Join WhatsApp Channel
It was a 2-day junket to Goa, with the right ambience created with a lot of effort by the PR machinery of Parag Desai and team. A ‘Confidential Case File’ of Vijay Salgaonkar, the iconic family man of the Drishyam franchise, was given to media-persons at the time of checking into the Panjim Novotel on September 8 (along with a mini gunny-bag stuffed with thermocol balls that marked the room number and name of the journalist).
The evening saw a visit to the vintage Goa Police Headquarters in the city, a crucial locale where the Salgaonkar family was questioned ruthlessly. We next drove to Salgaonkar House, the vintage bungalow, where the family ‘stays.’ The next stop: Copita Bar and Café for a riverside dinner and drinks party, where some key paraphernalia connected to the story was also kept.
On September 9, there was an early morning hand-delivered ‘Summons’ in a beige envelope to attend the trailer launch of the film with the key unit members. Ajay Devgn, Shriya Saran, Tabu, Rajat Kapoor, new entrant Jaideep Ahlawat, producer-co-writer and director Abhishek Pathak, his co-producer-father Kumar Mangat Pathak, co-producers Alok Jain and Ajit Andhare were all present along with Mrunal Jadhav and co-writer Aamil Keeyan Khan. The film releases on October 2.
The media was then taken to Fisherman’s Wharf in Panjim, for a delicious lunch. A brief meet-and-greet (a term used nowadays for photographs taken turn by turn) with Ajay, Tabu and Abhishek Pathak followed.
Drishyam The Conclusion is the third and concluding part of one of Hindi cinema’s most-cherished family drama-cum-thriller franchises, wherein the story continues in its much-loved gray zone. As of now, most of the media and also some of the cast, continue to hope that a fourth part will happen somehow!
But Ajay stated, “It is always better to end on a high.” Unanimously, the cast stated that they would miss the family ambience they have enjoyed since 2014, when they all came together for the shoot of the first Drishyam, then for Drishyam 2 and now for this film. The warmth between the four Salgaonkar family members—Vijay (Ajay Devgn), wife Nandini (Shriya Saran), daughters Anju (Ishita Dutta, who was missed at the launch) and Anu (Mrunal Jadhav) with their reel opponents Meera (Tabu) and Mahesh Deshmukh (Rajat Kapoor) and the rest of the team was real.
Mrunal Jadhav also added that she had literally grown up with the film. “I was seven when the first film released,” said the teenager. Jaideep Ahlawat stressed that his character was new and he was not a replacement for Akshaye Khanna as stated by the media. He added that his career had come full circle now. His Hindi film career had begun with a small role in Aakrosh (2010) also produced by Kumar Mangat Pathak and starring Ajay.
Pathak senior told us that he was like family to the Devgans, in a 45-year association that had begun even before Ajay had become an actor. Ajay’s father, Veeru Devgan was an iconic stunt director and had later produced and directed the 1999 Hindustan Ki Kasam.
The franchise remains unique: Drishyam (2015) was a remake of the hit Malayalam thriller written and directed by Jeethu Joseph. It was directed in Hindi by the late Nishikant Kamat. With Drishyam 2, the original Malayalam movie was released during pandemic but the Hindi version saw substantial modifications in the plot curve by writer-director Abhishek Pathak. And this time, the film has nothing to with the recently-released Malayalam film, Drishyam 3!
At the Fisherman’s Wharf, I caught up with Abhishek Pathak to ask how the idea had come to him after he must have conceived several plots. Did it happen, like many such great concepts, during a casual activity like a walk? Smilingly, he revealed, “I first thought of the end, which had to be a shock and also justify Vijay Salgaonkar’s loyalty to family.” While writing (his father revealed that Abhishek would lock himself up in his room from 6 a.m. for this), how many times did he have to revisit the earlier films? “I have lost count!” he grinned.
When I asked Tabu (while our picture was being taken!) about how seamless it was working in this franchise as well as in the two films of the De De Pyaar De under different directors’ interpretation of the same character, she riposted, “Are you taking my interview? Then please come to my office!”
Will keep that in mind, ma’am.
