New Delhi: Karan Johar, in a recent roundtable discussion, showered praise on Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s ‘Animal.’ Labelling the Ranbir Kapoor-starrer as ‘the best film of the year,’ he shared watching it twice. Karan also said that it took courage to make such a statement, considering the fear of judgment.
Karan Johar attended the Galatta Plus Mega Pan India Roundtable 2023, alongside Sandeep Reddy Vanga. Seated right in front of him, the director praised ‘Animal,’ dubbing it the ‘top film’ of 2023.
“People have come up to me after I spoke about how much I loved ‘Animal’, and said, ‘You have made ‘Rocky Aur Rani…’, that’s the vaccination for a film like ‘Animal’. It’s the opposite extreme.’ I said that I could not disagree with you more, because ‘Animal’ to me is the best film of the year. It took me a while to reach this statement and a lot of courage because when you are around people, you fear judgement. Like during the time of ‘Kabir Singh’, which I also loved… I was like I am going to say this and I am going to get dirty looks from certain people but I don’t care anymore,” Johar said.
“I loved ‘Animal’ for its front-footed, absolutely conviction-based narrative storytelling, breaking grammar, breaking myths, breaking everything that you think conforms to mainstream cinema. Suddenly you have an interval block where the hero is getting bashed up and everyone’s singing a song… I am like, ‘Where have you seen a sequence like this?’ It’s genius,” Johar added.
Dismissing the discourse on the film’s portrayal of misogyny, Karan Johar concluded, “You can debate about it, you can debate the politics, the scenes, but I am aroused and engaged by the cinema of this film. You get into the nitty-gritty of every film, and you can find flaws and red flags, but for me, the biggest green flag is the talent of this man who has conceptualised this film. I have seen so many good films this year, but the only film which taught me something was this film.”
Ranbir starrer “Animal” shows a toxic relationship between a father and son, where the son seeks revenge after an assassination attempt on his father. The cast features Ranbir Kapoor, Anil Kapoor, Bobby Deol, Triptii Dimri, and Rashmika Mandanna in key roles.