Piyush Jha opens up on Sikandar

Talk about a film based in Kashmir and two immediate thoughts that come to one's mind are it will involve terrorism and will aim at conveying a message in the end.

"You are right about the first part to some extent, though the second part isn't entirely true," smiles Piyush Jha, the director of Parzan-Ayesha starrer Sikandar. "Even otherwise, the terror element is just a backdrop. Otherwise, the film is mainly centred on the story of this young teenager Sikandar (Parzan) who stumbles upon a pistol. How events unfold from this point on forms the narrative of Sikandar."

How about the message part? "No, Sikandar is not a traditional message-oriented film," comes an outright denial from the young filmmaker, "I have not set myself up to making some boring, issue-based cinema. I can't blame the general perception though if one feels that Sikandar could be on the same lines. After all, you do get that tag once you film a movie in Kashmir."

In fact, the director of King of Bollywood and Chalo America insists that his own sensibilities do not allow him to venture into such subjects. "Honestly, I myself get bored with such�cinema where audiences end up saying�intentions were good but the execution was boring", says Piyush, "Come on, what's the point of making such cinema which can't keep the audience engaged enough. I wanted to make a story which is exciting and keeps the audience involved from beginning till end. Sikandar stays on to be a suspense thriller."

Piyush believes that if at all there is a message to be conveyed, it has to be�implicit rather than explicit. "You can convey a message only if you have your viewer interested in the story�you are trying to tell. If you try to hammer across a point, it will only end up hurting people's throats. I don't want to do that; I don't want to shout from the rooftops that I have made Sikandar for the sake of humanity," says Piyush honestly. "Sorry, those were never my intentions to begin with. More than anything else, first of all I want my audience to enjoy the cinematic experience and then think about the other subtexts."

Starring Madhavan, Sanjay Suri and newcomer Arunoday Singh in principal roles, Sikandar releases all over on 27th March.

Source: Bollywoodhungama.com