Project Report

He’s been in the news through the week and not for reasons he likes. So Abhinav Kashyap decided that the best way to quell rumours about his rather unpleasant fallout with Dabangg’s producer Arbaaz Khan and the film’s lead actor Salman Khan as well as speculations about his next film is to face the media and bare it all.

On Thursday,the filmmaker had a few important announcements to make. The first was about the launch of his production house,Movie Temple Productions,with partners Himanshu Mehra and Sanjeev Gupta. The second was the announcement of his next film with Viacom 18,currently titled Project 18 for the lack of a better title. “It’s not a love story or an action thriller — it’s a masala movie with all the trappings,including a toplining starcast,which we are yet to start looking for,” he clarifies.

Still in the process of writing the script,the writer-director says the story came to him during his travels post-Dabangg. The filmmaker has also moved the setting to urban. “I’ve explored the hinterland territory and I think I can do more than just that. So I am attempting something different this time. Whether it’s based in India or a foreign land is not yet decided,” he added.

Kashyap is also keen to put all controversies to rest. “It was when Arbaaz locked the dates for the Dabangg sequel that I finally made up my mind that I wanted to move away so as to not typecast myself. And there is no bad blood between us,” he asserts. Now that he has cleared the air,Kashyap wants to fully focus on his new film.