Arts / Entertainment

Dough doesn’t translate into a good film: Abraham

July 13, 2013

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Actor-producer John Abraham feels all Rs 100 crore club films are not great. After the critical and commercial success of ‘Vicky Donor’, the actor’s production house JA Entertainment and Rising Sun Films have teamed up once again for ‘Madras Cafe’. “This is a serious film. We believe in making quality films. I don’t know how much crores the film would make. I feel all Rs 100 crore films are not the greatest movies,” John told reporters at the trailer launch of ‘Madras Cafe’. A spy thriller, the film is a story based on the political relations between India and Sri Lanka and it releases on August 23. The other two big films releasing next month include – ‘Chennai Express’ (on August 8 -Eid) and ‘Once Upon A Time in Mumbaai Dobara’ (August 15). “Holidays do get you a good opening but at the end of the day, the content, quality of the film will speak. We are confident about our film and its release date. We wanted a clear open window and we have got that. It is a clutter breaker film, it is a very special project… we have spent six-seven years on it,” John said. “We want to make entertaining films with strong content. We want to make quality films,” he said. There were reports that the film has a reference to Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination and also deals with the LTTE’s activities in Sri Lanka. “The film has no such depictions. The backdrop of the film is India-Sri Lanka and after that the entire story is fictional. It is a realistic film. I’m satisfied with the final cut,” director Shoojit Sircar said. The film was initially titled as ‘Jaffna’, but the makers finally settled for ‘Madras Cafe’, as it is relevant to the plot of the film. A strategic meeting happens at this place, Shoojit said. The film also stars Nargis Fakhri as a war journalist. “I am happy to be part of this film. It was great working with John and Shoojit. For my role of a journalist I researched a lot, I saw lot of things online, how they report and work, their body language etc. I got scared to shoot intense scenes,” Nargis said. John praised Nargis for her work in the film and said she will make everyone proud.