I copy from Hollywood, am not guilty about it: Baahubali director Rajamouli

Chennai: The atmosphere inside the Student Activity Center (SAC) auditorium in IIT-M was electrifying, justifying the presence of filmmaker S.S. Rajamouli, who has delivered the richest Indian movie ever made —Baahubali — with overwhelming success.

From reminiscing his memories at IIT-Madras when he accompanied his musician cousin to answering questions about his professional journey and what keeps him grounded, the director handled it all with ease.

However, the filmmaker deserved credit for the way he handled the question thrown around casually at Indian filmmakers. “Has any of the Hollywood movies you grew up watching ‘inspired’ any scenes or sequences in your films?” – a student threw the tricky question to the ace filmmaker.

Following moments of silence, S.S. Rajamouli said, “He is being very respectful. The actual question is Do you copy from Hollywood?” to a thunderous response from the crowd. “The answer is, Yes I do. That’s obvious and most of you know that,” he said adding that he however doesn’t copy from any of his contemporaries.

The Baahubali director had his reasoning for the same recalling days from his assistant director times when most of his fellow assistants didn’t speak English or watch English movies. “During the story sitting, if I narrate a scene from Hollywood movies, the others will be like, Hey, this guy has lot of creativity,” he recalled reiterating that since he grew up in such an atmosphere, it didn’t occur to him that he was doing something wrong.

“The movies were so much part of my life, my DNA that I felt it compulsory to recreate them. Then I started questioning myself and by reading various works came to the conclusion that Art itself is a copy and develops on your predecessor’s works,” Rajamouli said.

The only time I feel guilty is when an inspired scene turns out bad than the original, he concluded.