Shatrughan Sinha broke down and wept when he saw his daughter Sonakshi Sinha's performance in the Vikramaditya Motwane period romance Lootera, also starring Ranveer Singh.
Speaking affectionately and with controlled parental pride, the man who generally calls a spade a spade, is uncharacteristically restrained when it comes to praising his own flesh and blood.
"When Sonakshi did Son Of Sardaar she looked every inch a Sardarni. In Lootera, she looks completely Bengali. I don't want people to say, Apni beti ke baarey mein shuroo ho gaye But the fact is I've faced the camera for 45 years, and I know when I see an extraordinary performance. I couldn't see my daughter Sonakshi in Lootera. I only saw this ill suffering girl called Pakhi on screen. And my heart melted."
So realistic is Sonakshi's performance as a girl in the 1950s dying of tuberculosis that the doting father spontaneously dialed his daughter during the screening to ask, Beta, sab theek toh hai?
Shatrughan Sinha laughs in ill-concealed embarrassment. "Ab kya Karen? Ek baap toh baap hi hota hai. The way Sonakshi has portrayed the bronchial cough is amazing. It was so realistic that I got scared. My girl has never been exposed to the harsh realities of life. Where did she get to know about such pain suffering, hurt and humiliation?"
Shatruji says he cringed when he saw Sonakshi's character Pakhi pleading with Ranveer's character to visit her.
"Rejection is a terrible humiliation. I never realized how much damage it can do to a girl's self-esteem until I saw Sonakshi's performance in that sequence where Pakhi begs with the man she loves to visit her the next day, or the day after or the day after that...My heart reached out to the character. When a girl faces such crippling rejection, she can do anything. That scene made me realise how callous and careless men can be, and how careful they need to be when dealing with a woman's heart."
Speaking affectionately and with controlled parental pride, the man who generally calls a spade a spade, is uncharacteristically restrained when it comes to praising his own flesh and blood.
"When Sonakshi did Son Of Sardaar she looked every inch a Sardarni. In Lootera, she looks completely Bengali. I don't want people to say, Apni beti ke baarey mein shuroo ho gaye But the fact is I've faced the camera for 45 years, and I know when I see an extraordinary performance. I couldn't see my daughter Sonakshi in Lootera. I only saw this ill suffering girl called Pakhi on screen. And my heart melted."
So realistic is Sonakshi's performance as a girl in the 1950s dying of tuberculosis that the doting father spontaneously dialed his daughter during the screening to ask, Beta, sab theek toh hai?
Shatrughan Sinha laughs in ill-concealed embarrassment. "Ab kya Karen? Ek baap toh baap hi hota hai. The way Sonakshi has portrayed the bronchial cough is amazing. It was so realistic that I got scared. My girl has never been exposed to the harsh realities of life. Where did she get to know about such pain suffering, hurt and humiliation?"
Shatruji says he cringed when he saw Sonakshi's character Pakhi pleading with Ranveer's character to visit her.
"Rejection is a terrible humiliation. I never realized how much damage it can do to a girl's self-esteem until I saw Sonakshi's performance in that sequence where Pakhi begs with the man she loves to visit her the next day, or the day after or the day after that...My heart reached out to the character. When a girl faces such crippling rejection, she can do anything. That scene made me realise how callous and careless men can be, and how careful they need to be when dealing with a woman's heart."
