Happy Birthday K-Jo!

In 1998 one of the best love-stories of Indian Cinema came to the big-screen, Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, and it was all because of one of the most versatile, inspiring and entertaining guy in the Indian Film Industry and that is Karan Johar!

Those who are Karan Johar fans, typically like him because he brings a new flavor and style to cinema. It’s lavishing and rich and more importantly every girl or guy wants to have a Karan Johar love-story once in their lives!

One of my favorite qualities of Karan is he sticks with what he loves. Sure, not all of us live in a house like Yashvardhan Raichand in Kabhi Kushi Kabhi Gham, or attend a college like Rahul, Anjali and Tina in Kuch Kuch Hota Hai OR like Abhimanyu, Rohan and Shanaya in Student of The Year, but we all surely dream to live that lifestyles and Karan no doubt loves creating that image in our minds of an exaggerated lifestyle.

In addition to the posh lifestyles he has always tried something different. When Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna released, there was a lot of mixed reviews and if I am not mistaken, the audience felt it was not a “Karan Johar Family Film.” But he tried it and today people still love the romantic track, Tum Hi Dekho Na and Rani Mukerji’s beautiful saris and still dance to Rock ‘n Roll Soniye at dance parties! He also began producing films, like Dostana and he clarified it had nothing to do with the original Dostana from 1980 which his father had produced. This one was a bit different and took upon a subject which we typically do not see on the big-screen in Indian Cinema and they twisted it around and made it into a comedy. Again lot’s of mixed reviews, but we still dance to the famous, Desi Girl song at parties!

https://youtu.be/L4NnWA_oDIo

Karan has continued to produce films since Kal Ho Na Ho and has been quite successful at doing so. He has the knack of finding fresh-new directors on the block who have small story ideas and then Karan enhances them and helps to create magic on the big-screen.

In the last 6 years, Karan has made some very wise decisions, or at least I think so!

The first one was producing Wake Up Sid (2009), and bring on director and screenplay writer, Ayan Mukerji onto the Dharma team because four years after Wake Up Sid, Ayan created Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani!

The second amazing decision Karan made was teaming up with Phantom Films for Hasee Toh Phasee, Karan gets a reality check working with Director and producer Anurag Kashyap and understands how other directors create wonderful films in a small budget! They spent the most money in the film for the song, Punjabi Wedding Song! Of course after teaming up with Anurag, a year later Karan is starred in his film Bombay Velvet in a dark villainous role!

And the third wise decision Karan made was introducing Alia Bhatt, Siddarth Malhotra and Varun Dhawan to the big-screen in Student of The Year! These actors have flourished the screens since they starred in his film and have immensely improved as they release another film. He is a wonderful mentor and I would say father figure to these wonderful actors. It shows on-screen and off-screen. I personally realized this when Alia Accepted her Filmfare Award this past year for the film Highway – Critics Award for Best Actress.