Force-ing John Abraham to love on screen

Director Nishikant Kamat, who has given acclaimed films like Dombivali Fast and Mumbai Meri Jaan, is a busy man these days.

The filmmaker has his hands full with his forthcoming film Force, starring John Abraham and Genelia D'Souza. It is a remake of Tamil hit Kaakha Kaakha, starring Surya and Jyothika.

He is also making his acting debut with Prawaal Raman's forthcoming film 404. 

Force is a love story that revolves around an upright cop (Abraham), and how his life changes upon a chance encounter with a woman. John, as we can see, has bulked up for this role.

The director, who also made the Tamil remake of Dombivali Fast titled Evano Oruva, feels that his knowledge of both the industries and their different sensibilities has helped him in making Force. "I adapted to the mainstream Bollywood sensibilities but I stuck to the original story," he says.

Nishikant is quite gung-ho about his leading man and says, "John is a fabulous person and we had a ball shooting for the film. He is a very hardworking guy and a nice human being."

While his earlier films dealt with socially-relevant films, Force is an action-cum-romantic film. When asked about the reason behind this departure, Nishikant says, "I am not on any mission to make films only on social issues. I feel a filmmaker is an artist, just like a painter or a musician. Now I want to make song-and-dance films, love stories et all."

Force is complete and will release on August or September.

Taking about his acting debut, many people would be unaware that he has acted before in a Marathi film called Saatchya Aat Ghraat  back in 2004. Darna Mana Hai director Prawaal Raman saw his performance and signed him on for 404.

What started out as a small part for the filmmaker soon turned into a well fleshed out central character. 

Talking about his role in 404, Nishikant says, "I wasn't sure that I could pull it off. Prawaal convinced me because it is a very complicated character to play."

The film also stars Imaad Shah, Tisca Chopra and Satish Kaushik.

"It was difficult for me to act in the beginning because when I first read the script, I would think of how it would be captured but that was just the initial hitch that I took care of in the very first week. I made a conscious decision not think like a director. I did not want to hinder the process of the director," he says candidly.

Acting involves a lot of preparation even before the camera starts rolling, even more so for first-timers. Recounting his own experience, Nishikant says, "Rajvir (Arora, co-star) and I mugged the lines even before the film went on the floor. We used to rehearse a lot together since we had a lot of scenes. Mostly we did everything instinctively but my lines were well rehearsed."

Talking about future projects, Nishikant says, "I would love to do a Marathi film and I may start one next year. It will take about a year to write the script', he signs off.