About two years ago while I was reviewing Arth — The Destination, a question popped into my head: why did Shaan Shahid — one of Pakistan’s most sought after talents — decide to make a film for himself?
Of course, he had directed movies before (Arth was his fifth film as director), but the magnitude of the undertaking was apparent on-screen. “[The only way] a bona fide superstar has to make a film for himself, [is] because no one else can,” I concluded at the time.
It’s a weighty notion — one that isn’t exclusive to Shaan (who again, is in midst of producing another film for himself). Ali Zafar, Humayun Saeed, Sheheryar Munawar, Adnan Sarwar, Faysal Quraishi and Hareem Farooq, amongst others, have been coerced by circumstances to make movies for themselves and, supposedly, the betterment of the industry.
Actors turning producers isn’t a startling, modern phenomenon — it has been practiced since cinema’s inception from before Charlie Chaplin’s time. In fact, Chaplin’s first film, Making a Living (1914) was directed by Henry Lehrman, a prominent silent era actor and producer.
A hundred and five years later, actors worldwide — and not just in Bollywood and Hollywood — have their own production companies. The difference is, in those markets, actors turn producers either because they crave a bigger cut of their films’ business or want to make specific stories they want to tell.
Increasingly in Pakistan, actors are becoming producers of their own films. But unlike in Hollywood or Bollywood, this is less about making stories they want to tell or a greater piece of the box office, and more about simple survival
In a struggling film industry like Pakistan, however, it is often about mere survival.
According to the actors who spoke to Icon, experienced producers are stuck in the past, screenwriters have yet to understand how to draft stories for the big screen and distributors have their own stringent set of requirements.