Filmmaker Vivek Agnihotri has joined the growing list of film personalities who've announced their intention to adapt the mythological epic Mahabharat into a grand film. In an interview, he said that he has been working on a Mahabharat adaptation for years, and assumes that it will be the last film project of his career were it to be made, because he wouldn't be able to top it. Similar statements have previously been made by director SS Rajamouli, and actor Aamir Khan. Aamir, in fact, said that he is beginning work on his Mahabharat imminently. Agnihotri told Siddharth Kannan that he is open to collaborating with filmmaker Karan Johar on the project, provided their visions are in alignment. He also appeared to take a dig at Prabhas' epic bomb, Adipurush, and the upcoming Ramayana adaptation headlined by Ranbir Kapoor, when he said that such films cannot be mounted as 'commercial projects'. Much was written about Adipurush's estimated budget of Rs 700 crore, while Ramayana producer Namit Malhotra has gone on the record to say that his movie costs around Rs 4000 crore. Agnihotri said, "I've been working on several years on an adaptation of the Mahabharat, based on a book by SL Bhyrappa, called Parva. It's considered to be one of the greatest interpretations of the Mahabharat, out of thousands of interpretations. One of the most revered and respected interpretations. He asked me to make a movie on it, and I got the rights. My heart tells me that I should move away from politics. The thing is, you can't make stories based on the Ramayan and the Mahabharat as commercial projects. If you do, you'll get into trouble one way or another." Also read - ‘They don’t have aukaat to boycott Ranbir Kapoor’: Vivek Agnihotri says every filmmaker in Bollywood secretly badmouths stars, keeps paying them Rs 150 cr for ‘sadi acting’ He continued, "You don't need a grand scale. Bhakti doesn't have a budget. People will find God in a rock, and they'll view expensive temples as museums if they want to. I don't want my Mahabharat to be a 'film', with stars and a budget and everything that comes along with it. If it was a film for me, I would've made it already. It's a personal experience for me, and after this, I won't do anything else. That will be the last work of my life. I won't retire, but how can anybody ever top the Mahabharat?" Asked if he would ever want to collaborate with Karan Johar on a project, Agnihotri said, "Why not? If Karan offers to produce Mahabharat for me, why would I say no? If he needs a director who can do the job, and if I can get the production support that he can bring, why not? Of course, our visions would have to align." Agnihotri worked for several years as a director for hire, before pivoting away from commercial cinema and directing the incendiary film The Kashmir Files. It earned divisive reactions from inside and outside the film industry, with many accusing him of promoting hate speech and spreading propagandist ideas. He had attracted similar backlash, but to a far smaller degree, after directing The Kashmir Files. In the interview, Agnihotri predicted even bigger controversy around his new film, The Bengal Files, which is scheduled to be released on September 5.
