Get ready to have Omkara between covers!

Vishal Bhardwaj’s Omkara continues to make news.

Now there is a book in the offing on the making of one of the most critically-acclaimed movies of the recent times. To be published by Harper Collins, the book has been written by Stephen Alter, the author known for his nostalgia-filled writing.

Steve has given us novels like Renuka and Neglected Lives and travelogues like Elephas Maximus - A Portrait of the Indian Elephant and Amritsar to Lahore. First cousin of popular film and theatre actor Tom Alter, Steve says Tom introduced him to the world of Hindi cinema and to Vishal who made Omkara.


Steve says this was not his first brush with Hindi cinema though. “Earlier Govind Nihalani gave me the opportunity to write the English dialogues of Tamas. This was different. Here I got to see how an idea is mounted on celluloid. I really liked Vishal’s pursuit for perfection. Look the way he managed to mould the regular Bollywood stars to give once in the lifetime kind of performances.”

Steve shares that the book also has 16 pictures from Omkara printed in black and white. “To make the book even more interesting I have included interviews of some of my favourites in the industry like Mahesh Bhatt, Shekhar Kapur, Javed Akhtar, M.F. Hussain and Prahlad Kakkar talking about how Bollywood has shaped up over the years. I wanted to include Karan Johar as well, but could not catch hold of him.”

Via