Filmmaker Sudhir Mishra has spent close to 40 years in the film industry, and has helmed acclaimed films such as Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi (2005) and Serious Men (2020). However, there’s one thing which he feels still hasn’t changed in cinema — the obsession with stars.

“It’s still star driven. And when they don’t get stars, they concoct the idea of a star by hiring people who were once stars,” says the 63-year-old, whose next, Afwaah, features actors Bhumi Pednekar and Nawazuddin Siddiqui.

Mishra stresses that the focus should be on talent, skill and the script, rather than just the name of the person in it. “Technicians should get more of a place. Nobody credits a film’s DOP (director of photography). He determines the visual look of a film. They are co-writers and should get pride of place,” he adds.

Has he ever given in to demands to make his film commercially viable? Mishra confesses that he once made a film which he should not have — Calcutta Mail (2003). “I enjoyed working with Anil Kapoor (actor), but the rest of it was something I should have avoided,” he says.

Mostly, he maintains, he gets creative liberty to make films the way he wants. “Whatever the adjustments, it happens in conjunction with me. It’s never, ‘Do this’. It’s always ‘Keep the audience in mind’, ‘Can we have background songs?’ And we have done that so the film gets better visibility. No director makes films for himself,” Mishra concludes.