Aitraaz’s one-take song featuring Akshay Kumar, Priyanka Chopra impressed Danny Boyle: ‘He saw this and contacted…’

Abbas-Mustan delivered many successful films in the 1990s and 2000s. One of the biggest hits of their career was the 2004 Akshay Kumar, Kareena Kapoor and Priyanka Chopra-starrer Aitraaz. In a recent interview, the director duo recalled how they shot for the song ‘I Want To Make Love To You,’ which was done in one take. The Baazigar directors revealed that the song even left Slumdog Millionaire director Danny Boyle quite impressed as he hired the technician who shot the sequence for his Oscar-winning film, which was released in 2008.
The song had Priyanka’s character trying to seduce Akshay’s character, and the directors recalled that they had to “capture their wild romance” in the music video. “The song had to show passion. We thought that if we have to shoot this song, we can’t cut it. It takes 3-4 days to shoot a song. When you cut, the expression also drops. We thought why not do this in one shot? Our actors were both so good, Akshay and Priyanka, so it was possible,” they said. The Race directors said that they discussed it with their cinematographer Ravi Yadav, choreographer Ganesh Acharya and the actors. “Akshay was very happy about it, he thought this was a great idea,” they recalled.
Abbas-Mustan recalled that they were so well-prepared that the song was done in just one take and it was perfect. “We did the first take and that first take was okay. It was perfect. We took another one for safety, which was also okay. The first take was used in the movie,” they recalled.

Steadicam operator Sunil Khandpur had shot the song, and while the film surely benefitted from his work, it brought him another opportunity. Abbas-Mustan said, “When Danny Boyle was coming to India to shoot Slumdog Millionaire, he was looking for a Steadicam operator here. Then he came across this video. Danny saw this and contacted Sunil and hired him.”

The 2004 film Aitraaz was a defining moment in Priyanka Chopra’s career as this was her first negative role. In a recent interview with RJ Siddharth Kannan, film producer Suneel Darshan had revealed that PC was unhappy because she had been offered a vamp’s role. “PC said she was approached for a vamp’s role and she was so upset, she cried, she went home and she went to sleep. I said after you wake up come back to the office. She was here and I pressed on her the importance of her doing the role. I thought I drilled it into her head and yes it was wonderful for them to be in Aitraaz,” he said.
In the film, Priyanka played a woman who uses her position of power to seduce her ex-boyfriend. The film was loosely based on the Hollywood film Disclosure.