Shahid Kapoor has come out and defended his character in Kabir Singh in an interview to Bollywood Hungama. Talking about the controversial film, which was panned by several critics and viewers alike for promoting toxic masculinity and misogyny, Kapoor said that, “That’s so hypocritical, when you see people in Hollywood do these things, “wow, wow, wow! so brave!”, somebody does it out here, “how dare you!” yeh kya hai? Have the same standard no?”
The actor also spoke about why he chose to not speak up earlier. “The reason I didn’t do any interviews before was because I felt everyone was very aggressive and I felt that was not healthy. I didn’t want to come out attacking anybody. I didn’t want to come out defending the film. I wanted to speak about a film like how a film should be spoke about - on merit, you can have healthy conversations. The beauty of art is that everyone can have a different point of view and that’s totally okay.”
“I waited so long because I didn’t want to defend the film, I didn’t want to use the fact that I’m a star to justify things, I really wanted to use this opportunity as an experiment... I wanted to see whether the film can brave this storm.”Shahid Kapoor
“We want you to feel that this is unacceptable, his behaviour has gone beyond control, I cannot like this guy, I don’t want to like this guy. That’s why the entire second half of the film is his fall. He is peeing in his pants in the interval of the film.”
Justifying Kabir Singh’s behaviour in the film, Shahid explains that Kabir Singh is both the antagonist and the protagonist in the film. “He is the guy who the film is about, he is the guy who is the problem. And actually Kabir has only one problem, there is nothing else wrong with Kabir. He has an anger management problem.”
While talking about the scene in which Kabir slaps his girlfriend Preeti, Shahid says, “So if Kabir hadn’t slapped Preeti, that one thing Kabir hadn’t done, would it be okay for everything else that he did? Because he slapped the girl, you feel that is unacceptable and therefore Kabir is an unacceptable character. We want you to feel that. We want you to feel that this is unacceptable, his behaviour has gone beyond control, I cannot like this guy, I don’t want to like this guy. That’s why the entire second half of the film is his fall. He is peeing in his pants in the interval of the film.”
Shahid also compares Kabir Singh’s character to that of Sanjay Dutt’s in the film Sanju. “Ek picture aayi thi Sanju, I loved the film. The character had all the same problems... that is the headspace of the character, that is where he was. You can choose to say I hate this guy.”
Talking about the reviews that were critical of the film, Shahid says that the film was baselessly attacked by film critics when it released . “I am totally okay if somebody sees the film and says, “I didn’t like the film, I don’t know why they made a film like this” but what people got upset about is when the same person said, “if you like this film na, you are a very bad person, how can you like this film” who are you to judge what somebody can like and not like and how do you know what their reasons for liking it are also.”
Shahid also said that the was overwhelmed by the response that the audience has given to Kabir Singh, which he believes is also an answer to the unjustified criticism by reviewers. “That is why for the first time in movies that I remember, the reviewers have been reviewed by the audience,” says Shahid in the interview.
(Source: Bollywood Hungama)
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