Neerja and Aarya director Ram Madhvani: I’m just trying to turn mediocre work into acceptable work

His film Neerja (2016) won the National Film Award, and his web show Aarya has bagged a nomination at the International Emmys in the Best Drama Series category. Yet, filmmaker R Madhvani likes to believe he is “struggling” and “trying to work hard”.

He says, “I’m just trying to turn mediocre work into acceptable work. Sometimes my acceptable becomes other people’s good. That’s all I am here for, just trying to make it happen.”

After Neerja, it took him four years to come out with Aarya. And after over a year, his next — web film Dhamaka starring Kartik Aaryan — is set for release next month. Ask him why he isn’t out there churning out content frequently, and Madhvani laughs, “Not out of my own choosing… you’ve to ask these actors. They have the green-lighting power.”

On a serious note, he elaborates, “Cinema isn’t in my power. It really is in the universe’s power. Jab kuch baat hoti hai, banti hai na, it’s a miracle. When something happens, it’s because the universe has willed it and is protecting it. I’m not saying this out of any falseness but I’ve genuinely found that it takes me a long time and lot of struggle [to bring out projects]. It’s like climbing a mountain, and I’ve seen it in my own career — the landslides, frost bites, people pushing me off the mountain — but as I keep climbing, I don’t go below base camp. I get there and I start again. Sometimes, I don’t even do with proper clothing, so then I feel very cold and frozen, emotionally, but it’s something not in my hands. These things just happen.”

Madhavni also clarifies that it’s not because he immerses himself in story writing so much that projects take more than usual time to finish.

“I’m constantly working. Currently, I have six scripts written, with dialogues, which are there on the shelf. But it depends on how it all works out. There are times when I also run away if I find that the vaatavaran is now quite what I’d like. And there are times when I’d like to make something but it doesn’t happen,” he notes, revealing that Aarya took nine years before it got made whereas Dhamaka took just one. “Now maybe the next one will take three months,” he quips, adding, “So, it’s not really that I’m choosy.”

That being said, Madhvani is quick to share that there’s a different kind of choosy that he prefers to be. “I’m choosy about having some amount of creative control — not in a bad way; I’m very collaborative — but at the same time, there has to be a certain ownership and a commitment that has to happen. And that in turn makes me feel secure,” he concludes.

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