New Delhi: Director Vivek Agnihotri, who is gearing up for the release of his upcoming film ‘The Vaccine War’, claimed that no one from the industry is talking about his film on purpose. The film is touted as India’s first bio-science cinematic endeavour. It talks about the scientists pivotal in developing the indigenous BBV152 vaccine, commonly known as Covaxin.
In a conversation with Galatta Plus, the filmmaker claimed that money is being paid by people to not review the film. “When Buddha in a Traffic Jam came, at least 50-100 people reviewed it on YouTube. With The Tashkent Files, we had limited resources and could only release it in 175 theatres. These days, if you just write the name Jawan, at least 10,000 people will come and review it. People do so much YouTube-ing now. Yet, when such an important film like The Vaccine War is coming, and that too after I delivered a Rs 350-crore movie which also created a significant impact, nobody has reviewed it because money is being paid and there’s an embargo that nobody should utter our names,” he told Galatta Plus.
He also emphasised that he never makes films for money and despite many offers from studios to make a sequel of ‘The Kashmir Files’ but he doesn’t ‘want to fall into that trap.’
“I didn’t want to fall into that trap. After The Kashmir Files, every single studio was ready to give me Rs 200-300 crore and every star has called me privately expressing their desire to do The Delhi Files or The Kashmir Files Part 2 with me. Anybody in his right sense would make The Kashmir Files 2,” he said.
‘The Vaccine War’ is slated to release on September 28, 2023 and stars Nana Patekar, Pallavi Joshi, Anupam Kher, Sapthami Gowda, Raima Sen, Girja Oak, Nivedita Bhattacharya, Mohan Kapur and Vivek Prabhakar.