After Riz's sizzle... Mira's next might fizzle

Lead actor Riz Ahmed, who is playing the title role of Mira Nair’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist has gone and done a romp in the raw in another film ­— Trishna which has just released in the the UK and US and is set to hit Indian theatres in October. Mira is worried how the love scenes between her hero and Frieda Pinto in the film will impact her film in which he plays a devout Muslim.

Riz  is currently garnering accolades for his performance in Trishna, not aware that  his enthusiastic love-making scenes may damage Mira’s film, in which he plays the very sensitive role of a progressive Pakistani Changez in the US who post-9/11 returns to Pakistan. The character as written by Mohsin Hamid in his 2007 novel, is a deeply sensitive study of Islamic isolation. Riz’s sizzling-hot scenes in Trishna based on the teachings of the Kama Sutra, now pose a problem for The Reluctant Funadmentalist, which is why Mira was keen that her film release first. Says an insider, “Mira has kept the love scenes between her co-stars very low key. Her Pakistani hero has an affair with an American woman in The Reluctant Fundamenlist, and there was a kissing scene between Riz and co-star Kate Hudson which was modified to a peck away from the lips.

One has to be careful about the protagonist’s conduct when he’s representing a sensitive issue and a cultural-religious crisis.”

The crew of Mira’s film is wondering how Riz’s audience in Pakistan would react to his scorching love scenes with Freida in Trishna. Says Mira, “I haven’t seen Trishna. But I’ve seen the trailer long ago…hasn’t it come and gone? But the whole look, charisma and strength of his part in  The Reluctant Fundamentalist is something we’d have liked to bring forward in a proper manner. People tell me, and I am talking about curators of major international film festivals who are the only ones to have seen the film, say a major star will be born through my film. Riz carries the film on his shoulders.”

When informed that Trishna is ready for an Indian release, Mira is taken aback. “Who is releasing it? I don’t  know. I just feel our film should have been the major breakthrough for Riz.”