Koena Mitra and Fardeen Khan in a moment from Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena

So you are another journalist trying his luck in Bollywood?

I call myself an offline media product. I was a senior producer with a web portal and was also in charge of the web radio section. I also contributed to the movies section, doing interviews and reviews.

How did movies happen?

I once interviewed Ram Gopal Varma and that interview led to many film ideas. He then put me on to Feroze Khan and I started writing Janasheen. Hansal Mehta read my film reviews and we two collaborated for Chhal. When I wrote Yeh Kya Ho Raha Hai for him, the film?s producer Harry Baweja asked me to write Qayamat. Then, on the sets of Qayamat, I met Ajay Devgan who referred me to director Rohit Shetty. So next I wrote Zameen. One thing has led to another.

So what led to you directing Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena?

All these films that I have written, I have been on the sets during shoots and even inside the edit rooms. I didn?t want to jump into direction. I started writing Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena with Fardeen in mind and I had told him that. When I finished the script, Fardeen called Pritish Nandy and he just loved the script when he heard it.

Suparn Verma

You are calling it a con film. That?s a new term for Bollywood?

I am personally very fond of con films? of grey characters, of murky moralities. See, I have always maintained that as film-makers, we are conmen ourselves. We cook up a story, sell it to the public, make them pay for it and if the con works, then the people enjoy being conned. My film is a tribute to every single conman out there.

So your con artistes ?f*** the law??

In the film, the characters don?t have ?mera baap chor hai? written on their hands. They are con artistes by choice. And here, the law is not the police. My film is against the establishment?

That sounds almost Oliver Stone?

Oh well, the difference being he was a flower child and I am not. We are all products of this generation and the system has failed us completely. There are people who just f*** it and move on and there are others who keep getting bothered by it. So when Fardeen says f*** the law in the teasers, he means laws of nature, made by man. We are all victims of the law, which has been misused and abused over and over again. In Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena, all the characters live and play by their own rules, against that law.

Are you trying to create a separate world altogether, like say a Tarantino movie?

Yes, it?s a different world from a regular 9-to-5 world. But we do brush past such characters even if we don?t interact with them. I believe you need to create a new world to make it look larger than life. My film is perhaps closest to Grifters ? everyone is in a post-apocalyptic world and has to fight for himself. In fact, Fardeen says in the film: ?Koi kisi ka nahin hai.? We are in a world now where we have not only given up on joint families but even as two individuals trying to create a family, we do not have time for each other. It?s a dog-eat-dog scenario everywhere.

What kind of response are you expecting from the desi audience?

At no point of time did I want to escape Bollywood. It?s very much a Hindi film with songs and dances. It?s basically my take on a certain kind of movies. There are only certain stories in the world and it?s about how you tell them. We all know of great wines but they have to be marketed and presented differently. I love tampering with the structure and Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena is just that. When this woman (Koena Mitra) comes into the life of conman Fardeen, how it has a rollerball effect and how everybody is engulfed in it. There?s a lot of side-changing, people framing people?

And what?s our Bengali babe Koena doing in your scheme of things?

I wanted a new face but I didn?t want a girl, rather a woman. When I met her for the first time, she looked the lady. Then, the character is very quiet, not bubbly and talkative. And she fit that bit perfectly. Also, being her first film (in the lead), she would have given her 100 per cent, which she did. She did the song Jhoom with a kidney stone in her stomach, which she got operated the next day. That?s quite something. She?s like a sponge, absorbing every nuance that we discussed.

Now that you have got into direction, will you write for other film-makers?

Yes, I?ll continue to write for others. Agar do dukaan khula hua hai, to koi problem to nahin! But of course it?s much more satisfying being a director. The script becomes 3D only when it is translated on the screen.