

Akhil Bhalla
4.4K posts

@akhilbhalla
30+ yrs @BBC, @AajTak, @Zeenews, Disney+Hotstar. Now Product lead- CTV/OTT @NDTV, Journo in ‘zen mode', Views personal. RT ≠ endorsement





He literally explained the Black Coffee Theory and why it changes how you approach life.

Throw back pic from my first film, Masoom. On the first day of release, I went to the main theatre … and there were only two people in the whole cinema hall.. and one of them was me ! Those days ‘black marketing’ of cinema tickets was really prelavent .. young men, or even gangs, would bulk by cinema tickets and then sell them at higher prices on the day of the show.. of course if the hall was full .. Except the first show on the first day for Masoom, the hall was completely empty ! Outside I got surrounded by some pretty angry looking young boys when they discovered I was the director .. they had lost their money that day .. I must have looked pretty crestfallen. So one of them actually took pity on me, and said .. ‘Sir .. the problem is you’ve made an ‘article’ film’ .. if you want a career , don’t do that ‘ Article film ?? I kept wondering .. article film .. I realized he meant an ‘artistic film’ .. Don’t ever make an artistic film this young black marketeer was trying to warn me .. Well, the Friday of release .. all the cinema halls were empty .. as they were on Saturday, Sunday , Monday , Tuesday .. The Distributors of the film gave up trying to support the film. It was too expensive to keep the film showing to empty halls .. I remember the feeling that day .. when they told me they had decided to give up trying to hold the theatres .. I walked the streets of Mumbai and thought about what I was going to do next in my life , for making films was certainly no longer an option. Something strange happened on Thursday. A friend called me and asked if I could help him get tickets to Masoom. I told him that was a bad joke. But then .. On Thursday one cinema hall had filled up .. then on Friday there were lines of people waiting to buy tickets .. and over the weekend the distributors were scrambling to get back the halls they had given up, and my ‘Article’ film was declared a hit .. What happened that weekend ? People say in retrospect it was ‘Word of mouth’ .. but how could it be, when hardly anyone saw the film ? What happened that Thursday ? .. I still wonder as am about to go into making ‘Masoom, the next generation’ .. years after Masoom the original became a cult film .. Is ‘Masoom, the next generation’ another ‘Article film’ ? #film #Masoom #throwback #directing #FilmDirecting #Career
