'Sultan' Breaks All The Records, Ali Is In Happy Space

Sultan’s director Ali Abbas Zafar is on cloud nine as his film is breaking all kinds of box-office records. Raghuvendra Singh partakes some of the euphoria.

- Raghuvendra Singh

Ali Abbas Zafar is in a happy space right now. He tells me the real reason for his happiness is that the people have taken to his film Sultan in a big way. Vox populi, vox dei, as they say. The Gods have not only spoken in favour of the film but have emptied their coffers as well. His Sultan has all the trappings of being one the biggest blockbusters of all time, having crossed Rs 285 crores India collection at the time of writing and is in all probability set to enter the 300-crore club. He’s glad that the film has lived up to its hype. “When expectations go through the roof, then it becomes the director’s responsibility to meet those expectations and I’m glad we were able to do that,” he explains. He’s extra happy that Salman Khan went out of his way to try something different for his film.

Ali was born and brought up in Dehradun. He was a huge fan of Salman while growing up and says he has watched Salman’s films in single-screen theatres. “I watched Karan Arjun some four-five times in theatre. Hum Aapke Hain Koun..!, Khamoshi, Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam… Salman was brilliant in all those films. Today, when people say he isn’t an actor, they should go back to all these films.” Ali shares that what he liked most about Salman was his honesty. “What you see is what you get with him. When people say that Salman ka connect hai, what they are actually connecting to is his honesty.” He says that’s what they tried to do with Sultan’s character – keep his stardom intact but create an honestto-goodness-grassroots pehelwan that the masses would instantly connect with. “People like watching him shirtless. He said that iss baar shirt kya, pant bhi utaar dete hain but do it in such a way that it shouldn’t look like a gimmick.”