There’s a charm to Western noir movies, you’d agree. Anil Kapoor and Harsh Varrdhan Kapoor are ready to give the genre a go with Thar. While the two have shared screen space before in AK vs AK (2020), it was Harshvarrdhan’s idea to cast his actor-father in Raj Singh Chaudhary’s directorial venture.

Anil remembers being blown away by the Netflix film that revolves around Harshvarrdhan’s Siddharth who goes to a remote village in Rajasthan that has been rocked by violent killings. “It was Harsh who brought the film to me. His faith in the story, and the fact that it was a new genre for me and hence, a new learning opportunity — these were reasons enough for me to do the film. The story strikes the perfect balance between gritty and slick, fast-paced yet nuanced,” says Anil.

That it teams him up with his son is sheer joy for the senior actor. He adds, “Harsh has a unique approach to his craft. Working with him was a learning experience for me. I can’t wait to do it again with the Abhinav Bindra biopic.”

With Thar set to drop online on May 6, it marks the culmination of a four-year journey for Harshvarrdhan. The actor remembers receiving a call from Vikramaditya Motwane in 2018 regarding the film. “He said he had a script for me. When I read it, I wanted to do it. It was meant to be produced under Phantom Films, but the company dissolved after a few months. After that, for a year, I met several producers, trying to get the film going. Raj and I were [simultaneously] working on the script, and I just fell into the role of a producer. Finally, one day, a producer came to offer me a love story. I told him about this movie instead, and [he was on board],” he recounts, adding that they proceeded to do a test shoot with Anil to understand their synergy. “We performed three key scenes. Around the same time, we were talking to Netflix about AK vs AK. We shared the script of Thar, and the test shoot. They were excited by our vision.”

The actor, who plays an intense character, says the idea was to make the performance “almost meditative”. “I worked with Jeff Goldberg, my acting coach, on the character’s backstory, and with Natasha Goldberg on my voice. I put on nearly 10 kilos in two months to play Sid. He doesn’t speak much, and tries to conceal who he is. Within that [framework], I had to make it engaging.”