Journalist-turned-filmmaker Khalid Mohamed’s Fiza completes 25 years today. Starring Hrithik Roshan, Karisma Kapoor, Jaya Bachchan and Manoj Bajpayee, the film was an emotional drama that received high acclaim. On its landmark anniversary, Khalid Mohamed spoke looked back at it in an interview with us.
20 years of Fiza: Khalid Mohamed on the negative reviews, “I can’t fathom why the journalistic fraternity was so hostile, lathering me with reviews, which were personally aimed at me and not the film”
Khalid, 25 years of your finest work as a filmmaker Fiza. How do you look back on that experience?
At the risk of sounding immodest, yes, I think cinematically and theme wise – set against the repercussions of the riots of 1992-’93 – I feel I would have been incomplete and even useless without plunging into direction with Fiza. The song and the picturisation of the qawwali Piya Haji Ali’ composed by A R Rahman, was conceived as affirming the vital element of ‘secularism’, hopefully made an impact, as did the underlying message that the polarisation of communities has various vested political interests behind them, from either faith.
Who were your inspiration as a filmmaker?
Inspired by the work of director Costa-Gavras (Z and State of Siege), I maintained his style of pacing and editing, aided considerably by the editing of Sreekar Prasad, the cinematography of Santosh Sivan and the background music of Ranjit Barot, whose contribution as the film opens with a dedication to Maa (my late grandfather) is so sensitive. The overall experience was a breeze, there were hurdles galore, of course, but I remained cool. Fiza was meant to be.
The reviews were quite hostile
To date, I can’t fathom why the journalistic fraternity was so hostile, lathering me with reviews, which were personally aimed at me, and not the film. It was declared a flop by the hallowed trade magazines, whereas if you Google the box-office collections it was made on a budget of Rs 7 crores and earned upwards of Rs. 32 crores.
Be that as it may, the scripts of Mammo and Zubeidaa written for Shyam Benegal sir, and Fiza, are the ones that I’m identified with, to date. As an aside, I do want to add that I spoke to Costa-Gavras during a visit to Paris, where he stayed, asking him if there was any point in making a film which made a plea for anti-terrorism and he had answered, “There can never be enough. Every film on the subject counts, please don’t have any self-doubts.”
You had a dream cast in the film: Jaya Bachchan, Hrithik Roshan, Manoj Bajpayee, Karisma Kapoor, Sushmita Sen.. .hell, is this a Manmohan Desai multistarrer, or what?!
The comparison with Manmohan Desai is a joke. None of my actors were larger-than-life superstars then. Mr Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan were to do cameos but I felt that would be gimmicky and a needless commercial ingredient, and so excluded their appearance from the script. Jayaji, a hard taskmaster, read the script and gave her go-ahead. Hrithik Roshan, who was completing Kaho Naa…Pyaar Hai, I remember reading the script to and at the end of an hour, he said “yes”.
I had been bowled over by his performance as a child actor in Bhagwaan Dada but more importantly, his eyes are so expressive that he could go beyond conveying his anguish as Amaan, way more than the written dialogue. His performance as Amaan is rarely mentioned today but to me, it’ll always be priceless. Karisma Kapoor had been offered the scripts of Zubeidaa and Fiza simultaneously. She’d been approached for Mohabattein at that time for the Aishwarya Rai role, but again I lucked out. She did both, and to watch her enact the most difficult scenes – especially her pent-up scream and a scene with a newspaper editor whom she berates – made not only mine but the entire unit’s jaw drop.
As for Manoj Bajpayee and Sushmita Sen, both had agreed instantaneously. Sushmita had heard out the scratch recording of ‘Mast Mahaul’…and shot the number on at least six to seven different locations in Udaipur in three days, snatching a nap in between in her car. Anyway, it wasn’t a formal star project… Karisma was the biggest star when we started out. And Hrithik became an overnight sensation with Kaho Naa… Pyaar Hai in the midst of the Fiza shoot. He remained unaffected by the stardom, and would even wade through monsoon floods to reach the shoot at distant locations of Bombay.
Were all these your first choices? I remember everyone I knew who mattered, wanted to be part of Fiza… Did anyone actually say no to you?
Nadira Zaheer Babbar politely refused to play the part which eventually Asha Sachdev did terrifically. And there was an odd instance: my co-producer Pradeep Guha said Akshay Kumar was interested, though I wasn’t. I read the script to him to play the role which Bikram Saluja did subsequently. Akshay wanted to be Amaan, the brother of Fiza. I bolted from his office as rapidly as I could. That would have been a case of gross miscasting.
How difficult was it to control that vast cast? How did you handle the temper tantrums and ego clashes?
The cast were collaborators. It was my first go at direction, and I remember Jayaji once asking me, “How are you staying so cool?” This doesn’t sound pragmatic but I was cool because I knew someone up there likes me, my grandma whose memory swirled within me throughout. Her last words to me were, “Kabhi kisike mohtaj mat banna.” Of course, I was dependent throughout on the entire team of high calibre. And yes, I did find it strange leading a team of 100-plus for some sequences, since I’m not a ringmaster. But if you ask me, directing a film can be as natural as breathing.
The only time I was flummoxed was in Udaipur during the shoot of ‘Mast Mahaul’ which included inserts of Hrithik. He had become the nation’s craze and everyone from the Collector to the top police officers wanted to host parties for him. Not possible. So the song was shot guerrilla style. We’d go into all sorts of places like a farm with a huge well and into brick kilns. And I would close my eyes when Hrithik had to do an action scene. He had this knack of doing it so realistically that he’d get injured, like once his arm bled with a knife wound, but he was unperturbed. (He) applied some antiseptic and continued without half a grimace.
Fiza dealt with an issue that remains more relevant today than ever: the Muslim identity. How deeply do you feel about Fiza today?
I don’t feel deeply. I feel torn apart with the rise of segregation and non-inclusivity. I’ve directed and written films only with Muslim characters and their conditions, the ‘fiza’ around them. No financier/producer wants them today. So end of my stories, on the screen at least.
It is widely believed even now that journalists make inept filmmakers. Do you feel you proved them wrong?
You’re talking of the Old School of Journalism. I didn’t have an agenda or proving anyone right or wrong. If most of them, especially Stardust and Indian Express and India today panned the film, that’s fine. The most off-putting review was by the erudite Maithili Rao who wrote in Britain’s finest magazine, Sight and Sound, surprised by the fact that how someone who liked the films of Mani Kaul could turn turtle. She forgot that I have been an admirer of both mainstream and parallel cinema. Perhaps, I should have sent her my reviews of Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Khamoshi: The Musical, Aditya Chopra’s Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge and Karan Johar’s Kuch Kuch Hota Hai. But rehne doh, to each his or he own.
Finally, why are you so withdrawn from the film world?
I’ve withdrawn since I was being commissioned to write obituaries, nostalgia pieces and the crop of the nation’s inadvertent or calculated propaganda films. For heaven’s sake, the fact is once you’re not in a chair yourself, you need them more than they need you. So no, thank you. Subhash, I’m in another hemisphere. I’ve written three books, directed a theatre play and made three documentaries, including a 90-minute tribute to Shyam Benegal. Plus, I’ve completed two more novels (one tentatively titled The Imperfect Prince and the other is a memoir on being inside Bollywood). I paint occasionally. That’s more than enough work for me.
More Pages: Fiza Box Office Collection , Fiza Movie Review
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