Ratan Jain:
Aiming for the unknown
The young Ratan Jain first started an audio cassette shop in the ’80s, under the brand name, Venus. His shop flourished and soon Venus was a company with a banner to respect. Ratan then discovered the magic of films, got his brothers to understand the intricacies of filmmaking and Venus, the banner, was soon a banner making films. Venus has taken just 12 years to make films like Khiladi, Baazigar, Main Anari Tu Khiladi, Badshah, Josh and now the seven brothers stand united under the leadership of Ratan Jain to present Dhadkan, a film about love which is more than love. Ratan Jain, the man behind the show, talks about Dhadkan and all that is to come from Venus. An intense and rich eye-opener of an interview.

Something about Ratan Jain before Ratan tells you everything about Dhadkan, his plans, his new ideas, his urge to change the ways of filmmaking, making it more enjoyable, more entertaining, more economical ("which is the one disease that will gradually destroy the industry if we don’t discover a vaccine for it fast"). This man Ratan Jain -- just watch him at a party. He is well-dressed, suave, sophisticated and philosophically silent, most of the time, talks only when talked to, knows so much but talks only if talked to. He gives you the feeling of a man who is full of compassion, care, concern, a man ever ready to help, even if he knows he is being cheated. "Cheating doesn’t help. It has never helped. It can never help. I know that as God’s truth. So why should I bother about little things like cheating and lying and making efforts to fall from a position from which they can never rise. I and all my brothers firmly believe that we are not here to pass judgement on ordinary human beings. There is one more powerful power above there, who is all powerful and in direct connection and communication with everything that happens between Him and His creations,” Ratan says.

This man, Ratan Jain, gives you the feeling that he is of the industry and yet not of the industry. He gives me atleast the feeling of a man who is on the verge of taking his first step to become someone rare. He is, if you ask me, the example of what God has in mind to create as his new creations in the millenniums to come.

There is talk all over that you started Dhadkan first with Dharmesh Darshan who gave you Raja Hindustani, one of your biggest hits before starting Dhadkan. Somewhere in between he came up with a project called Mela. He also gave us the temptation of getting bulk dates from Aamir Khan, the hero of Mela. What more could a single producer or a production company want? Aamir Khan affordable so easily?
We had a series of meetings and finally decided to put a coma to Dhadkan and went full steam ahead with Mela which we completed within a matter of months. But things were not going as smoothly like we always made films. We soon realised that one director (Dharmesh) couldn’t handle two big films at the same time. Dharmesh too confessed that he couldn’t do justice to two films because he was not used to making two different subjects at the same time. The industry soon spread the news that there were a lot of problems between the Jains and their director. But they didn’t knew that we were all friends, we would not let the industry talk itself crazy. We had to find a solution and we would. And we did which ultimately helped everyone, didn’t leave anyone dissatisfied and soon we were shooting both Dhadkan and Mela with equal enthusiasm and excitement.

What’s this? You have two heros who are known as action heros and also over thirty. And then you have two young girls Shilpa Shetty and Mahima Chaudhury. What kind of a love story is this supposed to be?
This, if you ask me, is the kind of realistic love story without being realistic the way the other kind of realistic films are, I mean the parallel or whatever you call it parallel films are. You have seen Akshay and Sunil in very different characters in all their films and you must have seen people getting bored with their most exciting action sequences. So we decided to go in for one big change. You have to just see Akshay and Sunil perform in Dhadkan and you will find it very difficult to believe that our two actors and two actresses are the same names who are seen in the cast of so many other films which come one after another and go before they come. I am not joking but the kind of films mostly made these days give you thoughts that are growing more and more negative. I hope our film becomes the first to start a vogue of spreading optimism among filmmakers planning films for the future.

Of the girls, both Shilpa and Mahima have done their best. Dharmesh has given them all the opportunities to prove themselves as actresses and they have taken up his challenges and you will see the beginning of a new innings for both these girls who will be seen in a different light in Dhadkan. Girls usually are used to rouse the dhadkans of the audience. These two girls have done more than what they have been asked to do in Dhadkan.

Did the disappointments in Mela and Josh put a break on your passion for filmmaking, in any way?
Who told you Mela and Josh were disappointments? Those negative stories are spread by people who have no other work and who sit in their offices and make up stories which break up offices and companies, stars and filmmakers in the air. I don’t know what pleasure these people get out of it but in all these fifteen years that I have been around I have found that a majority of our filmmakers take pleasure in the pain of their brother filmmakers. Till this attitude doesn’t change, nothing is going to change. Mela and Josh did well enough. We are not dissatisfied at all. In fact they have given us the energy to go on to make and plan better projects for the future.

You have been a producer for years now. Don’t you think that the producers get their status and standing?
The biggest problem this industry faces today is the lack of respect it pays to its producers. The producer is the boss. The producer decides to make the film. He brings in the finances from wherever he can. He sees that nothing goes wrong in the making of the film. He sees that nothing goes wrong with the manpower working in the film. He is the man in action all the time. He is the man who faces all the flak and yet look around while the shooting is on and you will find him sitting in a corner with his blood pressure running high, his diabetes going out of control and his dhadkans beating beyond their limits. The power of the producer has to change. He has to be the boss, he has to be the badshah. He has to create that kind of position for himself. Unless he does that, he will remain like that, even willing to polish the shoes of the spotboy. I don’t want such things to happen. I want the position of the producer to change because I know that unless the producer is king there can’t be an empire. There are critics who say that there are some producers, like me, for example, who "interfere" in the making of the film. What’s wrong if a producer who is spending his whole lifetime in making just one film makes some suggestions while a film is being made? In fact, the producer has to play a very prominent part right from the start of the film, from the time the story is selected, the diretor and the cast, the technicians, the music director are selected. You know in Hollywood the producer is treated like an emperor. In Mumbai he is treated like a "chaiwala".

There is this story which says that there are so many star who make their producers sit out of the sets while they are shooting because they don’t want them to interfere in the shooting. Who are they to take such action? In fact, it should be the other way round. The producer should have the right to throw out anyone he feels who comes in the way of his film. But that day is far off, I don’t know when it will come. The day that happens this industry will be better than what Hollywood is today.

What about the star system which is strangling the industry?
What are all the industry leaders doing? How long can we sing and dance like puppets to the tunes of stars. Every producer very seriously says ‘something has to be done or we will perish’, but where is the man who can take the first step. How long can we go on working under all kinds of fear? It is high time we found solutions to the star system and all the other systems which are strangling us. Let’s all of us, producers, get together and take stock ourselves. We cannot make money by tying the bootlaces of boys who were walking the streets just the other day or working in hotels some time ago. Things are going wrong drastically. The only man who can change the system is the producer and I say again till the producer changes nothing can change.

How involved are you in the making of your projects?
As I told you earlier from the story idea to the script to every phase of filmmaking I would love to have a say, call it involvement if you mayt. I have to make good films under my banner. I demand quality, I need good people working around me, I need good music. If I don’t need anything good why should I make films? I can try any other business where there is lot of money, if I only need money. Money is not my only mission.

What kind of subjects would you like to make in the future?
My basic requirements are romance, emotions and fantastic music. I don’t like to see films which make you cry till you die. I am all for total-entertainment. The other day I saw a film called Astitva. It was a great film. It had all the brilliant performances. It was great work of a great director but there was not a spot of entertainment anywhere. No, let the film win all the awards in the world, but I will never make a film like that.

Why don’t you when you have reached such a stage in your career, both as an individual and as a company encourage youngsters by giving them breaks?
We are always open. We are always looking for good subjects, good directors, good, young, actors and actresses. We have tried all over and I think we have to try some other planet. Why doesn’t India have talent? Or why does all its talent lie hidden in faraway corners and not come forward? Till that happens how will we know where and how to get these newcomers?

What are the future projects Venus has in mind?
Venus is not going to stop at any stage. In fact, we are now going in for greater and bigger plans. We are planning to build a complete software TV studio where a TV filmmaker will get everything that he wants from start to finish. We, at Venus too, also have plans to go into television with software of our own, soon. We will go into software only when we have software of a very high quality, not the kind of software that is seen on TV day and night these days till they drive you mad, make you cases fit for the psychiatrist. But right now we are too busy with our films. We believe in doing the right things at the right time.

Your next film?
(Laughs) My company cannot plan one project at a time. We have seven projects ready. We have signed seven big directors to direct them. They are all busy working on various scripts. The day they are satisfied and we are satisfied we will go on making one film after another.

What is your one-line description of the industry in which you have spent so many years now?
There is no industry like this industry. Good, bad, mad, sad, crazy. All this industry needs is self-respect. The day every producer, every director, every star learns to respect himself/herself and the industry as a whole and every man working in films, for films, employed by filmmakers learn that this is not just a petty shop where you can go on cheating, play all kinds of games with the only intention of making money, money and more money, will be the day when the industry will be able to tell the world which generally looks down on it that this is an industry which deserves respect, demands it and must get it..

Ali Peter John