With work as distinctly different from one another as Udaan (2010), Lootera (2013), Trapped (2017), Bhavesh Joshi Superhero (2018) and AK vs AK (2020), Vikramaditya Motwane is more of a chameleon filmmaker than an auteur. His style never overpowers the script. It is difficult to figure out the Motwanesque in a movie. "My style is not as important as what the film or the series best served as. Also, I love experimenting. I am such a fan of so many different styles - I love period dramas, big action thrillers, survival dramas - that I want to try out each. Maybe in a way, I am trying to find myself as a director also," says Motwane, as we catch up for a quick chat.
Currently, the filmmaker is basking in the success of his epic period series, Jubilee. Although, in its essence, it has a similar lyrical quality as his heartbreakingly beautiful cult classic Lootera, and he has previously co-directed season 1 of one of the most popular Indian web series, Sacred Games, with Anurag Kashyap, Jubilee is a unique piece of work. In fact, Indian OTT has seldom experienced such a sprawling spectacle before.
Much like Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time.... In Hollywood, where he fictionalises the tragic end of Sharon Tate, Motwane's Jubilee is a fictional tale that uses a real incident as its core material and builds a fictional world around it, placing it in a geopolitical context. In Motwane's, the timelines of the real and reel don't overlap perfectly, that is by design, and it is what makes the series such a delicious watch. We talk to the director about his blast from the past that has taken the present by storm. Excerpts:
What made you pick up the Himanshu Rai-Devika Rani-Najmul Hasan incident to base your story around and then, set it in the backdrop of the Partition a time when Himanshu Rai was long dead?
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