Copy Cat Atlee gets SRK nod

 

Copy Cat Atlee tops SRK list of four films that he has selected after rejecting 20 scripts. This time, like all previous times, Atlee claims it is not a copy but an original with SRK playing a RAW agent. After the washout of Zero, Shah Rukh Khan took a break. Now the word is that Karan Johar’s Dharma  production and Red Chilies’ is to produce the film and almost all the pre-production work on the subject is over. During the promotion of Atlee’s last film Bigil, his fellow director Harish Shankar let the cat out of the bag confirming his next with SRK. In reply, Atlee smiled which confirmed that he was indeed collaborating with SRK.

The director himself posted pixs of himself and his wife with SRK. Atlee said that he always takes his wife along when he narrates a story to an actor. The news that SRK has put the signature on four projects which are Aditya Chopra produced Pathan, Siddharth Anand's action film and Rajkumar Hirani's social comedy film , one with Raj and DK  apart from Atlee’s.

Right from his first film Raja Rani onwards, Atlee has been facing the copycat charge. The film was a revisit of Mani Rathinam’s Mouna Ragam. Atlee asked about Mounam Ragam, he replied “ A film with same theme ? Got to see it”. It is either a rehash of an earlier hit or `inspired’ by a Hollywood film. This has been the case with all his four films- Raja Rani in 2013, Theri (2016), Mersal (2017) and Bigil (2019), all featuring superstar Vijay.  It came to a stage that Vijay had to tell the director to hone in on other actors and not just bank on him.

From Mersal onwards, Atlee became a producer’s nightmare.  T Siva who is a leading producer had stated “I have heard that Mersal has suffered a loss of Rs 60 crore. All the issues are over. The actor got his money. The director who received Rs 3 crore in the last film has now got Rs 13 crore. Generally, if a director gets Rs 3 crore, he should get Rs 5 crore in the next film. How did he get Rs 13 crore? There should be some reason for the expenses spent on a film.” Bigil, directed by Atlee was Thalapathy Vijay's only release in 2019. ... Now, eight months after the movie's release, some online portals claimed that Bigil was actually a flop at the box-office, and AGS entertainment incurred a loss of more than 20 crores for making this film. AGS Productions Archana Kalpathi, claimed that Bigil's budget was exceeded due to the use of graphic scenes in football match scenes. These reports also added that the producer said release of the film was delayed due to budget constraints, and it had also caused several issues within the team.

To douse fire and appease Vijay fans, Archana denied having said anything like that. As T Siva says “A producer cannot go and talk about these issues to a star. Especially, with a mass actor like Vijay. If I do so, then misunderstandings and the call-sheet problems might arise.” Hope Karan Johar does not get embroiled in a skirmish with Atlee and be accused of anti- Tamil.