DEEWANE
Harry has a passion in his madness

The first time I met Harry Baweja he was an assistant to director B Subhash (Disco Dancer was the turning point in his life, in the life of Mithun Chakraborty and a new formula of entertainment was found). Subhash kept making films and Harry was his constant assistant. He was already a class apart from all the other assistants. He was restless, raring to go all the time, serious to learn more and more about the business of entertainment. Harry was a man in a hurry to reach a goal he had marked for himself — to direct his own films. And whoever knew him, observed him at work, doing much more than an assistant was supposed to do, was sure the young man would go far, would not wait in the wings for his time to come but grab the opportunity the moment it came anywhere near him, the kind of opportunity that comes and inspires an assistant to make it as a filmmaker who mattered.

The opportunity came for Harry in a hurry. It was big, it was tempting, it was challenging, just the things he wanted to have in his first film. He made Trinetra with Mithun and Dharmendra in a special appearance — Dharmendra playing Mithun’s father for the first and only time. The film had class, it had style, it had something different from most films, a class film for the masses but there was that mysterious element which haunted it. It was something another Harry or anyone close couldn’t explain. The film didn’t do as well as it should have but it was a major lesson in Harry’s life. He realised his mistakes and he knew he had to hurry up making up for those mistakes. He couldn’t repeat them, he just couldn’t. He then directed Imtihaan for an outside producer. He was good, a man and a craftsman who knew his job, knew it well. Harry was a gentleman too — the right combination. Harry Baweja the director today is a major force to reckon with — young, daring, to take some bold steps, determined to fulfil them, show the world new ways.

It was time to look ahead, to grow, to go on, not to look back. He started Dilwale his own film with Ajay Devgan and Sunil Shetty and made people wonder what he was upto. He showed them just what he was upto when Dilwale went on to celebrate its golden jubilee at several centres on merit only. Harry was a master, accepted as a master even by those who once scoffed at him as an Angrez digdarshak. He then made Diljala with Ajay Devgan again and the two made a very good team, they realised. They tried their best to know what the people wanted and gave them more than which they deserved.

Entertainment was an essential commodity, they knew. They realised both its value and its madness. They decided to make meaningful entertaining films as long as they could.

The two came together again with the same fire in Deewane (Harry seems to have developed a liking for the alphabet D) to make “another very special, very different and more than just challenging film. I have always believed in a good script as the foundation of even a reasonably good film. But then I felt, I believed that I was making a very special, very ambitious film. So I went deep into the writing of my script. I have followed my interest with a passion I have never felt before and with the encouragement I’ve never experienced in all my career as a filmmaker before. I know these are very strange times. I know some of the biggest and best films and some of the most glorified stars are being rejected by the people who suddenly seem to have seen through the games filmmakers are playing. This far and no further, the people have made it clear. No more fooling around. I know I have to be very careful. I know that I and my work are being watched very carefully. One slip and they’ll be ready to push me down the slopes which reach nowhere.

I am taking all the care. I have no other way. Have I? My artistes, Ajay, Urmila Matondkar, Mahima and the others and anyone close to the last man working with me are also going out of their way to give me a good product. I owe a good film to my people who have given me an ordinary theatre actor from Punjab the guts to visualise great dreams and fulfil them. I promise not to let them down. My subject, I assure you, is something that no other filmmaker has tried before. It’s not a boast. It’s the truth as I know it. My creative team, the technicians have also seen something in which I have been trying for the first time and, thank God, the results have turned out to be excellent till now, I have always put my whole life and by example, tried my best to instill the same fire in my team. That’s the only way I know how to work and get work done.”

Harry is also directing Meri Biwi Ki Shaadi for Prakash Mehra. Rekha is the leading lady, “the only actress I always wanted to work with.” I have never seen dreams get fulfilled so soon. He knows he has the ability to make two good films at a time. That’s why he’s doing them without doing any harm to any of them.

Harry also has the ideal producer in Paramjeet Baweja in Dilwale, a producer who has felt the fire in her director. He has Manish-Darshan, the sons of music director Shravan (they also have never in their blood. Harry’s madness has to succeed, he knows. He cannot let his madness harm anyone, no one who has put all their trust in his madness magnificent.

Ali Peter John