Apr 23, 2026 7:14pm IST
‘Dev.D’: Ahead of Its Time or Impossible Today? Anurag Kashyap, Abhay Deol Revisit Cult Disruptor (EXCLUSIVE)
When “Dev.D” returns to theaters on April 24, it does so with a reputation that has only grown sharper with time. But for Anurag Kashyap, the label that has followed the film for years is one he rejects outright. “Before time, ahead of its time, are the worst kind of explanations for a filmmaker,” he says. “You end up being called that for decades and still wait for one film that works the moment it releases.”
It is a blunt dismantling of a phrase often used to redeem films that fail commercially but find life later. And few Hindi films embody that journey as clearly as “Dev.D,” Kashyap’s fractured, contemporary take on “Devdas.” At the time of its release, the film divided audiences and underperformed. Today, it is widely seen as a cultural marker, a film that anticipated shifts in tone, storytelling and character design that would later become mainstream.
Anurag Kashyap insists none of it was calculated. “I don’t know how to make that kind of film where you study the market. I cannot follow what is selling. For me, filmmaking was always about what I am feeling, what triggers something in me.”
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That instinct led to a version of Devdas that actively resisted nostalgia. The blueprint was familiar, but the execution was not. The idea, as Kashyap recalls, came in a moment of casual imagination with Abhay Deol. “He said, imagine there is some bar in LA, an Indian girl dancing there, and a boy walks in, heartbroken, and falls for her. I said then what? He said this is Devdas,” says Anurag.
From there, the film became an exercise in subtraction and reinvention. Kashyap removed what audiences expected and replaced it with the textures of a rapidly changing India. “People had already seen the Shah Rukh Khan version. They knew the key elements. So, I took those away and filled the gaps with what was happening then. Social media, cameras, everything.”
What “Dev.D” captured was not just a story but a moment. Its language, its gaze and its moral ambiguity were inseparable from the time it was made in. That specificity is also why Kashyap believes it cannot exist in the same form today.
“You cannot make a Dev.D today,” he says. “Anything authentic will not be received as easily as something inauthentic, and that's a fact no one can deny.”
For Abhay Deol, who anchored the film with a performance that redefined the Hindi film anti-hero, the idea of being “ahead of its time” is equally suspect. “No. It never does,” he says when asked if that time ever arrives. “If I make today what I want to make, I would still be told it is ahead of its time. It is a blessing and a curse.”
That paradox reflects a deeper structural shift in the industry. The space for experimentation, both Kashyap and Deol suggest, has narrowed as filmmaking has become more system-driven. “Corporate structures work with something they can put a number to,” Deol says. “That is why the formula is repeated. You cannot put in something that has never been made before unless someone allows space for experiment.”
“Dev.D” thrived precisely because it did not fit into that logic. Its tone shifted between satire and tragedy. Its approach to intimacy was raw and unfiltered. Its narrative moved with a looseness that came from trust rather than design. Deol recalls that fluidity on set was central to the film’s identity. “He hardly gave me lines. I just made them up, and he kept it. Between action and cut, we were just flowing.”
That sense of freedom extended to the film’s portrayal of desire and vulnerability, elements that are now mediated through evolving industry practices. While Deol has not worked with intimacy coordinators, he acknowledges their place in a changing ecosystem. “You are more vulnerable in certain scenes. It is important to make co-actors feel at ease. I think intimacy coaches should exist.”
But beyond craft, both actors point to a broader cultural shift. Kashyap frames it in stark terms. “We have gone backward a bit. Things that were once scandalous became classics over time. You have to go through that cycle.”
In that context, “Dev.D” feels both timely and out of place. Its provocations, which once felt disruptive, now sit in a landscape that is simultaneously more open and more cautious.
Deol points to another factor that shaped the film’s afterlife. Visibility. “Most people who love the film say they discovered it later. They did not even know when it was released. It developed a following over time.”
That delayed recognition complicates the idea of success. Was “Dev.D” misunderstood, or simply underexposed? “Half the battle is making it,” Deol says. “The other half is releasing it. That is where many of these films lost.”
Today, with distribution models more controlled and marketing more targeted, that kind of organic discovery is harder to come by. The system, as Deol puts it, is not built for risk. “Corporate structures are not made to experiment. They are made to exploit.”
And yet, the continued interest in “Dev.D” suggests that the appetite for such storytelling remains. The film’s return to theaters is not just an exercise in nostalgia. It is a test.
Does it still provoke? Does it still feel dangerous? Does it still belong? Perhaps the more relevant question is the one both Kashyap and Deol circle back to in different ways. Not whether “DevD” was ahead of its time, but whether the present has moved closer to it or further away?
Seventeen years on, “Dev.D” remains less a relic and more a reminder. Of a moment when instinct overruled calculation. When discomfort was not softened. And when a filmmaker could take a familiar story and break it open without asking if it would work.
Dev.D re-release in PVR-INOX on April 24, 2026.
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