Manoj Bajpayee is the latest in a long line of industry folk to add his two cents about the controversy surrounding Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s most recent outing, Animal, starring Ranbir Kapoor. The film was criticised for its violent and misogynistic themes, and has caused much debate on the responsibility filmmakers have towards their audiences.
In an interview with Pinkvilla, Bajpayee said, “I am very clear if many people disagree or don’t like a film, what’s wrong with that? The film is released, does its business, and moves on. The money goes into the producer’s pocket; let them take it; they invested in the movie.”
He continued, “If you don’t want to watch it, then don’t. If you disagree with something, it’s better not to watch it, but don’t create trouble for the movie. You will be only encouraging a bad notion by doing so, what if others hinder your work in the same way? There should be open discourse without calls for bans or protests.”
Bajpayee’s last theatrical release Joram in fact clashed with Animal, as did Vicky Kaushal’s Sam Bahadur. Vanga’s project ended up becoming one of the highest-grossing films of 2023, with a worldwide gross of nearly Rs. 1000 crore. For his part, Bajpayee opened up about how the hype around Animal impacted his own film: “We couldn’t afford to spend that much money on our film because Joram was a different kind of a film and we could only allot a certain amount of money to promote and publicise it.”
The actor added, “We didn’t want to over-burden our film. We were very practical and realistic about it. We knew that we couldn’t be idealistic about the situation and our film. And that’s why the pressure on us was less in terms of earning profits as quickly as possible.”