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Zoran009
PostPosted: Thu Feb 13, 2003 4:11 pm 
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'A big studio would have pitched Devdas in a big way'

Subhash K Jha | February 13, 2003 13:36 IST


Late in the evening of February 11, when the Oscar nominees were announced, Sanjay Leela Bhansali was calm.

His Rs 500 million drama Devdas, starring Shah Rukh Khan, Aishwarya Rai and Madhuri Dixit did not make the shortlist for Best Foreign Film. "I cannot deny I am disappointed. But nobody knows how the Oscar nominations happen. The whole process is kept under wraps.

"In an Internet poll, Devdas got 8 out of 10," he adds. "I am sure if a big studio had backed Devdas in Los Angeles, it would have stood a better chance. Everyone says I should have been there to lobby for the film. But we did not go to the UK to lobby for BAFTA."

"Of course, an Oscar nomination would have added considerably to the film's business abroad. But it has already made nearly Rs 150 crore. It has done stupendous business overseas. We did a business of Rs 80 crore when we took Devdas to Cannes. A lot of people disbelieve the profits Devdas has made."

"I just wish one of the big American studios had bought Devdas. They would have pitched the film for the Oscars in a big way, like Miramax did with the Chinese film Hero," says Bhansali.

Last year, Ashutosh Gowariker's Lagaan made it into the Oscar shortlist for foreign films. "It would have been wonderful to be nominated," Bhansali says, reflectively. "But I am very proud of the BAFTA nomination though neither means as much to me as a Filmfare Award. I am distressed when I see news channels saying Devdas has let down the country by not getting an Oscar nomination."

One theory doing the rounds why Devdas missed a nomination is that two Indian films in successive years would have been excessive. Filmmaker Ram Gopal Varma disagrees, "I don't see why the Lagaan nomination should have been a deterrent. If we can have two Miss Worlds in two successive years, why not two Oscar nominations? No, I think Devdas missed the bus because there were better films in the race this time. We do not really know the calibre of the films that have been nominated, do we?"

Says Bhansali, "I don't think international cinema is ready to embrace mainstream Indian cinema unconditionally. Even Mira Nair's Monsoon Wedding didn't get to the Oscars after being nominated for the Golden Globe Awards."

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Number of User Comments: 18






Sub: oscar

Devdas type of film is enjoyed by only Indians. Though Lagan was a good movie it missed the oscar as there were better movies from ...


Posted by jacob







Sub: Oscar's credibility

Good that it was not selected for Oscar, otherwise oscars credibility would have taken a beating. I do not know how people send such masala ...

http://rediff.com/movies/2003/feb/13sanjay.htm




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bhaskar
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 14, 2003 11:43 am 
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Tell me about it - can't he just accept that his film is crap!!!!!

BTW, isn't this thread in the wrong forum? :hmm:
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Khiladi
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 14, 2003 3:48 pm 
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man...sanjay leela bhansali actually thought he would bring home the oscar this year. i cant understand how the movie even made it as a entry from india. I'm so glad it didn;t get selected. now all he's doing is finding excuses for it not making it in the top 5. how pathetic is that? all his figures about the movie making money is also sh*t!

like Bhaskar has mentioned, he just needs to understand that his movie was crap & no way close to LAGAAN! i hope he realises this & just gets on with his next flick.
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Kishi6406
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 15, 2003 2:08 am 
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It's his refusal to the fact that Devdas was an over budgeted and non-international film that wasn't the best of 2002. He knows it and he's trying to run away from this fact. If Devdas ever did make it to the nominations though, I would be quite proud. That film is just unbelievable. I have never seen a film like that before, with all that glamour. But huge sets aren't just the one thing that impresses the judges: it's entertainment, a good film with soul, and Devdas was missing just that.
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Simran
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 15, 2003 8:09 am 
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Quote:
Says Bhansali, "I don't think international cinema is ready to embrace mainstream Indian cinema unconditionally. Even Mira Nair's Monsoon Wedding didn't get to the Oscars after being nominated for the Golden Globe Awards."


Um, here Bhansali reveals his absolute lack of understanding about the Oscar process. Only ONE film can be submitted for consideration from each country. Instead of Monsoon Wedding, India chose to submit Lagaan. And if they had chosen to submit Mr & Mrs Iyer OR Kannathil Muttamithal (sp?) this year, I think India would've stood a far better chance of being nominated. Devdas, IMO, sucked.

Now, here's some REAL BS excuses, from the Times of India.
I'm sorry, but blaming Devdas's failure to get nominated on RACISM is like blaming Showgirls' failure at the BO on SEXISM.

(OOPS, edited to delete the article because i realized there was a thread about it below...)



Edited By Simran on 1045296848
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ali
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 15, 2003 2:21 pm 
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"I don't know why we should lick the ar-s of these white men and beg for an Oscar, and have a biased approach towards our own awards!" - Mahesh Bhatt

Class! :laugh:

Ali
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Kishi6406
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 15, 2003 2:40 pm 
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Monsoon Wedding would've won for the Oscars because it made $13,000,000 in the USA and $3,000,000 in the UK, and judging by it's success, as well as the type of great movie it was, it would've won. Lagaan wasn't a good movie period. I knew it wouldn't win, I never had confidence in that film!

This was our big mistake last year.

Now this year, we make another mistake. Let's atleast give a regional film it's time to shine! Everyone's talking about Kannathil Muttamithal constantly, and this would've been our meal ticket to international mainstream success.
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Aryan
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 15, 2003 3:32 pm 
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You really think a 'regional' film would be able to finance the publicity needed to secure a nomination? Hardly likely. If you are talking about Maniratnam's film, it isn't really regional. Tamil films are 'major' enough not to be considered 'regional'. If they are good enough, or hold enough credibility on other grounds, I'm sure they would be nominated. The very fact that Devdas was probably the only film which had a producer who would be able to afford major publicity in the U.S. made it the wisest choice to submit to the Oscars. The other films didn't even stand a tiny chance. If Kannathil Muthamittal was a whole lot better than Devdas, I would have supported its submission...but it wasn't.
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ali2003
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 15, 2003 4:48 pm 
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I think the reason Devdas was sent in the first place was because it did extremely well in the US and Canada. Many received it well and thus I guess the board believed it would share the same success at the Oscars.

I agree with Mahesh Bhatt's statement to a certain extent, but typically after reading reviews made by the American Press around the Oscar nominations of Lagaan and now Devdas, they were typically looking for a hollywood flick! One reviewer said Lagaan would be a masterpiece if all the songs were deleted and the second half were an hour shorter! True it is just the opinion of a few critics but it makes you sit back and look at what these people are looking for.

I think that India's own national awards should serve as a standard to really judge a powerful film by, at least from an indian viewpoint. IMO Devdas was entertaining every moment of it, but what do film-makers want to prove by going forward with submitting films to be looked at by the U.S.?

Plus, on another note, Bhansali seemingly could have done so much more to improve Devdas' chances but did none of that. I read an interview with him saying they did not lobby to get the BAFTA nomination for best foreign film and so they felt they did not have to lobby at the Academy Awards either. The only publicity Devdas had was its one viewing in Los Angeles in which a load of the Academy members walked out after the intermission!

They could have learned a lot from the Lagaan team but it seems as though they didn't want to!
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Kabir
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 15, 2003 9:32 pm 
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Also, considering that the team that selects the films to be sent as India's entry to the Oscar is based in Chennai, its suprising that a GOOD tamil film hasn't been sent for nomination so far. One year they actually submitted 'Jeans' with Aish and Prashanth and expected to be nominated. I think that was the year that 'Life was Beautiful' was submitted from Italy.

The problem lies with the committee that chooses the film to be sent, and not with the film per se. 'Devdas' was a great film to many of us Indians, so lets be content with all the national awards coming our way. I honestly think Sanjay B is a nice enough guy, though his producer Bharat Shah needs some serious help. Hes really giving the entire Devdas unit a bad name, plus with a personality like Shah's its easy to see why 'Devdas' didn't charm its way into trade circles in the US. Not ONE US studio picked it up.
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ali2003
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PostPosted: Sun Feb 16, 2003 12:17 pm 
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Agreed about Bharat Shah. I guess sitting in that jail cell for that long time really rotted his brain cells as a whole.

What other scenario would he hand over the distribution and DVD rights to EROS Entertainment? Talk about low quality, there are many other solutions that Shah could have gone to.

This is one thing people should learn. Should they want a film to succeed, don't put it into the hands of EROS. The retards at that company killed what could have been a classic DVD and really did not do justice to the representation the film needed.
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spike86
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PostPosted: Mon Feb 17, 2003 2:51 pm 
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Is EROS run by Indian Mafia?
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Sanjay
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PostPosted: Mon Feb 17, 2003 4:15 pm 
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spike86 wrote:
Is EROS run by Indian Mafia?

It might as well be. After all their way of doing business is quite similar to that of the mafia.
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Mr_Khiladi
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PostPosted: Mon Feb 17, 2003 4:28 pm 
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As I've said Devdas could never win as it was all gloss and no substance, you can't fool the judges. SLB's best film without a doubt was Khamoshi, which was also the most different of his films. And if Monsoon Wedding was put forward last yr instead of Lagaan, it still wouldn't have won as it was still up against some tough competition and Vashundara Das' bad acting would have brought it down. Plus I'm not sure if Monsoon Wedding counts as an 'indian' film as I think it was funded manily by US sources. Something truly outstanding has to come out of India for it to win an oscar and whoever thought Devdas had a chance must've been high!

As for Mahesh Bhatt, he's now proved that not only is he a dirty old man, he's also a hypocrite and a racist. The whole reason he's upset that Devdas didn't get nominated, is cos his friend Bharat Shah was involved!
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Aryan
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PostPosted: Mon Feb 17, 2003 4:37 pm 
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I'm quite sure that Monsoon Wedding could have been entered as an Indian film - but it I don't know if it could even have been nominated. The Academy doesn't quite like shoddy, gritty films, even if it is intentional. Mahesh Bhatt is certainly being unnecessarily racist. I think the old man suddenly feels the need to sound important...It gets the best of us...
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