Dibakar Banerjee reveals Ekta Kapoor saw his unreleased controversial Netflix film Tees, told him ‘I loved it, but wouldn’t want to release it’

Though garnering acclaim, LSD 2–a sequel to his own edgy 2010 anthology–hasn’t been able to fire at the box office. But Dibakar is not new to high octane stressful situations, nor to helm movies which sooner or later, irrespective of the box office, find their audience.

In an interview with Indianexpress.com, Dibakar talks about the origins of LSD 2, why he doesn’t watch many Hindi films and reveals if the myth that he doesn’t like commercial Bollywood cinema and stars is in fact true.

Edited excerpt:

 

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Is this the most stress-free release of your career?

No, it was just full of extreme stress but at the same time extreme energy… I remember in 2020, I was finishing Tees through COVID. After having finished the film with a lot of effort, reimagining, hoping that now that people are stuck inside their homes maybe this will get the maximum number of eyeballs. That’s when Netflix told us they didn’t think this was a good time to release the film. On a screening for Tees with Ekta, she told me, ‘Look this is not going to release. I loved the film, I wouldn’t want to release this film. But I am still waiting for us to make LSD 2.’

The situation was very clear between both of us. I also had fewer choices! My choice not to make LSD 2 had reduced my room for movement in that side of the court. You don’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Frankly, we had also been thinking of stories even before that. One had started talking to the script writers, the stories were forming… Then when Tees got rejected and Ekta said let’s make LSD2, I could see this is a canny and smart producer at work. I said let’s go with the smart thing to do, the stories had already been cooking.

Do you watch Hindi films? 

I do a bit, not too much. I am actually very scared of making films about other films and 90 percent of our films have become of other films. It is natural, because you consume life through a cultural statement and then you output your experience. If you are consuming life only through films and not through books, not through your immediate surrounding, your lived experience, if you are constantly jumping into another plain of existence and living just that life, whatever you express will be just about that life.

Which was the last Hindi film you enjoyed?

(Thinks a lot) Eeb Allay Ooo. I saw it twice. Because Prateek (director Prateek Vats) and I were working, I thought let me watch the whole film all over again!

There is a section which is convinced that you are not fond of mainstream cinema or actors.

I don’t think fondness has got anything to do with it. The answer is far dryer and more mundane and much less emotional. The kind of films I make without getting bored are where the stories are the universe, the actors are characters within that universe. What happens in the star system in Bollywood is that the star has an independent relationship with the audience, over and above the story, in which he is supposed to be playing a character.

When a star acts, one eye is always towards the camera, which says, ‘Look I am going to do comedy now, action now.’ I am saying metaphorically. That is something that isn’t exciting for me to make, it has got nothing to do with the stars. Stars by their definition have to have a bigger persona than the story they portray.

But everything is not absolute. Stars mean money, I would love to do a film with stars, make some money, have some budget to make a film. But those stars are not waiting to make a film with me. There are 100s in the line. So it is about when I get a project which could consume a star and I plan it out. Sushant Singh Rajput for me is a star, Parineeti Chopra and Arjun Kapoor are for me stars. I used that tenure with Yashraj to its fullest, where I tried to work with newer, younger stars within the nature of my stories.

So it is completely wrong to say I am not fond of mainstream or stars. I can’t make a film hating the actors, stars or the system. I have made Detective Byomkesh Bakshy, Sandeep Aur Pinky Faraar. Why did I choose Sushant, Parineeti, Arjun? Because they agreed to workshop. They were excited about slumming it, which they did.

Has the fight to make your films reduced over the years?

The fight to make my kind of films has intensified and it will only get worse. Abhi toh aur mushkil hogi. Between a state that only wants a certain kind of a narrative to be the culture and the film business, that is now controlled by four or five big companies, hence it is the oligarchy. When the state and the oligarchy have had a pact… Where the State says, ‘Look I am going to give you 150 cr consciousness’ to mine, control and sell to as long as you don’t go there, here, there.’

That oligarchy wants to sell. It would love cultural multifariousness to exist, but that’s not the priority. It is to control each and every consciousness and make money out of it. They want control, more power. It is a tussle between the oligarchy and the State. Both of them are giving each other too much importance, reducing the room for the number of conflicting things that we can express in a dynamic culture.