Farhan Akhtar, along with Ritesh Sidhwani started their production company, Excel Entertainment, 25 years ago and the rest is history. Yes, if you can believe it, it has been 25 years since Farhan Akhtar’s debut, both as director and producer, with Dil Chahta Hai. Now, the company has announced they are establishing a new arm of their production house to support and develop young filmmakers like they were back in the day.
About the origins of their filmmaking philosophy they wrote, “25 years ago, we started Excel Entertainment and began work on a film called Dil Chahta Hai. We had a simple belief – New voices and a different way of telling stories, will find an audience. We were twenty six years old. We didn’t have all the answers but we had an idea we believed in, the courage to take risks and the tenacity to make it happen.”
Coming to today and the future, they say they want to empower young filmmakers, “As we look back at everything this journey has given us, we also find ourselves thinking about what the next 25 years has in store for us. We believe it will include Excel empowering young, aspiring filmmakers with bold ideas and the courage to tell stories differently. So, as Excel celebrates its silver anniversary, we’re launching EXCEL ORIGINS – an initiative to discover and back the next generation of filmmakers.”
Expanding on the idea they write, “New voices. Original stories. Breakthrough genres. Because the best way for us to celebrate where we came from is to invest in where cinema goes next. 25 years of Excel. Now, back to our Origins.”
