Edited By: Yatamanyu Narain
Last Updated: February 27, 2023, 20:31 IST
Ayan Mukerji receives News 18 Showsha Best Director Popular Choice Award from Anil Kapoor.
Ayan Mukerji won the prestigious News18 Showsha Reel Award for Brahmastra Part One: Shiva under the Best Director Popular Choice category.
Ayan Mukerji’s Brahmastra Part One: Shiva was one of the few films from last year that managed to break through the box office ceiling owing to its chartbuster music, memorable performances by Alia Bhatt, Ranbir Kapoor and Amitabh Bachchan and most importantly, it’s direction. While Ayan Mukerji ventured into uncharted waters with the fantasy-adventure flick, it was successful enough to fetch him the prestigious News18 Showsha Reel Award that took place on Saturday.
The Yeh Jawani Hai Deewani filmmaker won the Best Director (Popular Choice) while competing with Rohit Shetty for Sooryavanshi, Sanjay Leela Bhansali for Gangubai Kathiawadi, Kabir Khan for 83, Vivek Ranjan Agnihotri for The Kashmir Files and Jasmeet K Reen for Darlings. The viewers voted for Ayan Mukerji as the victor among all the other nominees.
The award was handed to the visionary director by Anil Kapoor, who applauded him for his relentless hard work and patience. In his acceptance speech, Ayan Mukerji shared, “I worked on Brahmastra for seven years and additionally it took me two years to write it. Thank You Anil sir for giving me this award and speaking so nicely about my film. To be honest, in the time after Brahmastra released, I really didn’t think we would win many awards for it. But winning an award always feels nice. So thank you for this popular category, everybody who voted, News18. I must thank everybody, our actors, our producers, Karan is sitting here, our entire crew who survived with me on Brahmastra. It was the most challenging thing I think I will ever do in my life.”
He further added, “Thank you to all of them for just having lasted with us on the film. We had put in a lot of love to make the film. We got a lot of love back. But we got a lot of learning back as well as the film came out. And I hope we are able to take all that learning and create something much bigger and better in Brahmastra 2.”
Released in September last year, Brahmastra was the first time that Ranbir Kapoor and Alia Bhatt shared the screen. The Ayan Mukerji directorial also starred Amitabh Bachchan, Nagarjuna and Mouni Roy in key roles. Shah Rukh Khan also made a special appearance in the film. The film earned close to Rs 400 crores at the box office worldwide.
Meanwhile, fans are now excited about the sequel of the film. Following the film’s release, in an exclusive interview with News18 Showsha, Ayan talked about Bhramastra- Part Two: Dev and shared that he plans to release the film in three years. “The basic storyline of part two and part three has always been in place. The entire concentration so far was on Brahmastra – Part One: Shiva as that was the foundation film in the trilogy. Our goal is to make the film in a much shorter period. The idea is to come out with the film in three years,” he said.
