Harris Jayaraj’s track proves unlucky for John Abraham

By Subhash K. Jha -

April 13, 2011 - 12:31 PM IST

This is a story that makes you superstitious all over again. A song has brought a big Bollywood blockbuster to its knees. And the producer seething in anger is Vipul Shah who has to repeatedly cancelled the recording and shooting of the song for one reason or another, man-made or otherwise.

What's with this Southern chartbuster 'Oeee Re' from the Tamil film Kaakha Kaakha that's proving to be such a stumbling-block for the Tamil film's Hindi version Force?

Harris Jayaraj’s track proves unlucky for John Abraham

To rewind a bit, Harris Jayaraj who had done the hit score for Vashu Bhagnani's Rehna Hai Terre Dil Mein ten years ago had kept away from Hindi films thereafter because of his numerous South Indian assignmentsâ€¦until Vipul Shah coaxed Jayaraj to return to Hindi cinema with Force.

Vipul decided to scrap the entire music score of Kaakha Kaakha by Jayaraj in favour of a completely new soundtrack in Force. So far so good.

But then John Abraham and Genelia D'Souza who play the lead in Force, fell in love with one of the Kaakha Kaakha tracks. 'Oeee Re', it was decided would remain in the remake. Javed Akhtar was given the task of re-writing the Tamil lyrics into Hindi. And the song was to be shot in Kutch this in February.

But a double calamity hit the filming of the song. Kutch was hit by freak rains and worse still Javed was not ready with the lyrics.

Jumping to Javed's and the song's defence, Vipul Shah says, "Its true Javed Saab's lyric was not ready when we were scheduled to shoot the song in Kutch. He's a Rajya Sabha member now and very busy. Then a natural calamity hit Kutch. So we decided to postpone the song to the end of the shooting."

Now that the shooting of Force is almost over, the beleaguered song is again in trouble. Apparently it can't be shot in Kutch any more!

Vipul admits, "It's too late to shoot in Kutch any more. If we put John and Genelia in that sun, they will turn into a different colour, due to pigmentation, than what they are. We've to find a different location, and fast. Also, Javed Saab has yet to write the lyrics. Once the Kutch schedule was aborted we decided to go easy on every aspect of the song."

But Vipul denies that the Eid release is jeopardized because of that one song. "No! We decided against releasing in Eid. Are we mad to release an action film against Salman Khan's Bodyguard? Nope. Eid is now reserved for Salman every year. We'll come with Force either in July, or September after Ramzan."

July now seems unlikely since the troublesome song's lyrics and location are yet to be decided.

Suggest that Vipul scrap the song and he protests, "No no. 'Oeee Re' has the potential to be our film's biggest USP. We all feel we need the number in the film."