Though director Rahi Anil Barve's Tumbbad had garnered enough critical acclaim at the time of its release, it was the film's re-release business that proved to be extraordinary, ensuring a significant number of eyeballs for actor-producer Sohum Shah's upcoming film Crazxy, directed by newcomer Girish Kohli.
Shah, who produced Crazxy jointly with Adesh Prasad and Ankit Jain, Shah said in an interview with PTI that Crazxy has nothing to do with Tumbbad but promised it will offer the novelty factor that the 2018 horror thriller did.
"I want to say one thing: this is notTumbbad. Tumbbad was a period film with a classical structure and story of three generations, and Crazxy is the story of one day. There is no similarity between the two," he clarified.
At the film's trailer launch event, Shah said he brings Crazxy with the promise that those who see the film will leave with the feeling that it was "something they've never experienced before."
Shah says he is the kind of actor and producer who doesn't prefer making formulaic or "routine" films while adding that fans of Tumbbad can expect a different experience from the sequel, too.
Shah also shared his two cents on the current state of the movie business. He didn't sound very optimistic. Despite the quality ofTumbbad, Shah recalled experiencing difficulties while looking to fund his next film, referring to Crazxy. After a six-year struggle to find anyone to back his vision, Shah says the situation forced him to become a producer again.
"After Tumbbad, you would think every producer or studio will give you money. But I struggled a lot with Crazxy. I went to a lot of production houses. Girish brought the script to us in 2019. We decided in 2019 that we would make this film. But after that, COVID happened. No one else was making it. So, I had to make it. I didn't have the resources. It took me six years," he said.
Shah chalks up the failure of films in today's box office to the removal of the producer from the ecosystem, observing that the producer's job has become the same as that of a line producer. He feels that since everyone has started collaborating with corporates, "the director's film has become the production house's (film)."
Crazxy will hit theatres on February 28.
