EXCLUSIVE interview of Vikas Bahl on his film Ganapath, Kriti Sanon's National award win, and directing Amitabh Bachchan

Filmmaker Vikas Bahl is known for directing films like Queen and Super 30. He’s now coming up with Ganapath, a futuristic action-drama that’s based in the year 2070 AD. The film stars Amitabh Bachchan, Tiger Shroff, and Kriti Sanon in lead roles. Bachchan is a legend with more than five decades of experience and expertise, Shroff’s agility in action makes him a crowd favourite, and Sanon is just fresh off a National Award. In an exclusive interview with Firstpost, the _Queen_ director spoke about the idea of making a futuristic film, working with the leads, and his fond memories of directing Kangana Ranaut nearly a decade back. Edited excerpts from the interview Where did the idea of making a film based in 2070 AD come from? It was a much simpler idea when I thought of it originally, it was the story of an ordinary boy. As I kept writing, I don’t know when I landed up in 2070. I realised I was writing a film that’s based in the future. Writing is a process where you also don’t know when you go into a completely different direction. This story just found itself landing up in this scenario. Were Amitabh Bachchan, Tiger Shroff , and Kriti Sanon the only names that came to mind? After I finished writing, the first two people that came to my mind were Tiger and Kriti. I had never met Tiger before but when I narrated him the story, he immediately agreed. When I narrated the story to Kriti, she also loved it, and we are here now. It has been a long and beautiful journey with them. How was it like directing Amitabh Bachchan ? You have to pinch yourself every morning to believe that you’re directing Amitabh Bachchan. It’s never believable but he’s the one who makes it so comfortable for you and it’s so much fun. It’s only because of him that you can believe that you can direct him because he’s so beautiful on sets. Also, when he’s around, I’m always nervous and on my toes on the sets. What was your brief to the entire VFX team about how the film has to look? It wasn’t just about me telling them what has to be done, I wanted to see the film from their imagination. My job was to pick and choose the best thing from everything that was coming my way and align everyone together. This is an output of everyone’s imagination. It was a great and long journey. What is your take on the action that Tiger Shroff does? He’s like a sportsman when it comes to action and he loves it. Action is an outcome of an emotion. In our film, while we have a lot of exhibition action, we have a lot of dramatic action too. To align these two is the toughest journey. Tiger gives you so much action on a platter that you’re always spoilt for choice. Now how do you pick up the best? What do you have to say about Kriti Sanon winning the National award for _Mimi_ ? She deserves every bit of it, we have seen her journey in these 8-9 years. While we were working, I knew how phenomenal she’s. The validation that she has got in the form of the National award is only going to make her bigger and better. Your film Queen that starred Kangana Ranaut completes a decade soon. What are your memories of making that film and the cult it enjoys? When we were making Queen, we were just hoping we were able to make it. And when it finds a journey like this that we are talking about it even nine years later, you can’t replace this with any other feeling. It is god-sent and happens once in a lifetime. You just have to cherish it and celebrate it all the time.

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