A shower of success
RANA SIDDIQUI
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Bipasha Basu is back on the silver screen after a gap with "Barsaat" and other interesting projects.
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I don't mind if the director says my womanly charm is utilised in this film to lure the audiences. This is my USP Bipasha
NOT ONLY GLAMOUR Bipasha Basu is picking and choosing films to showcase both her talent and charm. PHOTOs: R.V. MOORTHY
Some three years ago Bipasha Basu was one of the judges at the Miss India contest. She opted for Priyanka Chopra, then an emerging model.
And now Priyanka shares the screen space with her, that too as a "leading lady" (as producer Suneel Darshan declares) in "Barsaat", releasing this Friday. Bipasha is `the other woman' for Priyanka's screen husband Bobby Deol.
Though neither tires of praising the other for conviction, hard work, forthright attitude and honesty, many observers declare they can make out the subtle tension between the two.
At a press conference at The Park hotel in New Delhi for the promotion of the film, the arrival of the two ladies at different times, and Bipasha leaving the venue just before Priyanka's appearance, had many assuming it was strategic planning to help both take advantage of undivided media attention.
But then that hardly takes away from Bipasha's charm and Priyanaka's grace. Darshan declares that the former is "breathtakingly beautiful" in the film.
And the inclusion of rain, both as the metaphor for joy and sorrow and to encash Bipasha's magnetic sex appeal is one reason to watch the film, in which the emphasis on family values and women's strength come as bonus.
"I don't mind if the producer/director says my womanly charm is utilised in this film to lure the audience. That doesn't hurt my feelings. I know that my sex appeal is my USP and there is no harm in highlighting that. It is a love story against the background of family values.
And so there is a romance on screen, but those romantic shots don't qualify as stereotypical sexy scenes. Since I play a modern girl born and brought up in South Africa, there is a lot of stylisation, which is required to portray my kind of character," defends Bipasha.
And she cares not for the Mallika Sherawats and Neha Dhupias stealing the limelight too often by snatching what she guards as her USP.
"People are intelligent enough. They know that I don't make an extra effort to look appealing. It's there in me, naturally. So I never feel insecure by the arrival of anyone who superficially projects an image. I have already carved out a niche for myself as an actress too. People do notice that the glamour roles that I do have lots of acting to do.
They are not just about looking great. The youth find me irresistible and they identify with me. My style statements become a fashion trend.
And at the same time I am appreciated as an actor," declares the actress, who has earned fame for her spontaneous responses and lack of airs.
Speaking about "Barsaat", she tries to draw attention towards her "two shades" in the same character, drastically different in approach and hence with lots for her to do as an artiste. "Priyanka's role is more sensitive.
Though mine is more of a bubbly girl who is full of life. I am not a spoilt girl in the film despite my Westernised leanings.
Throughout the first half of the film, I am projected as a happy-go-lucky girl who falls in love with Bobby Deol.
But in the second half, I am made to realise how it is to love a married man and snatch someone's husband. My role graph changes and it gives me lots of shades to play."
And about her chemistry with Priyanka? She chuckles, "We had a rocking chemistry on screen which also grew fabulously off sets. It is good to see a woman coming from nowhere making her mark in the film industry in such a short span of time."
Bipasha does regret some projects not working in her favour because of the lack of publicity. "There were some good films in which my involvement as an actor was more than as a glamour girl. Those films just came and went as the at the production level, there had been no promotion. It still hurts. It only makes me feel drained out and wasted," she laments.
The film "Madhoshi" was one such, in which she played a schizophrenic patient.
Comedy now
But she isn't the one who would "sit and cry over spilt milk", so for a change and to experience her own range of acting, she has tried her hand at comedy films.
"No Entry" she says, is one such "laugh riot" and also "Hera Pheri Part - II".
"Initially it was very difficult for me to open up in comedy films. It took me two days to settle down and prepare myself for that comfort level required not to look unnatural. But things fell in place when my directors and co-actors helped me."
She also has in her kitty Raj Kunwar's romantic comedy "Jawani Deewani" opposite Vivek Oberoi, "Humko Deewana Kar Gayi", "Dhoom- II" and an untitled film, "a realistic social drama on the educated but misguided youth" in which she plays an "American student who is the conscience keeper of her protagonist boyfriend".
But that's not the end. Rituparno Ghosh has found his protagonist in Bipasha for his next Bengali film.
"The talks still have to be finalised but I have agreed to the project," she informs us.
Did anyone say that forbidden things have a secret charm?
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