When Sridevi lost out on a role in Bahubali, much criticism swirled against her choices. The story went that when the producers of Bahubali approached her, husband Boney, who negotiates all her deals, asked for Rs 6 crore. One must remember that when they started out, the producers had no idea they would be delivering a box-office jumbo. At that juncture, the fee seemed unreasonably high. So they looked elsewhere. But after considerable thought, including ambitious plans of giving it pan-India acceptance, they returned to Sridevi. Boney, it is whispered, upped the price by a few more crores. That's when the makers decided on Ramya Krishnan in the powerful role of Rajmata, who ruled the mythical kingdom of Mahishmati.

After Rana Daggubati (who played the antagonist) used his connections with Karan Johar to give Bahubali its all-India appeal, and the film and its sequel went on to set astonishing records at the box office, many went tsk, tsk. Imagine, she didn't do Bahubali but did the over-the-top Puli , which was a mega flop. Puli was made in the same state as Bahubali . It was an opulent drama in which Sridevi got a whopping fee to play the cruel antagonist flaunting grand capes made by Manish Malhotra. But the makers didn't have the vision to either market it all over India or to make a good Telugu film. Therefore, Sri's money-over-role choices were closely questioned.

But after watching her in Mom , one is sure all those questions will evaporate. Irrespective of how critics or the box office receive this well-made family drama with thriller elements, Sri's decision to pick this role, or her heartfelt performance in it, will withstand any scrutiny. Mom also serves as a good example of how the same subject under two different directors can turn out to be vastly different. A few months ago, the Raveena Tandon-starrer, Maatr , had come with more or less the same theme but it was mangled by poor and crude making. In contrast, Mom is sophisticated and the gangrape is one of the cleanest on Hindi screen. Therefore, Mom is a worthy follow-up for Sri after English Vinglish. It doesn't matter she turned down Bahubali or did a flop film.

But why did Bipasha Basu turn down the terrific role that finally went to Anushka Shetty? As is well known, Bipasha had a special equation with Rana. It's heard that, once again, in their quest to give the film an all-India flavour, the producers approached her for the lead opposite Prabhas. Those who've seen both editions know Anushka was the queen of the second instalment and if she was shown ageing in the first edition, it was fleeting and far too powerful to have rejected it. But Hindi film stars have a way of looking patronisingly at films that come out of other states and Bipasha probably thought, "Who's this Prabhas?" She should've looked at director S.S. Rajamouli's record instead. Anyway, since she is not in Sri's league and one hasn't heard of anything brilliant coming her way, the decision to turn down Bahubali must be something she regrets today.

English Vinglish had brought Sridevi back with a bang in 2012. If director Gauri Shinde showed brilliance in her debut film, she couldn't follow it up with equal sparkle in Dear Zindagi, a good premise that dragged interminably. One hears that Shah Rukh and Karan (joint producer with Shinde) will not be repeating that partnership with her in a hurry. There are nightmare tales emanating from SRK-Karan camps of how they tried their best to make Gauri edit the film. But she was just not open to suggestions and wouldn't allow any of them, however senior and capable, to touch her film. It was an unpleasant experience for Karan and Shah Rukh even if they, as producers, made some money from it. Therefore, when Shinde makes another film, it'll have to be bankrolled only by dear husband R. Balki.

Bharathi S. Pradhan is a senior journalist and author