Straight answers

<div class="section1"><div class="Normal">Pooja Bhatt, Director, On life before and after Paap<br /><br /><span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">How did direction happen?</span><br /><br />After Jism, I wanted to start work on our next film immediately. That''s when dad told me about this subject with a Buddhist backdrop involving a girl and the dilemma she faces.I had a subject, which could appeal to not just women but every section of the society. It was a film which demanded audacity — and I had it.<br /><br /><span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">Have you inherited your father''s directorial finesse? </span><br /><br />Well, I have inherited my father''s emotional audacity to do films I really want to make. Mind you, I like the idiom of Bollywood — the exaggeration — but I can''t bring myself to make that kind of cinema. I would rather have small success on my terms. We are missing simplicity in today''s films. I''m a far better person sitting in the audience than up on stage. My applause is contagious.<br /><br /><span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">Did you experience a mental block while shooting?</span><br /><br />All the time. I was very unsure about myself but I was honest about it. Each time I reached a dead end, I told my crew to stop shooting for 10 minutes, during which I sorted things on my own.<br /><br /><span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">Is direction your ultimate high? </span><br /><br />At the Karachi film festival held in Pakistan, where we premiered Paap, I was called onto the dais after the film''s screening, I felt those 20 steps I walked to reach the stage were too many. As an actor and as a producer, I have done that several times but as a director, I felt bare. I have learnt that there are no bad actors only bad directors!</div> </div>