The Sholay battle rages on
Thou shall not remake ‘Sholay’ seemed to be almost a commandment of the Sippy family — one which Ram Gopal Varma is rather familiar with. But with the release of ‘RGV ki Aag ‘just a day away, it looks like Sascha Sippy has found another way to rub in the fact that the ‘real Sholay’ remake is yet to hit the screen.
Sascha Sippy got into a deal which has the whole of Bollywood talking. Sascha has sold the rights for Sholay to Pritish Nandy Communications for a whopping 100 million dollars. According to Sascha, the magnum opus of his family’s creative stature deserves someone better than RGV.
“Sholay deserves someone who can respect its scale and magnificence. Pritish Nandy does,” claims Sasha. Of course, a not so subtle way of saying that Ramu doesn’t have what it takes.
We for one were pretty surprised that Sascha Sippy thought Pritish Nandy Communications had what it takes, considering that they’ve only had a ‘Jhankaar Beats’ and ‘Pyar Ke Side Effects’ to rave about. However, when we tried contacting the other members of the Sippy family for their comments on the deal, they were pretty mum on the issue and chose the most convenient stance, “No comments.â€
But looks like in the middle of all the brickbats, even Ramu has started to show some signs of insecurity. “I hope I haven’t messed up the film,†said the maverick filmmaker in a recent interview, almost admitting his apprehension.
But considering what we’ve seen of the promos and the rather dark and almost crass way in which the film is shot, we have to say that we think that Ramu has every reason to be worried. And it’s definitely not because PNC may do a better job, but because we think the filmmaker is capable of a lot more, if we forget about his last few box office disasters that is.