Bhaag Milkha Bhaag opens Indo-German Film Festival

Milkha Singh’s biopic continues to run. And how! Having proven itself a long-distance runner in India in spite of its inordinate running-time of nearly 3 hours, Bhaag Milkha Bhaag (BMB) is now on the way to being in the inaugural film at the Indo-German film festival in Berlin. Speaking in transit from Zurich the film’s director Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra says, “I am on my way to Berlin. Bhaag Milkha Bhaag opens the Indo-German Film Festival. So the film’s journey continues.” For international audiences Rakeysh has prepared a shorter 2-hour version of BMB which he refers to as the “world version.” He saw the need to prune down the material in order to reach out to a wider audience. “It’s easy to get self-indulgent and say, ‘I can’t remove a single shot from what I’ve already edited.’ But my wife Bharathi (who edits all of Mehra’s films) and I had to be ruthless. It’s important to let the film reach as many corners of the globe and as many hearts as possible. For that I’ve sacrificed some footage. The larger picture is far more important than my creative integrity.” About BMB’s confident march ahead Rakeysh says, “The film is no longer mine or Farhan’s. It belongs to the world. It now runs in non-traditional global areas where Hindi cinema is synonymous with the Bollywood formula. BMB is Bollywood. It has songs and dancing. But it’s still not what audiences in the West expect from Indian cinema.” Farhan Akhtar was also supposed to join Rakeysh in Berlin. But he was unable to get away from the promotion of his new film Shaadi Ke Side Effects.