A storyteller for all seasons

Four and a half decades in, Vidhu Vinod Chopra continues to revel in the joy of the craft

- NAMRATA ZAKARIA

Select cinemas across India have just finished week-long screenings of films by celebrated auteur Vidhu Vinod Chopra, whose production company Vinod Chopra Films is celebrating 45 years. Among the films shown were the iconic Parinda—the Anil Kapoor-Jackie Shroff-Nana Patekar starrer is one of the finest gangster films of Hindi cinema—and 3 Idiots, a mega blockbuster starring Aamir Khan and directed by Rajkumar Hirani. Some of his older films, cinematic jewels like Sazaye Maut and the cult murder mystery Khamosh, were also screened.

Chopra, 71, is ready with his newest offering—12th Fail, starring the talented Vikrant Massey and newcomer Palak Lalwani. It releases on October 27 and promises to be a heartwarming, feel-good film about the people who attempt the UPSC examinations—India’s arduous civil services examinations that often take a decade to clear. In typical Chopra style, the simple storytelling unpacks socially relevant themes. “I showed the film to Naseer (thespian Naseeruddin Shah), and he said I can finally call myself a director,” Chopra jokes. Chopra’s first documentary, An Encounter with Faces, was nominated for an Academy Award in 1979.

We are sitting in his Santacruz office, a ground-floor space with a waterfall and a small landscaped garden for an oasis, and a table lined with cushions covered with Kashmir’s crewel embroidery. Chopra, a Kashmiri Pandit, last made Shikara in 2020, a lament for his lost land and his mother’s abandoned home. He had not directed a film for 13 years before it, but had produced several superhits like 3 Idiots, PK and Sanju.