Currently Sanjay Dutt is busy shooting what Apoorva Lakhia’s “realistic action” for Shoot-out at Lokhandwala on five replica buildings representing the Lokhandwala buildings where the actual eight -hour shoot-out between the hit-men and the cops had happened. Earlier producer Sanjay Gupta had planned to shoot the prolonged climatic shoot-out for the film on actual location in the building called Swati where the actual action had unfolded. Says Lakhia, “We were going to shoot in the actual building. But practical considerations prevented us from going realistic to that extent. For one the entire building’s rhythm and routine would have been disrupted. When the building’s committee got to know of our plans which included gun firing and exploding bombs they freaked out. My producer thought it better that we come clean about our plans.” Now Lakhia is both saddened and relieved by this climactic sham that had to be brought into his docu-thriller. “You know, the crowds that would’ve gathered at the authentic location to gawk would’ve served our purposes fine since those crowds would’ve seemed like the actual crowds that gathered when the shoot-out happened in 1992. Now what we’ve done is to replicate the crowds plus every detail from the actual location in Lokhandwala.” Lakhia is shooting on different days with different sets of actors. “In real life the shoot-out happened for eight hours. We’ve to shoot it in chunks until the final day when the entire cast will shoot together.”
“The shootout lasted for eight hours” – Apoorva Lakhia
Subhash K. Jha
