Saif Ali Khan recalls how Agent Vinod failed despite a ‘vast budget’: ‘I could’ve made anything’ | Bollywood News

4 min readNew DelhiJul 30, 2026 06:32 PM When Sriram Raghavan’s Agent Vinod hit theatres in 2012, it arrived with considerable buzz but ended up as one of the year’s biggest disappointments. The disappointment was quite personal for actor Saif Ali Khan, who was the lead star and the producer of the movie. In a recent video, the actor said they had a massive budget to make Agent Vinod, but it still ended up as a failure. He also called it a learning experience, because he picked many skills while filming it.
During a chat on Rotoris’ YouTube channel, Saif sat down for a conversation with comedian-actor Vir Das, sarod player Ayaan Ali Bangash, chef Prateek Sadhu, and wildlife presenter-filmmaker Suyash Keshari. While having a candid conversation with them about failures, Saif shared, “We produced a film, Agenda Vinod. We had just had a successful production company. We could have made anything and we got vast budgets to make it. It opened well, but didn’t really work. That was a failure, we learnt. We produced it well, we did good music.”
The actor further added that even if his films fail, the efforts that went into it was real. “Films fail all the time, but the effort of making them… We had to learn various skills and kind of do stuff. We had gone to Vietnam to learn a certain kind of martial art. In our business, it’s a failure at the moment, but if you worked hard, you learned or picked something up, it’s still ok.”
‘Made the film for myself’
During an interview with Variety India, in June this year, Saif Ali Khan called Agent Vinod a ‘vanity project’. Reflecting on the film’s failure, he said, “I think of Agent Vinod as a film that might have been vain. But also, that film opened really well, you know. It’s just that it did not sustain because it probably wasn’t a tightly made film, or it went off track in many ways. Or, as Sriram himself said, he put too many toppings on the pizza.”
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He continued, “But the idea wasn’t bad, and the title wasn’t bad, and it was the right film to make. Imagine a kind of spy movie ahead of its time, perhaps. It was a cool film, but it should have held more. Maybe we made some makes. But my point is: it was vanity. I was excited to do that. I made the film for myself, but it did open well. So its failure was not because it was a vain idea.”
Claims of excessive interference from Saif and Kareena
The actor’s statements came days after actor Lalit Parimoo, who was also a part of the movie, claimed that Agent Vinod tanked because of too much interference from the lead actors, Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor Khan. While talking to Siddharth Kannan, he had said, “I think the main reason was that there was too much interference from the stars, Saif and Kareena. The way Sriram wanted to make that film, he couldn’t make it that way. He was constantly being told what he should do, so it became a mess. The writing and the direction team… They didn’t get to present what they wanted. That was the flaw of the film.”Story continues below this ad
The 2012 action spy-thriller drama was directed Sriram Raghavan. Besides Saif and Kareena, the film also starred Adil Hussain, Ravi Kishan, Prem Chopra, Ram Kapoor, and Gulshan Grover. Produced Saif Ali Khan and Dinesh Vijan, the music was composed Pritam. Agent Vinod narrated the story of a RAW officer Vinod (Saif Ali Khan) who travels the world to put an end to a major terror plan of a stolen nuclear suitcase bomb targeted at New Delhi.