Vidhu Vinod Chopra is an Indian film director, producer, editor, screenwriter, lyricist and actor.  His well-known films include Parinda (1988),  1942: A Love Story  (1994), 3 idiots (2009), PK (2014),  Sanju  (2018),  Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga  (2019), and Shikara  (2020), which except for last two have been commercially highly successful and some of the highest grossing Indian films. He is the founder of Vinod Chopra Films and Vinod Chopra Productions.

He studied film direction at the Film and Television Institute of India in Pune. After attending the FTII, he made his directorial debut with first student short film Murder At Monkey Hill in 1976. This won the National Film Award for Best Short Experimental Film and the Guru Dutt Memorial Award for Best Student Film. Two years later, in 1978, he made a short documentary highlighting the plight of India’s destitute children, called An Encounter with Faces, which was nominated for an Academy Award  in the Documentary Short Subject category in 1979. It also won the Grand Prix at the Tampere Film Festival  in 1980.

Chopra then went on to make his first mainstream Hindi-language film called ‘Sazaaye Maut’ (Death Row) in 1981 (this was based on Murder at Monkey Hill).

Khamosh  (Silent) is 1985 thriller film starred Naseeruddin Shah, Shabana Azmi, Amol Palekar, Soni Razdan and Pankaj Kapoor. The film became notable for actors Palekar, Razdan and Azmi portraying fictional versions of themselves. Khamosh  is a series of one inspiring scene after another.  Right from the first murder in a creepy, claustrophobic costume closet of a boat house where Soni Razdan is rehearsing a scene wherein she’s, ironically, protesting over her murder. The venue, as it turns out, is the murderer’s choice for the second execution as well as the remarkable climax in the end.   It’s also impressive how Chopra succeeds in keeping the unit so isolated from mainstream by cleverly planting hurdles that cannot be escaped immediately. Situations within the script build themselves in a manner that prevents the film unit from getting back to normal. These carefully thought out intricacies contribute in making the songless Khamosh a case of exemplary filmmaking.  There’s no place for romantic angles, poetic flirtations, lilting music, Kashmir darshan, no pleasantry whatsoever in his crisply-edited vision of a stark script.  Khamosh remains one of the notable Indian films in the genre.

Parinda  (Bird) is a 1989 film stars Jackie Shroff, Anil Kapoor, Nana Patekar and Madhuri Dixit. Film follows Kishan (Shroff), who works for the underworld chieftain Anna (Patekar). Kishan’s brother Karan (Kapoor) returns home after completing his studies in the United States. The two brothers are caught on different sides of a gang war after Karan decides to avenge his friend’s death by Anna. Parinda received critical acclaim when released. It is considered by several critics and scholars to be the turning point in the introduction of realisam in Hindi cinema.  Parinda  won two National Film Awards  and five Filmfare Awards. Critic Carl Bromley called the film “hands down the most powerful and influential Hindi gangster film of the last two decades.”

Chopra’s next film,  1942: A Love Story, was a patriotic romantic drama. The film is set in 1942, when the British Raj  was declining from power. It was a time when many Indian citizens were either working for the British regime or rallying in underground meetings and protests against them.  The film won a total of nine awards at the 40th Filmfare Awards.

He founded his own production company, Vinod Chipra Films, in 1985. Since then, the company has gone on to produce major Bollywood films, and is currently one of the biggest and most successful film production houses in India. Bengali filmmaker Ritwik Ghatak affectionately gave him the name ‘Vidhu’.

Mission Kashmir  is a 2000 Hindi language action thriller film follows the and tragedy of a young boy named Altaaf Khan (Roshan) after his entire family is accidentally killed by police officers. He is adopted by the police chief (Dutt) who is responsible for this, and when Altaaf finds out, he seeks revenge and becomes a terrorist. The film deals with terrorism and the tragedy of children suffering from war. The film was screened at the Stockholm International Film Festival. The film became a critical and moderate commercial s uccess and emerged as the 3rd highest-grossing Bollywood film. Mission Kashmir  received 6 nominations at the 46th Filmfare Awards, including Best Film, Best Director  (Chopra), Best Actor  (Dutt), Best Supporting Actress  (Kulkarni), and Best Villain  (Shroff), and won Best Action. Saisuresh Sivaswamy from  Rediff  wrote, “This is a story from the director’s heart, not his head, and the sincerity comes across in frame after frame.” Giving the film 4 out of 5 stars, N. K. Deoshi of  apunkachoice.com wrote, “Beneath all the drama that goes on in the movie there lurks the aspiration to get across to people the message of what actually people of Kashmir are going through.”  Savitha Padmanabhan of The Hindu stated, “Mission Kashmir  might have its faults but it is definitely a cut above the rest of the commercial Hindi films that have been made on terrorism.”  

Munna Bhai M.B.B.S.  (Munna Brother M.B.B.S.) is a 2003 comedy drama film produced by Vidhu Vinod Chopra. At the 50th Filmfare Awards, received the Best Film (Critics), Best Screenplay, Best Dialogue, and Best Comedian (for Warsi) in addition to four other nominations. It won a number of awards at the 2004 Zee Cine Awards. In the 2004   where it won the National Film Award for Best Popular Film  and the 2004 International Indian Film Academy Awards  where it won the IIFA Best Comedian Award.

Parineeta (he Married Woman) is a 2005 musical romantic drama film adaptation of Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay’s 1914 Bengali  novella of the same name. Directed by debutant Pradeep Sarkar, it was based upon a screenplay by the film’s producer, Vidhu Vinod Chopra.

Eklavya: The Royal Guard  is a 2007 Indian action drama film directed by  Vidhu Vinod Chopra  which was released in India, Netherlands, the United States, and the United Kingdom on 16 February 2007. The film marks Vidhu Vinod Chopra’s return to directing after seven years. The film was chosen as India’s official entry to the Oscars  to be considered for nomination in the Best Foreign Film  category for the year 2007.

3 Idiots  is a 2009 Hindia -language comedy film  written and directed by Rajkumar Hirani, with producer Vidhu Vinod Chopra  acting as a screenplay associate. Adapted loosely from Chetan Bhagat’s novel Five Point Someone. The story follows the friendship of three students at an Indian engineering college  and is a satire  about the social pressures under an Indian education system. 3 Idiots  won six Filmfare Awards. Overseas, it won the Grand Prize at Japan’s Videoyasan Awards while it was nominated for Best Outstanding Foreign Language Film at the Japan Academy Awards  and Best Foreign Film at China’s Beijing International Film Festival. 3 Idiots  went on to become one of the most successful films in India, and became the first film in the country to cross Rs. 200 crore at the boxoffice. It also found popular appeal in markets like Taiwan and Korea.

Ferrari Ki Sawaari (Ferrari’s ride, A Ride in the Ferrari) is a 2012 sports comedy-drama  film written and directed by Rajesh Mapuskar, and produced by Vidhu Vinod Chopra.

Broken Horses  is a 2015 American mysterythriller  film directed by Vidhu Vinod Chopra. It was released on April 10, 2015. The film is a remake of the 1989 Hindi film Parinda, also directed by Chopra.

Wazir  is a 2016 Indian Hindi -language neo-noir action thriller film directed by Bejoy Nambiar  and produced by Chopra. Written and edited by Abhijat Joshi  and Chopra. Based on an original story by Chopra, Wazir  follows the story of a suspended Anti-Terrorisam Squad  officer who befriends a chess player who is a wheelchair user.

Sanju  is a 2018 Hindi language biographical film jointly produced by Hirani and Chopra uinder the banners Rajkumar Hirani Films and Chopra respectively .  The film chronicles the life of  Bollywood actor Sanjay Dutt, his addiction with drugs, arrest for his association with the 1993 Bombay bombings, relationship with his father, comeback in the industry, the eventual drop of charges from the Bombay bombings, and release after completing his jail term. It earned seven nominations at the 64th Filmfare Awards including Best Film and Best Director  for Hirani.

Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga (How I felt when I saw that girl) is a 2019 Indian Hindi-language film produced by Chopra, with the story inspired by the 1919 novel A Damsel in Distrss by P. G. Wodehouse.  

His latest film, Shikara is a Hindi language historical romance film released on 7 February 2020 marking his return to direction in India after 13 years. The film is based on the Kashmiri Pandit exodus  of 1990. The story revolved around the love story of Shanti and Shiv Dhar, who are Kashmiri Pandits in the backdrop of the Exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from Kashmir.

Not only is he a filmmaker par excellence, but he has also nurtured some of the brightest talents in the Hindi film industry, including directors Rajkumar Hirani, Pradeep Sarkar, and Sanjay Leela Bhansali. In Unscripted, Vidhu Vinod Chopra speaks to his long-time collaborator and scriptwriter Abhijat Joshi about his exceptional journey. Engaging and illuminating, the book provides a glimpse into the mind, method, and madness of one of contemporary Hindi cinema’s best filmmakers. His production company, Vinod Chopra Films is one of the leading film production houses in India.

Photos courtesy Google. Excerpts taken from Google.