Yash Raj Films’ action thriller Pathaan, starring Shah Rukh Khan, is shattering box office records, grossing 591 crore rupees ($73.6M) worldwide in just six days, with an impressive $27.56M coming from overseas.
It’s a huge relief for the Bollywood film industry, which has had a string of flops or almost hits over the past few years, and disproves industry fears that the rise of OTT in India has killed the cinema star. Khan is back bigger than ever in his first major release since Zero in 2018. Deepika Padukone and John Abraham also star in the film, about an exiled spy working to take down a rogue agent who plans to release a deadly lab-generated virus across India.
Pathaan director Siddharth Anand sat down with Deadline to discuss the film’s success, future projects and the development of action cinema in India. Anand’s credits also include War, starring Hrithik Roshan, a big hit in 2019, which along with Pathaan and the Tiger films starring Salman Khan, is also part of the YRF Spy Universe.
DEADLINE: Bollywood has had a difficult few years during the pandemic. From your perspective, why has Pathaan broken the drought?
SIDDHARTH ANAND: I’ll talk from the audience perspective, rather than my perspective. They’re coming because this is a film with big stars in a popular genre and the songs are a big success. Recently we’ve had stars trying to do things that are a bit different. But stars should choose films as stars and not as actors. That’s why Tom Cruise is still the only star in the world whose films are doing well outside of the Marvel Cinematic Universe – he chooses films as Tom Cruise and not because he wants an Oscar nomination. We know he can act, that’s why he’s survived all these years. And that was why Shah Rukh chose to do Pathaan. We played around with that, we gave him songs, we give him scale, we give him action. And that’s what the audience wanted to see. John as the antagonist has also worked and Deepika has also been a huge factor in bringing in a larger large audience.
DEADLINE: So Shah Rukh Khan is back? Big stars are back?
ANAND: Shah Rukh never went away, but perhaps some of the films he was doing before were not justifying his stardom. It’s the same with Hrithik in War, which also opened with big numbers. I also think the world has changed and the film viewing experience has changed in India – OTT is a major draw. So there are certain types of films that people want to see stars in, and there’s some OTT content that people want to see actors in. And the line between those two things is very clear.
DEADLINE: So you think theatrical and streaming can coexist?
ANAND: I think we’re following the Hollywood model where you have tentpole films releasing in theatres and you have a different kind of content releasing on OTT. These two mediums will coexist. We just need to understand the difference and read the writing on the wall.
DEADLINE: Are you personally interested in making OTT content?
ANAND: I haven’t given it much thought, but given a choice, I will still try to do theatrical tentpole films. The joy for a filmmaker is to sit there with an audience and get that reaction in real time right there. And I would be lying if I said that box office doesn’t matter. Those numbers coming in, the love pouring in, and the videos of audiences dancing to your songs. There’s no greater gratification for a filmmaker.
DEADLINE: The ‘Boycott Bollywood’ brigade was out in full force in the run-up to Pathaan’s release, including a big objection to Deepika’s saffron bikini in the Besharam Rang song. Were you worried that would have a negative impact on the film?
ANAND: All I know is they tried to boycott Pathaan and audiences came out in large numbers and supported it. I think if you’re going to boycott something, or raise your voice against it, there has to be some merit in that. It has to be substantiated with some facts and some reality. What they were trying to do with Pathaan was just ridiculous and the audience has given its verdict. There’s also been a huge amount of support for Shah Rukh who has been a soft target in recent years. That’s why the film has done such big numbers. There’s been such an outpouring of love – they came in wanting to like the film and not to judge it.
DEADLINE: There’s also been a lot of talk over the past year about how pan-Indian films, or films that work across the whole of India, are now only coming from the South. Has Pathaan been a hit across the whole country? And are families turning out for the film?
ANAND: We’ve captured all four quadrants, families are going in large numbers, men, women, youth audience, across both multiplexes and single screens. It’s also firing in all territories. Earlier it was a little slow in Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh because people were afraid of protests. That was on the first day. But by evening, the numbers started increasing. The South is also coming in with big numbers, not just the Tamil and Telugu dubbed versions, but they’re also coming for the original Hindi version, because they want to hear Shah Rukh speaking in his original voice.
DEADLINE: In what sense are Pathaan, War and the Tiger films connected in the YRF Spy Universe?
ANAND: War and Pathaan are the first two original films coming of that universe following the Tiger films. Kabir, the character played by Hrithik in War, and Shah Rukh’s Pathaan character, are my creations. Then the character played by Salman in the Tiger films is there in Pathaan, so this is basically the first crossover film where we’re referencing other characters and films. So hopefully going forward we’ll have a lot more fun with that.
DEADLINE: You are known as an action director, but that genre struggles to compete with Hollywood in many territories. How is it developing in India?
ANAND: It’s very nascent right now. We’re still discovering the action genre in India, because we’ve always had mass ‘masala’ films that have some action elements, but films like War or Pathaan that you could genuinely call action movies are still quite rare. We’re still learning in terms of VFX, directors and technicians. Budgets were always a limitation, but the numbers are changing, so we’re getting the freedom and flexibility of budgets to do bigger things. We have a solid base of great action directors in India and we’re also bringing in talent that has a lot of experience in Hollywood. On Pathaan we had people like Casey O’Neill, who’s worked with Tom Cruise, and Craig Macrae (Mad Max: Fury Road) working alongside our local action directors.
DEADLINE: Apart from further films in the YRF Spy Universe, what else is next for you?
ANAND: Right now I’m shooting a film called Fighter with Hrithik and Deepika, that I’m also producing [Viacom18 Studios is distributing]. We plan to release that next year. I’m also producing a Hindi remake of Rambo with Tiger Shroff. We licensed the rights from Millennium Films and plan to start shooting at the end of this year.
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