Gangs Of Wassepur goes UK

Anurag Kashyap have been branded a torch-bearer of new-age Indian cinema but for him, it's a burden which he hates to carry.

He will be going to promote Gangs Of Wasseypur in London, which releases across Britain on February 23. Kashyap described the two-part grainy gangster flick as his most commercial film till now.

He quoted in an interview, "I hate being a poster boy, because he eventually becomes a dart board. I never consciously carried any kind of burden of new-wave Indian cinema but people have a tendency to label you. All I felt was that if there were more filmmakers who made cinema I relate to, then I could also co-exist. It would increase my chances of survival".


"I am very keen to see how it does in the UK. I know a lot of audiences here who have been waiting to watch it on the big screen. I hope it will benefit from all the word of mouth. The audience all around the world just enjoyed it. There has been a lot of analysis in India, but we tend to do that in India," he said.

The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival last year and proved a box-office hit in India. The flick is set in the mine fields of Wasseypur in Jharkhand and was shot completely in Kashyap's own hometown, Obra in Bihar.

"The only reason I was able to do everything was because I shot it in the town where me and my brother (fellow filmmaker Abhinav Kashyap) grew up. I used all my father's contacts, who was a senior engineer based there. People opened up their homes to me and were so excited about the film being shot there. Major on-screen blast sequences would have cost crores but I got them for free as I was told to just land up with my camera when a mine blast was happening," Kashyap quoted.

Kashyap has been compared to Hollywood director Quentin Tarantino as a result of a similar streak of barefaced gun fights in Gangs Of Wasseypur and its second part, which opens in the UK on March 2.

"I have stopped reacting to such comparisons. The only thing that has changed for me is that I now get paid for the movies I make; and that has taken 12 years. I have now consciously tried to extract myself from any labels. I don't want my name to figure anywhere and have even renamed my company Sikhya. Expectations are a killer. I wish I could be a new filmmaker with a new name with every film. I just want the freedom to make my films," quoted the 40-year-old artiste, who is also celebrated for his on-screen performances in films like I Am and Trishna.

The writer and the director behind award-winning films like Black Friday and Gulaal, now their focal point is only direction and they are also eager on exploiting the television medium with Western-style season-based dramas that are ingrained in Indian sensibilities.

"The biggest problem has been the first-generation Indian diaspora's control over film and TV content. They left India physically but not emotionally and were forcing the same stories down the second generation. And because the money was coming in dollars and pounds, that was the audience being catered to. But the next generation is now coming into its own and liberating itself. The mainstream itself is getting more rooted and when the mainstream gets rooted, everything else changes. The world has realized our cinema is changing and once the authorities in charge realize that too, it will reflect in the international awards scene as well," he said.

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