Shahrukh challenging Rajinikanth?

For some time now, Shahrukh Khan has been thinking of coming up with a grand scale special effects movie. Enter Shankar: who approaches him for Robot, his sci-fi epic. But after a few creative differences, the duo part.

Shankar moves on, making his big project even bigger by roping in Rajinikanth and Aishwarya Rai, with the largest budget Indian cinema has conceived of so far.

Now, Shahrukh responds by announcing that his Red Chillies banner plans to make the most expensive film in India with a budget of $25 million. Was SRK provoked/inspired by Shankar’s grand ambition?

While at the Berlin Film Festival, Shahrukh recently spoke to the legendary Hollywood trade magazine, Variety: "We are dedicating the next eight or nine months to taking the best technicians from around the world and asking them to help us make the best VFX film India has ever made. It will be madcap, over the top. I want it to be as beautiful as 'Spider-Man' in terms of effects,"

The film is yet to be titled but we roughly know the plot: what happens when a bunch of children have all their wishes come true. Are wishes that come true always a good thing or actually a nightmare disguised as a dream? The director of movies like Cash and Dus – Anubhav Sinha – will helm this mega project. What will excite VFX buffs is that Charles Darby, the man responsible for some of the special effects in Minority Report and The Matrix has been roped in. Apparently he has set up a VFX studio in Mumbai.

It will indeed be interesting to see what Shankar’s response will be. An even more grandly scaled movie than what SRK has in mind? After all, isn’t Shankar one of India’s initial special effects movie wizards?

Such healthy professional rivalry will only help in the betterment of Indian cinema.