Karan Johar's blog;tongue in cheek

I love the film fraternity. I love everything about it. Nowhere in the world will you find such a cocktail of complexes, complexities, contradictions, and of course, charisma. We are unique and our DNA must be preserved for posterity. Why deny generations ahead of our vanity and our insanity? Pardon the rhyme; it's with good reason. So what makes us so special? Well, read on.

In Denial:

We deny our relationships, affairs, infidelities, and enmities. We love denial. God forbid if we started admitting to things, the speculation would stop, and we just can't have that. We like to be in the news, and to make sure of that we employ publicists who plant stories under our surveillance that we later deny with an absolute straight face. It's called "The Art of Convenient Alzheimer's." Of course within close, or not so close circles, we go on about the invasive paparazzi and the trashy tabloids. The truth is we love the invasion and we feed off the trash. We deny this of course. It's a vicious circle that we're completely square about.

Star Hatings:

Favorite conversation piece at fraternity affairs: critic bashing. It's more fashionable than bling (Bappi's back!) From saying they are bought to calling them biased, we don't leave a single stone unturned. We take all the critics' comments personally and feel it's a vendetta against us. But we love the persecution complex. It's our favorite emotion. To think of it as an objective point of view is something we just cant wrap our heads around. Maybe we actually made a bad film??? Oh god, how could I have just said that?! We never make bad films, we make "misunderstood cinema", understood? All this can change because all it takes is a 4 star review (5 stars would be pushing it) and paragraphs of gush and we're back on track. A critic is on our speed dial, he's a member of our family, it's all about loving the critics all over again. The next step is to give full-page ads in leading newspapers highlighting the critic's comments in "inverted commas." Double standards?? Don't be silly; we think it's our birthright.

Disease of Delusion:

The fastest spreading disease within the fraternity is the disease of delusions. It can give any viral a run for its medicine. We are delusional about the box office figures of our films, our current star status, our lover's fidelity, and our physical appearances (though thanks to Photoshop, that gets taken care of.) Sometimes I wonder if we just turn a blind eye or have genuinely inhabited planet delusion. I'm hoping for the former, it would make us more real. Hmmm, being real…wonder what that feels like. Anyway, moving on….

And the Loser is…:

A very wise man once told me, (oh forget it, lets give credit where its due) Javed Akhtar once told me, "Take the awards seriously the year you get them." Year after year we've been going on about the commercialization of our film awards. The rigged decisions, the lobbies and the camps, the jury villains and the vamps. Yet year after year we land up in our shimmering saris, ill fitted gowns and tacky tuxedos. The criterion for turning up is simple; either we're winning or performing. A combination of the two is ideal. The only other reason to turn up would be to market a close to release film or give tight television close-ups to ex, current, or potential lovers(😆). The spirit of competition??? What's that? Please lets not discuss alien concepts.

I could go on and on but I must practice some restraint. Also, I'd like to add that I've used "we" everywhere because I'm very much a part of the above disorders (barring maybe the tacky tuxedos, I think mine are quite nice.) To be fair to us, the stakes are high, competition is fierce, and stress levels are cardiac friendly. Nowhere in the world is anyone's work judged globally like ours is and we wage battles everyday till we reach the "Friday wars."

So please allow us our quirks and shortcomings. We never claimed to be perfect; you put us on that pedestal. Chew on that while we go back to making movies, for what in the world is better than that?

Amen.

Love and koffee,

Karan

p.s. I continue to read all the comments. Thank you again from the bottom of my heart. Many inquiries on "My Name is Khan" I promise to tell all in good time. I do wish to correct some misconceptions, though. The film is not based in New York, and Shah Rukh Khan is not playing a terrorist. I love you all, and if you haven't aleady watched "Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na" go right now and watch it. It's fresh, it's real, and completely audience friendly.