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Recently it was revealed that the decision around promo unveiling of Heroine along with Rowdy Rathore was reversed at the last minute. The reason stated was an apparent conflict between Madhur Bhandarkar and the film’s producers (UTV) over its hard hitting content (read: smoking and drinking scenes featuring Kareena Kapoor). However as has turned out, this is hardly the case and the real reason is something far beyond that.
“‘Heroine’ does chronicle the life and times of a Bollywood leading lady who goes through a turbulent journey and hence it is but obvious that it would have Kareena in a smoking and drinking avatar. In fact neither Madhur nor UTV want to hide that fact. They were okay with the promo as well, more so since it was brilliantly cut. However they foresaw problems from the Censor board for this. They didn’t want to get into a situation where Censors directed the promo of ‘Heroine’ to be played only with ‘adults only’ films”, informs an insider.
That would have been troublesome for Heroine because not only would it failed to reach out to the maximum audience base, it would also have had to wait for a film that came with an ‘A’ certificate.
“Summer releases are mostly family entertainers and hence there are hardly any ‘A’ certified films releasing”, the insider continues, “‘Rowdy Rathore’, ‘Shanghai‘, ‘Ferrari Ki Sawaari‘ and ‘Teri Meri Kahaani‘ are some of the notable films releasing in June and each of them is expected to be a ‘U’ or ‘U/A’ certified film. Even with a ready promo, where would ‘Heroine’ have fitted in?”
This is when there was a call taken pronto between Madhur, his creative team and the production house representatives and the strategy was revised. It was mutually decided that the promo wouldn’t have any adult element to it so that it could find an easy way into the theatres. Now work is in progress to make it suitable to be screened along with a ‘U’ or ‘U/A’ certified film.
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