Mumbai, Nov 17, 2024, IANS

Mumbai, Nov 17 (IANS) Bollywood multi-hyphenate Karan Johar is over the moon with the re-release of his home production ‘Kal Ho Naa Ho’. On Sunday, the director-producer took to the Stories section of his Instagram, and shared the poster of the movie, as he expressed his gratitude to people’s interest in the movie even after 21 years of its release. He wrote on the picture, “So heartening to see full shows of our film 21 years later. Looking at people dancing and repeating dialogues of the film in cinemas is so gratifying”. ‘Kal Ho Naa Ho’ is celebrated as a milestone in Hindi cinema because of its urban approach of storytelling (the film was set in New York City and had an elegant urban upmarket styling) and more importantly its path-breaking melody driven music clubbed with Javed Akhtar’s lyrics. The film can very well be called a timeless piece of cinema owing to its music, styling, narrative and the dynamics of the characters. Interestingly, Preity Zinta was not the first choice for the role of Naina. Karan in fact, went with the film to Kareena Kapoor Khan, who had then just delivered a massive flop in the form of ‘Mujhse Dosti Karoge’ which was directed by Kunal Kohli. As per Karan’s book ‘An Unsuitable Boy’, Karan had specifically asked his father Yash Johar to stay out of the negotiation room so he could convince Kareena at a cost effective budget. But, Kareena was demanding the same money as SRK as she felt Advani again being an assistant director making directorial debut rides with greater risk similar to Kohli. Prior to this KJo and Kareena had worked together in ‘Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham’. The discussion around money ended in a deadlock and Karan, hurt by Kareena’s unreasonable demand, offered the film to Preity Zinta, and the rest is history. However, KJo and Kareena later buried their hatchets, and are known to be the BFFs in the fraternity.