occasional rides on my father's scooter life style. By the time Gopal was ready to shoot the film I rose quite a lot in both Surendra's and Venket's eyes but I did not meet Nagarjune yet. Mr.Gopal and his assistants used to feel visibly uncomfortable with my proximity to the producers considering that I was merely a fifth assistant. Also in those days assistant directors were expected to be very subservient. My attitude and my speaking in English used to understandably turn them off to the extent that when one day Surendra was having a discussion with Mr.Gopal to cut the budget, he suggested to removing me as one of the cuts. Also in just about a week I proved to be the worst assistant director ever by often loosing clapboards and continuity books. So Surendra asked me to lay off and just hang around the set without taking any responsibilities which worked out fantastically for me and because of me being free on the set I slowly started developing a rapport with Nagarjuna who started shooting by then. Nagarjuna used to be pretty impressed with my narrative skills and also my cinematic sense but he himself was not in a very strong position because after the success of his first film 'Vikram' which many attributed it to being because of A.N.R's son's first film, he had a string of flops and he was no position to make a decision to give me a film. So in the film industry I managed to attain the status of Nagarjuna's chamcha and the worst assistant director ever and also as a guy with a huge attitude problem with no hope for the future. Meanwhile I left my video shop to my staff and they cheated me royally and the business went for a toss. All the 'we told you so' guys appeared back and lectured me on how in chasing a foolish dream I went horribly wrong. And then I turned that wrong into right by making 'Shiva' happen. To be Continued...... By Ram Gopal Varma
"If its back-lit its called erotica, and if its front-lit its called porn" - Ramu
1. Is Phoonk a copied version of the Exorcist? Ans: Exorcist was about demonic possession and Phoonk is about black magic. Black magic is according to legend the application of an evil force to harm or kill an enemy. So in that sense there is no similarity. But yes in the emotional aspect of the near and dear ones concerned for the affected party there is a similarity. 2. I cannot keep watching your assembly line of productions. Ans: Don't. 3. I think you have great ideas but not so good execution. Ans: Teach me. 4. Would you consider changing the format or presentation of your movies? Ans: Won't 5. I am ready to take up the challenge of watching Phoonk alone. Ans: I am just the Director of Phoonk and the idea of contest was the One More Thought production company's. Since every movie has some kind of contest going on, for a film like Phoonk they thought that this kind of contest will be very apt as the film belongs to the scary genre. They are working out the technicalities of when and how to implement it. As soon as they are done with it they will post the details on a designated website. 6. A strip dancer shows all to a crowd to make a living. Shameless are those who watch. Ans: Neither are shameless. They are consenting adults. 7. You often tend to show only what you want without thinking of how it unfolds to the audience. Ans: You could be right. But like I always say you can't generalize audience. What for one goes above his head, the same for the other will affect him deeply. There is a very thin line between spoon feeding and being clear. 8. What is vulgar? Ans: Vulgarity does not exist except in the mind because anything and everything is there for a predetermined purpose. The way one chooses to look and think and feel about it is what which differs. The mode of presentation of anything to a receiver is actually what programmes him to feel in a certain way. A woman's body is the same. If it's back-lit it's called erotica, and if it's front-lit it's called porn. If you are seeking intense gratification you would want to see hard core front lit sex and mere erotica won't suffice it. I remember that in my teens reading a porn magazine with provocative titles and bad paper and bad grammar used to arouse me. I don't think reading it in a hard bound well-written smart and profound looking books will serve the same purpose. A feeling can be neither vulgar nor aesthetic. A feeling is a feeling. 9. Do you think you can ever take the idea of Daud and make it work again? Ans: Yes, because ideas are never wrong. Only their implementation and execution can be. 10. I think Shimit Amin is brilliant and he won't take up a project like Gayab. Ans: This only tells how brilliant you are. If you read my article once again you will realize that I was not talking about Shimit's or anybody else's brilliance but only about how non-brilliant I am. 11. I think you just got hurt with the failures of your recent films and you wrote that article 'Everybody is a nobody'. Ans: I said what I wanted to say and you can think whatever makes you happy. Like the philosopher Nietrsche said 'There are no facts, only interpretations'.
"I am just a supremely selfish guy" - Ram Gopal Varma
The day you start thinking that your idea is you that is when you start taking yourself too seriously and you will start falling in love with the 'I' and start losing track of your thinking thereby loosing track of the source where the 'I' is coming from in the first place. If I come up with a hundred ideas, out of which 10 could be film ides, 80 of the other ideas also fail and 7 of the film ideas fail too. The people will only know about the failure of my film ideas. For instance I am known to be a huge success in my video library business when I started which is true from the perspective of my family and my colleagues in the video business at that time. But only I know that it was a big flop and here's why. The reason I had started my video library was because I knew about 20 people among my friends and relatives who owned video players. So I thought that if they between them hire 20 cassettes, going by Rs.10- per cassette I would get Rs.200- a day and Rs.6000- a month which was the running cost of my shop. Anything extra I thought would be a profit which I can take a chance upon. Within a month of starting my shop I was renting out more than 100 cassettes a day but none of the 20, I was counting upon ever came to my shop or if they did, they never paid the money as they were my friends or were related to me. So in effect what I counted on didn't happen and the success came from unexpected quarters. But I know in my heart that if I knew those 20 people would not come, there is no way I would have started my shop. So am I a success or a failure? I would say that I was a failure in intent and successful by chance. I believed in Raat more than Shiva and I only made Shiva first because the producers did not allow me to make Raat first. I believed in Daud more than Rangeela and the proof of that is why would I make a film like Daud after Rangeela unless I think it is better. I had the same belief in J.D.Chakravarthy to Manoj Bajpai to Vivek to Prashant to Mohit to Adhvik. I had the same belief in Urmila to Antara to Nisha to Amruta. I had the same belief in Anurag Kashyap to Jaideep Sahani to Sajid Farad to Prashant Pandey and my belief in any of them does not change till today. Some of them made it and some did not. But the people are seeing the effect of them and making judgments on them whereas only I know the cause of what made that happen. Any way to cut a long story short the point I wanted to make was that all my successes were by default and all my failures were by intent. Then what made me sustain all this time? It is nothing but me going on making decisions. Decisions led to me making an appalling film like Daud after the super success of Rangeela and decisions led to make a highly experimental film with sweaty bearded faces like 'Satya' after the failure of Daud.
"Why were Yashraj making blockbusters last year and failures this year?" - Ram Gopal Varma
I always find it very strange the tendency of people to emphasise on whose idea it is rather than the idea itself. I for one have been credited many times for innovative ideas and also discovering so many talents both in actors and technicians. But did it occur to anyone what I might have thought about those ideas and the talents at that point of time? The fact is that I never thought anything of anybody or anything or thought everything of everybody and every thing. The only reason I took Anurag Kashyap in Satya was nothing to do with my perception of his talent, but it was because he was the first writer to approach me after I decided to make that film. And later on he got Saurabh Shukla to join in as a co-writer. Why I credited Saurabh Shukla's name first in the titles of satya was because he was older in age than Anurag. People thought Anurag was the main guy among the two because I continued to work with Anurag and not Saurabh. The reason I did that was because Saurabh got married and he did not have as much time as Anurag to hang out with me. Similarly I did not think that Shimit Amin was more talented than Prawal Raman just because Shimit made Ab Tak Chappan and Prawal made Gayab. On the contrary I believe that given the material of Ab Tak Chappan Prawal would have made a better film and given the material of Gayab Shimit would have made it worse. I made Satya and Daud back-to-back at the same time. So who is the real me? Anurag writes 'Satya' and 'Main Aisa Hi Hoon' and makes 'Black Friday' and No Smoking'. So who is the real Anurag? Likewise why would Rakesh Mehra make 'Aks' first and 'Rang De Basanti' next? Why did Ashutosh waste his time and talent on 'Baazi' before he could make a 'Lagaan' and why were Yashraj making blockbusters last year and failures this year? The fact is that each and every one of us here are as good or bad as the material we take up at that particular time. The rest of the hype is in the media's, the industry's and the audiences mind. Fair enough the material I or anyone picks up surely is an individual choice but without knowing what factors affected that choice at that particular time, one cannot take it for granted that someone is very talented. That is just being ignorant about what goes behind the making of a film. In effect I am saying if Anaurag came to me for Daud, we would have made as bad a film and if some other writer was in Satya it would have been as good. I am not taking away the credit off him or Saurabh's or Sandeep Chowta's or the various actors and technicians of that film. All I am saying is that we all shined because of the material I picked up by chance and 'chance' is the operative word here. If I precisely knew what material to pick up why would I be also making bad films? And what did all those actors and technicians of the film do before and since Satya released 10 years back? All you have to do is to list down the works of Anurag, Saurabh, Manoj Bajpai, Sandeep Chowta, Mazhar Kamran the cameraman etc including myself for you to see my point. In Satya an idea just fell in place. Every one connected should just be happy with it and forget it, and be thankful that nobody realizes that a good film or a bad film can happen as random as that.
Rare Moments with Yesudas on Shemaroo
Shemaroo is catering to different target segments and reaching out to one and all with the launch of their following song compilation titles namely - 'Beedi Jalaile . . . Garma Garam Hits', 'Shubh Vivah Wedding Songs' and 'Rare Moments with Yesudas'! With summers on, Shemaroo has songs setting in various moods for the season. Like the hot blazing heat, we have sizzling Item Songs from recent Hindi films called 'Beedi Jalaile . . . Garma Garam Hits'. Most of the songs in this VCD are seductive and titillating. This title has hip shaking movements by your favorite actresses right from Preity Zinta to Sameera Reddy. There is also a lot of pulsating dance sequences by Dia Mirza and Amrita Rao among others. The highlight is the song 'We are hot very hot' from 'No Entry', since it was deleted from the film. It has been exclusively featured in this VCD album, where you can see Bipasha Basu, Lara Datta, Celina Jaitley and Esha Deol indulging in a lot of sensual nach on a beach. All the songs in this compilation are well picturised item hits. So all you item track lovers, ought to grab this VCD and watch these hot actresses, gracefully gyrate to the these popular pumping songs. After generating sufficient heat and fumes, it is time to go around them and take the 'pheras' for marriage. This concept of marriage is the essence of the song compilation title 'Shubh Vivah Wedding Songs' which is very beautifully bought out in this VCD. 'Shubh Vivah' is a compilation of famous wedding songs from Hindi films, where the songs are presented in a story format . . . one song actually leading to the other . . . carrying the story further. It begins with a song from 'Krodhi' wherein the boy and girl meet each other for the first time in a friends wedding. The rest of the songs that flow naturally in a sequence, present a gamut of emotions ranging - from the wedding preparations to the feelings of the brides father, the mehendi rituals, bidaai and the naughty neighbours & friends mischievously teasing the couple about their honeymoon. Further, we have some 'Rare Moments with Yesudas' coming up. This song compilation VCD features a mix of solo and duet songs of Yesudas right from the film 'Chhoti Si Baat' in 1975 to 'Daud' in 1997. This exclusive VCD is surely an audio visual treat for music lovers.