Ram Gopal Varma calls Vivek Agnihotri an ‘unknown’ director; says The Kashmir Files is ‘the slowest film ever made’

The Kashmir Files had turned out to be one of the surprise hits Bollywood witnessed this year. Made on a budget that was reportedly less than Rs 30 crores, the film went on to become one of the highest grossing Bollywood films of the year. But despite the film’s box office success, the Vivek Agnihotri directorial found itself on the receiving end of criticism as well. Filmmaker Ram Gopal Varma recently opened up about his views of the film.

In conversation with Bollywood Hungama, RGV referred to The Kashmir Files as ‘the slowest film ever made’. “It goes against whatever we, as filmmakers, learnt what not to be made. There’s no screenplay, no first or second act, no interval and no climax”, he said.

The filmmaker recalled an incident where he discussed the film with his nephew, producer Madhu Mantena. The latter had called the film ‘fantastic’ and remarked that there was no wonder why it turned out to be such a big hit. In response, RGV had asked whether Mantena would have brought the film’s theatrical rights, if he saw it a week or two before its release, to which the producer replied ‘no’.

Varma went on to say that the film had been made by an ‘unknown’ director, whom Bollywood had never taken seriously. And despite having only one big star in the form of Anupam Kher, the film had gone on to do extremely well at the box office. He also remarked how he thought, in the last 20 years, no one would have gone to see a film more seriously than they have gone to see The Kashmir Files.

Starring Mithun Chakraborty, Anupam Kher, Darshan Kumar, and Pallavi Joshi in prominent roles, The Kashmir Files had been released in theatres on March 11. The film is available to stream on ZEE5.