Hansal Mehta took to social media to talk about his second directorial, Dil Pe Mat Le Yaar, which was headlined by Manoj Bajpayee, Tabu, Saurabh Shukla and Aditya Srivastava. The filmmaker said that the failure of the film turned him into an alcoholic, made him bankrupt and left him with debts.
Taking to social media, Hansal wrote, “I was reminded that it’s 25 years since Dil Pe Mat Le Yaar released and it’s a strange, bittersweet feeling. Dil Pe Mat Le Yaar began with a crackling script by Saurabh Shukla - sharp, funny, subversive and alive with possibilities. But in many moments of weakness, we tampered with it.”
He added, “Manoj’s growing popularity, the lure of six songs and the need to make the protagonist a ‘nice man’ trapped by dark circumstances - all these compromises softened what was meant to be a story about betrayal and the shadows hidden in human nature when faced with desperation and greed.”
Hansal reflected on what went wrong with the film and said, “What could have been raw and unsettling ended up tame, at times even sycophantic towards its leading man. The irony is not lost on me: a film about greed was itself undone by greed. And it bombed.”
He further said that the film’s negatives are destroyed. “Lost to carelessness, negligence, perhaps even divine intervention. A cosmic reminder, maybe, that good intentions when corrupted by selfish motives rarely translate into good execution,” he wrote.
The filmmaker continued, “Its failure pushed me into alcohol, debt and bankruptcy. But here I am 25 years later, still around to tell the tale. The film gave me friends, cost me friends and left me with lessons I carry to this day. I am grateful for those lessons. I’ve made my peace - with myself, and with those I once blamed for the debacle. One day I’ll write more about this chapter in my memoirs.”
Meanwhile, on the work front, Hansal’s web-series, Gandhi, recently had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) 2025.
