Prashanth Neel is an accomplished film director and screenwriter, who rose to prominence with his directorial prowess in the blockbuster Kannada film KGF: Chapter 1. Neel's filmmaking journey reflects a seamless blend of innovation and storytelling. His keen eye for visuals and a knack for gripping narratives have earned him accolades. The maverick director is back with the fourth offering Salaar: Part 1- Ceasefire, this time he has teamed up with Prabhas.The film is all set to release on 22nd December, while its trailer is releasing on 1st December. In an exclusive conversation with ETimes, the filmmaker gets candid. Excerpts

What is your mindset right now as you are coming after the huge success of the KGF franchise and with everyone expecting your next film Salaar: Part 1- Ceasefire to be an even bigger hit?

KGF happened over a course of about 4-5 years, it took a lot of time. And that was a completely different story, a completely different emotion. Salaar is a completely different emotion. And the weight of expectations and everything, I hear about it only when I meet people. I don't meet too many people. So I don't know how it feels from the outside. I know there is a lot of pressure riding on the project itself. But my job is to just deliver a story. It doesn't matter if it is pan India material, or if it is just for the Telugu audience. It really does not matter to me. I have to tell a story. I have to first convince any sort of audience. It doesn't matter if it is from the South or from the North. I have to convince the audience to like the movie that I am making. And that is to entertain them. So that is my only goal. And I have not really sat down and thought about all the pressures behind this. Because if I had to have that pressure, I don't think I would have executed the story that I sat down and wrote.

The film was supposed to release in September. Now it is releasing in December. So there was this push that happened because of post-production etc. How was your mindset back at that point in time?

Yeah, it was a difficult decision. But only when you start lining up all the departments together whether it is the sound department or the visual department or the special effects department, only when you line them up will you understand how your product looks. So when that started happening, we understood that I don't want to name one department or the other. Only then you will realise that there is a misalignment in how the movie is going to come out finally. Our biggest responsibility is only when the movie releases, how the audience is going to react to it. So we did have that pressure of not releasing on a very, very good date. But at the same time we also understood that giving the best product is the most important thing for us. So it was not a very difficult decision for us. It was hard for us first to fathom a situation like this. But then after that it just turned into let's give the best product. It doesn't matter when. But let's give it. And that's what we did.

But now you clash with Shah Rukh Khan’s Dunki...

Clash is not something you ideally want, be it with a newcomer or with the biggest star of Indian cinema. But it is a very unpleasant situation for anybody to move their date to somebody else's date. We also wouldn't want somebody to move to our date when we have announced it a year before. And we also did not want to do it. But that was a logistical decision that was taken only by the production. And usually we (me and my team) don't get into the aspects of what the production is going to decide as a release date, because they do not interfere in my process of filmmaking. So I do not interfere in their process of marketing or the release dates, the business aspect.
We are not fearful of the fact that another movie as big as that, the combination that it has. Rajkumari Hirani sir is one of my favourite directors. I am definitely sold on going and watching Dunki. So I do understand that that's a very big movie that is coming out. But the biggest fear that we have which is always when making a movie is whether the audience is going to like it or not..

There are rumours that KGF and Salaar are part of the same universe. Is it safe to assume so?

No, it is not. One has to understand that there is a certain amount of respect that you give big stars. So when I go to Prabhas sir, I cannot tell him that I am making another movie from the same franchise. That's not how things work. This is a completely different universe. This is a completely different story. This is a completely different emotion. And I know that the amount of love that I have got for KGF, people will expect for that movie to come out again and again and again. Because they have loved that character Rocky. They have loved all the other characters in the movie and they would definitely want to watch more of that. But this is a complete respect that we have to give to our stars. I am trying to create another world which I hope that people like it as much as KGF or even if they don't like it as much as KGF, this is our attempt to portray a new emotion to the audience. So I am sorry that I am disappointing a lot of people that there is no connection to that. KGF is definitely not a part of Salaar.