Ashir Azeem opens up on how he fought for his movie Maalik

Gulf News

Ashir Azeem opens up on how he fought for his movie Maalik. Pakistani director and actor Ashir Azeem talks about the legal battle he had to go through to release his politically charged action drama Maalik.  Read the full Gulf News article: http://gulfnews.com/leisure/movies/features/maalik-banned-pakistani-film-gets-uae-release-1.1911255  See more at: http://gulfnews.com/gntv

Transcript

00:00Let me tell you one thing. First of all, he is a patriotic legendary, Asher, and what

00:14he has shown is very close to our, I mean, what to say, like politics, everything. My

00:22role, particularly, which I played in the movie, is very close to some of the facts

00:30of our life in our region, you know. So, I don't know, I have to say that it is a movie

00:39to see and you will just really feel and enjoy how the people works over there, how the politicians

00:48are doing over there, how they misuse, you know, the rights and the powers. So, let it

00:56be very clear that we have shown, Asher has shown the facts of life. I don't know, I have

01:03to say or not. It mirrors the society that you live in, basically. So, whatever we are

01:08showing in the film is from, is based on real life events of what Pakistan is confronting

01:14today, you know, and we just try to put it across. But, it's not, we have not targeted,

01:22as I said earlier, not targeted any particular party, any particular individual. It's a work

01:28of fiction.

01:29No, it shouldn't be and that's exactly why I decided to take the legal route. I was initially

01:39advised by friends to, you know, come to some kind of a compromise, a settlement, let's

01:44go meet people and say, okay, well, how can we settle this, meet in the middle? I said,

01:50there's nothing to meet in the middle, right? I have done nothing illegal and I refuse to

01:56remove a single frame from the film. Once it has been approved by the censor, three

02:02censor boards, why should I remove a single frame from the film? So, if it's going to

02:09be banned, let it be banned. But, we are going to stick to the principle and if somebody

02:15has to fight this battle in the country once, well, then let it be me.

02:19It was the first time that the federal government stepped in to ban a movie that has been cleared

02:23by the censor boards.

02:24And they don't have the authority because in a country that there's been a constitutional

02:29amendment and cinemas and censor boards are purely provincial subjects. But, yet they

02:34somehow stepped into it and I'm glad that they've taken it right up to the Supreme Court

02:39because now, let it be settled for once and for all, you know.

02:43But the movie has been screened in Pakistan as we speak, in certain provinces or?

02:47No, all across.

02:48All across. So, that's a victory of sorts for sure. Brilliant.

02:51And not just for me, it's for everybody who's going to be producing movies and future directors

02:58and future movies because you can't live in a situation where your film has been approved

03:03by censors and then one fine morning you find out, hey, it's been blocked by somebody.

03:07Why?

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