It won't be wrong to say Saif Ali Khan delivered a knock-out performance in Vishal Bharadwaj's Omkara released in 2006. Having taken home numerous awards for his negative character of Langda Tyagi, the actor stole the show. Now, years later, as he spoke about lesser-known facts about his personal and professional life on No Filter Neha season 5, Saif revealed that director Vishal had an idea on how to convey an entire page of dialogue without saying anything.
"Vishal Bharadwaj is a lovely director and it was a really clever scene because there’s this bit in Omkara where I had this one page of dialogue where I say ‘this Omkara fellow, he’s not made me the Baahubali, I’ll bloody show him, I’ll anoint myself the Baahubali, I’m going to kill everyone’. And he said ‘Listen I think this scene is too talky and this is cinema so we can do all this without any lines’. So, I said, ‘what do you mean? He said ‘You’re standing there in front of the mirror in the dark and the camera is coming close to you. You are looking at the mirror and you break it and it shatters. In the shattered mirror, I see your schizophrenic face and because you broke the mirror, your hand is bleeding. You anoint yourself with the blood. So that says it all, you don’t have to say any dialogues’ and I thought ‘Jesus, this man is a genius’ because that’s cinema, right? He’s taken a page of dialogue and converted into one shot," he told.
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Saif further added that Vishal wanted him to do the scene naked. However, the actor put forth a condition. Years later, Saif felt that he should have done it. He said he would have become the first butt of Bollywood on-screen after John Abraham. “So, he said, ‘in fact, I think you should do it naked’. I said, ‘what?’ He said, ‘ya it’ll look good, you’re standing there naked with your back to the camera’. He said don’t worry it will be very dimly lit, like the movie. So, I said ‘listen, you and Tassaduq (director of photography) stand there with me naked while you direct me and I will stand there naked. I don’t mind, I’ll do it’. He said ‘I’m not directing you naked’. I said ‘arre, if you’re not going to be naked then why should I be naked’. So, wasn’t. But in retrospect, I should’ve done it, it was just too new an idea. I think after John Abraham, showed his half butt, I would’ve been the first butt of Bollywood on screen,” Saif added.
(Source: No Filter Neha 5)
