Janhvi Kapoor and Sidharth Malhotra hit back at Chennai Express comparisons: ‘People are generalising, our characters are from different states’

In a country as diverse as India, it gets rather difficult to ensure an equal amount of representation of all identities. From time to time, Bollywood makes an attempt at this, but it often ends up creating a caricature of certain characters, and the 2013 film Chennai Express, starring Shah Rukh Khan and Deepika Padukone, was accused of doing just that. Now Bollywood is coming with another ‘North meets South’ story Param Sundari, starring Sidharth Malhotra and Janhvi Kapoor, and the actors have chosen to call out the people who think that the two films are similar in any way.

During an interview with Mirchi Plus, the stars were asked about how they felt being compared to a film like Chennai Express, and Janhvi quickly replied, “It’s a hit movie, and it is an iconic movie. But Deepika played a Tamilian in the film, which if you think about it is a generalisation happening from the people who are comparing the two films. I am from Kerala in the film, and not all people from the South can be grouped together. It’s a different milieu altogether, and it’s not like that this is a repetitive thing at all. 2 states was similar, but it came before Chennai Express, and these kinds of films aren’t being released every year. Anyways people aren’t comparing us to something that needs to be forgotten, Chennai Express was an iconic film, with iconic characters and actors.”

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Sidharth Malhotra doubled down on this and said, “We don’t mind the comparison at all, I think it is a compliment. I love that film, and I am a fan of Rohit Shetty films. People remember certain things due to the nostalgia factor that is connected to them, even though I don’t think that the two films are the same. Shah Rukh sir didn’t exactly play a guy from Delhi, and they were definitely not in Kerala, and Janvhi is playing a half Malayalam half Tamilian in the film, but it is definitely a compliment being compared to it.” He added that Param Sundari is more about bringing the rom-com genre back to Bollywood, and said that, “Films like Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, Hum Tum, and Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayege, are iconic, and we want to bring that back.”

Directed by Tushar Jalota, Param Sundari also stars Sanjay Kapoor, Manjot Singh, Aakash Dahiya, and Rajeev Khandelwal. It will hit the theatres on August 29.