‘Pathaan’ Director Siddharth Anand on Hit Movies, Bollywood Action Cinema and Future Projects

The action thriller from Yash Raj Films Pathanstarring Shah Rukh Khan, broke box office records and grossed 591 crore (US$73.6 million) worldwide in just six days, with an impressive US$27.56 million in overseas earnings.

This comes as a big relief to the Bollywood film industry, which has had a string of flops or near-hits in the past few years, allaying industry fears that the rise of OTT in India has claimed the life of the film star. Khan has since been back bigger than ever with his first major release Zero in 2018. Deepika Padukone and John Abraham also star in the film, which is about an expatriate spy who tries to take down a rogue agent who plans to spread a deadly lab-created virus across India to release .

Pathan Director Siddharth Anand spoke to Deadline about the film’s success, future projects and the development of action films in India. Anand’s credits also include Warstarring Hrithik Roshan, a huge hit in 2019, along with Pathan and the tiger Movies starring Salman Khan are also part of the YRF Spy Universe.

DEADLINE: Bollywood has had a rough couple of years during the pandemic. From your point of view, why did Pathan broke the drought?

SIDDHARTH ANAND: I will speak from the audience’s perspective, not my perspective. They come because it is a big star movie in a popular genre and the songs are a big hit. Lately, we’ve had stars trying to do things that were a little 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 do well outside the Marvel Cinematic Universe – he chooses films like Tom Cruise and not because he wants an Oscar nomination. We know he can act, that’s why he survived all these years. And that was the reason why Shah Rukh decided to do it Pathan. We played with it, we gave it songs, we gave it scales, we gave it action. And that’s what the public wanted to see. John as antagonist also worked and Deepika was also a big factor in getting a bigger audience.

DEADLINE: So Shah Rukh Khan is back? Big stars are back?

ANAND: Shah Rukh never left him but maybe some of the films he did before did not justify his fame. Same goes for Hrithik War, which also opened with big numbers. I also think that the world and the cinema experience has changed in India – OTT is a big draw. So there are certain types of movies in which people want to see stars, and there are some OTT content in which people want to see actors. And the line between these two things is very clear.

DEADLINE: So you think theater and streaming can co-exist?

ANAND: I think we are following the Hollywood model where you put tentpole movies in theaters and release a different kind of content on OTT. These two mediums will co-exist. We just need to understand the difference and read the writing on the wall.

DEADLINE: Are you personally interested in creating OTT content?

ANAND: I haven’t thought much about it, but if I have a choice, I’ll still try to do tentpole theater films. The fun of being a filmmaker is sitting with an audience and getting that reaction in real time. And I’d be lying if I said box office didn’t matter. Those songs that come in, the love that pours in and the videos that make the audience dance to your songs. There is no greater satisfaction for a filmmaker.

DEADLINE: The Boycott Bollywood brigade was in full force ahead of time Pathan‘s release, including a strong objection to Deepika’s saffron bikini in Besharam Rang’s issue. Were you worried that it would negatively affect the film?

ANAND: All I know is that they tried to boycott her Pathan and the public came out in droves to support it. I think if you boycott something or speak out against something, there has to be some merit. It needs to be backed up with some facts and some reality. what they did Pathan was just ridiculous and the public gave their verdict. There is also huge support for Shah Rukh, who has been a soft target in recent years. That’s why the film got such big numbers. There was such an outpouring of love – they came in because they loved the film and didn’t want to judge it.

DEADLINE: There has also been a lot of talk in the past year that Pan-India films or films that work across India are now only coming from the south. Has Pathan a hit across the country? And do families come to the cinema?

ANAND: We have captured all four quadrants, family herd, men, women, youth, both multiplexes and single screens. It also burns in all areas. Earlier, things were a bit slow in Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh as people feared protests. It was on day one. But in the evening the numbers started to rise. The South is also coming in large numbers, not only the dubbed versions in Tamil and Telugu, but they are also coming for the original Hindi version because they want to hear Shah Rukh speak in his original voice.

DEADLINE: In what sense Pathan, War and the tiger Movies connected to YRF Spy Universe?

ANAND: War and Pathan are the first two original films to come from this universe after that tiger movies. Kabir, the character played by Hrithik in Warand Shah Rukh’s Pathan character, are my creations. When the character played by Salman in the tiger movies are included Pathan, so this is actually the first crossover film where we reference other characters and films. Hopefully we’ll have a lot more fun with it in the future.

DEADLINE: You’re known as an action director, but that genre struggles to compete with Hollywood in many areas. How is it developing in India?

ANAND: It is now very much on the way. We are still discovering the action genre in India because we have always had massive “masala” movies with some action elements, but we like movies War or Pathan what you can really call action films is still quite rare. We are still learning in terms of VFX, directors and engineers. Budgets have always been a constraint, but the numbers are changing, giving us the freedom and flexibility of budgets to do bigger things. We have a solid base of great action directors in India and we also bring in talent with a lot of Hollywood experience. at Pathan we had the likes of Casey O’Neill working with Tom Cruise and Craig Macrae (Mad Max: Fury Road) together with our local action leaders.

DEADLINE: Apart from more movies in the YRF Spy Universe, what else awaits you?

ANAND: I am currently shooting a film called fighter with Hrithik and Deepika, who I also produce [Viacom18 Studios is distributing]. We plan to release it next year. I am also producing a Hindi remake of rambo with Tiger Shroff. We have licensed the rights to Millennium Films and plan to start filming later this year.