Sanjay Dutt Turns Producer, Wants To Bring Heroism Back To Bollywood

Mumbai: Inspired by the pan-Indian box office success of South Indian films ‘Pushpa’ and ‘Baahubali,’ Bollywood actor Sanjay Dutt is launching his production company ‘Three Dimension Motion Pictures,’  with a view to bringing back the golden age of heroism to the Hindi film industry.

“We’re trying to get back what we had, what the South Indian films are doing now,” Dutt told variety.com.

“When we entered the film industry, we started off with the heroism, the heroic roles, the mass love and everything, and I just saw that stopping. And I am trying to revive that.”

The era where leading men of mainstream Indian cinema were written as a complete heroic package has reduced to a niche, or a “little gap,” says Dutt.

“What Denzel Washington and Kevin Costner and Mel Gibson are doing in Hollywood, I think that little gap is missing here. I’m trying to get that gap back, of a hero of that age, who can perform and who can fight and who can stand for his rights,” the actor was quoted as saying.

“The golden age – it just can’t die. Even if you look at Hollywood, it exists there, and in the South. I don’t know what happened to Bollywood. But that’s what we’re trying to get back – those days of heroism,” he added.

Three Dimension is working on a horror-comedy ‘The Virgin Tree’, to be directed by Sidhaant Sachdev, who has TV, music video and assisting experience and will make his feature debut, with a cast of four newcomers.

There will also be a family drama, some action films with younger actors and some more action films with a mature man as the hero. “I will be starring in not all of them, but some of them,” Dutt told variety.com.

“I would like to relax as the producer, after 40 years of being in the industry – be on the sets on the other side of it. That will be an experience for me, I’ve never been in that chair before. I’m looking forward to that.”

The films are all meant for theatrical release. “I believe in the big screen – I know it can never die down. “I know that OTT (streaming) is an important part of filmmaking today. But I know eventually theaters will open up and there will be some films only made for theatres,” Dutt was quoted as saying.

According to the actor, the blame for vanished Bollywood heroism rests on the suits.

“I feel that this whole corporate structure coming and encroaching our space in Bollywood ruined everything.

“Because, those guys sitting on the table and who are giving the money, have got no right to interfere with the director for his creation, or with the actors or give their thought to content or a script, when [they] don’t have any idea about it, when it’s not their business,” the actor said.

“Their business is funding and that’s where the business ends. But once you start interfering in the script and in the direction and in the budgets and this and that, then things go haywire, and that’s why I think we lost out on a lot of good stuff during that time,” Dutt adds.

“Whereas in the South, this corporate structure does not exist. From the producer, to the director, to everybody involved in the teama they’re passionate about making good films and that is the thing which has worked for them.”

“And that has gone against us because that passion of making movies or that passion of making something great and working and performing is gone. Which I think will come back. At least in my company, it will come back.”