Firoz Nadiadwala’s ‘Fool N Final’ is inspired from Guy Ritchie’s Snatch. Director Ahmed Khan adds he was also inspired by Transporter and U-Turn

By IndiaFM News Bureau -

May 7, 2007 - 12:00 AM IST

Phir Hera Pheri directed by Neeraj Vora was a huge success last year but not many are aware that the film wasnt an original script. The Firoz Nadiadwala film was inspired from an English film Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels directed by Guy Ritchie. Not only was the basic theme of Phir Hera Pheri derived from Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels but the last scene of Phir Hera Pheri where the film abruptly ends when the frame freezes with Akshay Kumar hanging from a bridge is a direct rip-off from the English flick.

And seems like Firoz Nadiadwala has a huge fascination for Guy Ritchie films or perhaps his personal DVD collection is stacked with the English directors films. Thats because his next multi-starrer film Fool N Final again seeks inspiration from a Guy Ritchie film. This time Firoz has derived from Guy Ritchies Snatch starring Brad Pitt and Jason Statham which was his immediate release after Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. Interestingly Fool N Final too is Nadiadwalas immediate release after Phir Hera Pheri.

Director Ahmed Khan is honest enough to accept the source of his inspiration. I have been a very big fan of Guy Richie, Oliver Stone and Robert Rodriguez. So when we were writing this film, Snatch was there behind our minds. However I wont say its a copy. In fact why just Snatch, I would say I am even inspired by Transporter and U-Turn. But its just an inspired idea.

Fool N Final is written by Neeraj Vora who had written-directed Phir Hera Pheri. In fact the script was started by none other than Anurag Kashyap. The first draft was written by Anurag and then I needed to commercialize the film with some comic fill. So we roped in Neeraj. But it was Abbas Hirapurwala and Umesh Shukla who finally completed the screenplay. They spiked the ideas of dialogues and gags and thats how the film was made, explains Ahmed about the writers of this madcap comedy.

So Fool N Final is a multi-starrer not only in terms of its cast but also in terms of its screenwriters. One wonders why the film needed so many writers. This film deals with a multiple track storyline. It has three screenplays running simultaneously at the same time but they are not individual or different from each other. They are all weaved into one story, explains the director.

But Ahmed Khan goes a step ahead in deriving from the original source. Even the tagline for his film is directly lifted from Snatch which reads as Stealin Stones and Breakin Bones. The film is about a big diamond robbery. A diamond is robbed from India which is transit to London but via Dubai. Ahmed Khan justifies even this. I loved that tagline and so did Firoz. So instead of using a tagline like Fool N Final the game begins or the game ends or some crap like that we thought wed rather put on what we like. Theres no harm in showing people what we like.

So what next Firoz? Going by the chronology of your inspirations from Guy Ritchie films, could we next expect a remake of the Madonna starrer Swept Away? Only this time the original was a big disaster when it released in 2002.