EXCLUSIVE: Taran Adarsh on 4 Amitabh Bachchan films releasing in 4 weeks in 1978, “Never heard one negative word from someone on the other film”

Veteran film critic and trade analyst Taran Adarsh, in an exclusive interview with Bollywood Hungama, gave an interesting trivia related to Amitabh Bachchan. He was talking in the context of the negativity on social media during box office clashes between two big films – in this case Singham Again and Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3, which are slated to release on November 1.Taran said, “46 years ago, a film named Kasme Vaade releases. Amitabh Bachchan’s success was sky high at that time. The film also had Randhir Kapoor, Neetu Singh and Rakhee. Ramesh Behl, who is Goldie Behl’s father, had made this film. The next Friday a film called Besharam releases. It had Amitabh Bachchan, Sharmila Tagore and Deven Verma, the great character actor, was the director.”He added, “In the third week comes Yash Chopra’s multi-starrer, which had Sanjeev Kumar, Shashi Kapoor and Amitabh Bachchan, Trishul. It was written by Salim-Javed, who are also big superstars. So, Kasme Vaade, Besharam and Trishul all had Amitabh Bachchan. Wait, then on the fourth Friday releases Don. It has Amitabh Bachchan, Zeenat Aman, and (writers) Salim-Javed again and Chandra Barot was the director. On all four Fridays four Amitabh Bachchan’s films release, out of which Besharam performed average but the other three run for 50, 75 or 100 weeks.”Taran pointed out that despite this, there was no negativity back then. “Clashes used to happen,” he said. “I have never heard anyone from any of these films utter one negative word for the other film. There were also no fights on someone wanting one theatre and (saying things like) why you are releasing now. Even Amitabh Bachchan never put any pressure that his four films are releasing in four weeks, although he was number 1 to number 10.”He said that something like this is unthinkable today. “Can you imagine in today’s times that Shah Rukh Khan’s Pathaan releases this Friday, Jawan releases on the next Friday, Dunki releases on third Friday and in the fourth week maybe King releases? We can’t imagine but at that time it happened,” he said.Taran added that all this was accepted practice back then. “The industry had accepted that these films will come, and you won’t be able to avoid it,” he said. “There are more examples where they have clashed and there was no negativity, partly also because there was no social media in those days. The media used to write. There used to be media in those days, which was aggressive also. But there was no negativity.”Explaining the grim situation today, Taran said, “Today I see people celebrating (someone’s) failure instead of celebrating someone’s happiness. We form groups and clans. Like, I have to say bad things about this and good things about that. I have been noticing this for quite a few years. But you will have to live with social media.”Also Read: EXCLUSIVE: Taran Adarsh on big clashes like Singham Again and Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3, “Fan wars on social media spill over to the industry and distributors start fighting for screens”