He is a self-confessed food connoisseur, but film-maker Anurag Kashyap had more than cuisine in mind when he decided to put his money on Luv Shuv Tey Chicken Khurana which is due for release in November. For a change, Anurag is donning the producer’s hat for this Kunal Kapoor-Huma Qureshi starrer because he felt it had the old world charm of Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s movies. “When I went through the script of Luv Shuv Tey Chicken Khurana written jointly by Sameer Sharma and Kunal Kapoor it transported me back to the 1970s films. The film is about a character who has a secret chicken recipe.”
Anurag believes there is adequate space for all kinds of cinema to co-exist. But his upcoming film is not an experimental one like Vicky Donor which talked about sperm donation. “I want to make or be associated with all kinds of films. While I was studying in Delhi University’s Hans Raj College, I had a poster on my wall which read “At no point in life you can say you have arrived,” he says.
The film-maker says his upcoming film is not based on the life of his leading actor Huma, whose father is a famous restaurateur, but vouches for the succulent kebabs cooked at her outlet. Meanwhile, Anurag feels the nomination of Barfi as India’s official entry in the foreign feature film category for Oscars is good news because it would be watched by more number of movie buffs.
When he watched this Ranbir Kapoor film, he instinctively knew it had all the ingredients to be nominated. “Every film is judged according to the yardstick laid by Lagaan which nearly made it to the Oscars. My biggest problem with Barfi is that every five minutes there runs a disclaimer. Even in Prakash Jha’s film there are so many disclaimers…The Censor Board of Film Certification has a number of progressive people, but the lower staff are political appointees. Such people should not be appointed in the CBFC.”