‘Jab We Met’ Is My Most Rejected Script: Imtiaz Ali

New Delhi: “Jab We Met” was a story that Imtiaz Ali wrote just to entertain himself and he never thought it would be a “good enough” film. But the hit 2007 film proved him and all the naysayers who dismissed the script as silly wrong. The Kareena Kapoor and Shahid Kapoor starrer, about two diametrically opposed strangers who meet on a train and develop an unlikely friendship that later turns into love, is still remembered for its sparkling one-liners, music and story.

As a new director trying to make a name for himself, Ali recalled how long it took him to complete his first film “Socha Na Tha”, starring Ayesha Takia and Abhay Deol. He wrote “Jab We Met” during periods of inactivity while shooting the film.

However, the director said that even while shooting “Jab We Met” in Punjab, he continued to have self-doubt and was unsure whether the shoot would take place the next day.

Talking about what it took to write their story, Ali told PTI during a visit to his headquarters in Delhi, “And frankly, it was a story that I was not very proud of. I wrote this script just to entertain myself. I never thought that this film was good enough to be made. It was just my personal plaything, so to speak.”

After writing the story, he was too embarrassed to tell it. When told about this, the director said, “Believe me, this film was rejected by producers and actors more than any of my other films.”

When asked what they found wrong with the script, Ali listed some of the reactions he encountered while going around pitching the story to the producers.

“‘What is this movie about?’, ‘What does it achieve?’, ‘There’s no conflict’, ‘And actually what’s going on in this movie is pretty ridiculous’, ‘Why would they finally accept Shahid Kapoor’s character?’… It was a lot of rejection.”

Ali said that the first person who truly believed the story was actress Preity Zinta.

“It took a long time to find the cast for ‘Jab We Met’. I told this to Preity Zinta once… she was the first person who liked this story, this script.”

Zinta was ultimately not cast as the film’s production was delayed and Ali went back to his original choice, Kareena Kapoor.

When Ali read the script to Zinta, she started laughing at the point where Shahid’s character Aditya runs away from Geet at the railway station.

“And I thought he was laughing at me. I was a little weird about it. Then he looked at me and said, ‘This is really fun.’ I asked him, ‘Did you like it?’ I asked. ‘I love him,’ he said. What happens next?’ “And I thought, ‘man, there’s someone out there who really loves this.'”

Ali wrote the script and all the dialogue, including the memorable one-liners.

Like when Geet catches a running train and says shyly and loudly to the passenger who helps her board and the rest of the carriage: “Ab toh mera haath chor do… Itni bhi sundar nahi hoon main”. Continuing his non-stop chatter, he then confidently declares: “Main apni favorite hoon!” or ‘Bachpan se hi na mujhe shaadi karne ka bahut madness hai, for god’s sake!’

It wasn’t just Geet’s lines. Many other dialogues in the film have also become part of moviegoers’ lexicon. For example, when an angry Aditya tells Geet, “Tumhe uthakar museum mein rakhna chahiye… ticket lagni chahiye tumhe dekhne ke liye.” Or a confused Anshuman, Geet’s one-time boyfriend, asks Aditya, “Kyun dershoon main ganne ke khet?”

Ali said that these lines were written while he was stuck in a hotel room during heavy snowfall in Manali. Since they had to start production in just 21 days, he was never able to come back for a revision or another review.

“Actually, the entire dialogue draft was written because we went on location scouting, which was our only research, so to speak. We had gone to Manali and luckily it snowed and we got stuck in a hotel. And I was in the hotel all day and couldn’t leave my room.”

“So I had to sit down and write the dialogues. I was feeling so bad that I didn’t have much time. I wrote all the dialogues in that one night and one day. And I didn’t look back and see if it was right or wrong. I just kept writing and writing.”

Both Kareena and Shahid attracted attention with their performances in the film.

Ali credits Kareena’s natural acting for making Geet unforgettable.

“He’s a very instinctive actor. He’s a director’s delight. He doesn’t have any process and you have to be careful when directing him because he doesn’t take any time to work. Whatever he’s told to do, he does it quickly and with all his might.”

“I actually had to find ways to restrain him, hold him back, so to speak, and make sure I never miscommunicated him. Because if I say the wrong thing to him, he’s going to do it the wrong thing. And he’s going to do it with so much power and strength that it’s going to be hard to get him back to zero and start over.”

Will he cast Kareena in another film?

“I would love to cast Kareena in a film again and I will. And hopefully it will be something worth doing after Geet. It will be something very different from how she was in that film. Hopefully, it will be something equally exuberant and lively,” Ali said.