Failure of last releases made me reassess my choices as an artist: Sara Ali Khan

Mumbai: Sara Ali Khan said the failure of her last few releases made her reassess her choices as an artist and she is now focused on taking up scripts that will bring her ‘creative satisfaction’.

She started her inning on a positive note with ‘Kedarnath’ and ‘Simmba’, but her last three movies - ‘Love Aaj Kal’, ‘Coolie No. 1’ and ‘Atrangi Re’ - received a lukewarm response from the audiences.

“I have realised that if you do a film because you think it will work and then it doesn’t, then it is very hurtful. It really pains you. I never want to do that again. It is important to make films for the right decision and that should be creative satisfaction primarily,” Sara told the top news agency.

She referred to her 2020 movie, ‘Coolie No 1’, which she had signed due to its credentials as a massy entertainer.

“I thought this film would be a huge massy entertainer with great songs, colours and fun. But it wasn’t received well. Maybe because it was released on OTT and we were in the middle of the pandemic. And that’s when I realised, 'Was my motivation for doing the film 100 percent pure?' And it was the only time my inner voice said ‘no’. So, I don’t want to do that.”

Sara said her upcoming slate of films, which includes suspense-thriller ‘Gaslight’, ‘Ae Watan Mere Watan’, Anurag Basu’s ‘Metro...Inn Dino’ and two untitled projects with Homi Adajania and Laxman Utekar, represent her changed thought process.

“Whether ‘Gaslight’ or ‘Ae Watan Mere Watan’, in which I am playing a freedom fighter or Laxman Utekar sir’s film, which is like a small-town movie where I am playing a Punjabi girl living in Indore and then an urban film with Homi Adajania. I am doing such different work. I’m proud to say that with all the work that I am doing right now, I feel 100 percent convinced. And I don’t want to do work for any other reason ever again.”

Sara said she also wants to be ‘surrounded’ by people who can contribute to her growth as an artist.

“I want to be surrounded by people I can learn from; I want to grow every day. I want to explore more and more. I feel I can learn as I have just started and there is such a long way to go,” she added.