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Anurag Basu Biography

About Anurag Basu

Anurag Basu is an Indian film director and writer, known for directing films which tackle themes of dark passion and adultery  like Life in a... Metro, Gangster and Murder. Basu was nominated in the Best Director  category at the 53rd Filmfare Awards in 2008 for Life in a... Metro. He has also directed TV serials for Indian channels. He was diagnosed with acute leukemia in 2004 and underwent chemotherapy thereafter.

Anurag Basu started his career in the television industry, directing Tara, one of longest running soaps of the 90s. He was in his mid-twenties when he started, and went on to direct 70 episodes.He went ahead to direct more television serials and tried different genres ranging from daily soaps to thrillers like Saturday Suspense and horror X-Zone. His most successful work during this period was Balaji Telefilms daily soap Koshish ...ek aashaa in 1998, which went on to become one of the top shows on Zee TV.In 2002, Basu directed the TV series Miit, which was based on the novel Noukadubi, written by the Indian poet and writer Rabindranath Tagore.

In 2007, he returned to the television circuit to produce and direct the college-drama Love Story for SAB TV.

Basu made his directorial debut in 2003 with the slasher film Kucch To Hai, co-directing with Anil V. Kumar  and starring Tusshar Kapoor, Esha Deol and newcomer Anita Hassanandani. It was produced by Ekta Kapoor, with whom Basu had earlier worked on Koshish ...ek aashaa. Although the film was well promoted and had a decent opening at the box office, it failed commercially as well as critically.

After the failure of his first film, Basu joined Mahesh Bhatt's production company Vishesh Films, where he directed his next four films. The first was a mystery-drama Saaya starring John Abraham and Tara Sharma. It was inspired by the Kevin Costner 2002 thriller Dragonfly, but it failed to register any cash at the box office and was critically panned by the critics for a loose screenplay.

Basu's third film was Murder in 2004, which was inspired by Adrian Lyne's 2002 film Unfaithful.The film dealt with adultery, and contained sex scenes which are unusual in Indian cinema. In spite of getting an A-certificate from the CBFC, the film became Basu's first hit. It was well-received by the critics too, appreciating the performances by Mallika Sherawat, Emraan Hashmi and Ashmit Patel.The music in the film by composer Anu Malik was also a hit, with chartbusters like Kaho Naa Kaho and Bheeghey Hont Tere. The film catapulted Mallika Sherawat and Emraan Hashmi to fame, and Murder, till date, remains one of the few commercially successful adult-certified films in India.Basu's next movie was also with the Mahesh Bhatt camp was titled Gangster .This movie was critically acclaimed and was financially successfull as well, in this film for the first time Basu teamed up with musician Pritam for the first time and the union was a huge success.This success also continued with their second film together 'Life in a Metro'which was also a hit with the critics.Both the movies 'Gangster' and 'Life in a Metro'showed the deftness and maturity of the director.

Anurag Basu's latest movie is Kites, starring Hrithik Roshan, Barbara Mori, and Kangana Ranaut in the lead roles. This movie got released in May 2010.

Anurag Basu was diagnosed with acute leukemia in 2004 when he was halfway through his film Tumsa Nahin Dekha. He was immediately hospitalised where the doctors announced he had two months to live. Basu even directed parts of the film from his hospital bed as shooting could not be cancelled. To complete the film, he would give instructions on a dictaphone, talking about camera angles and the script. Mahesh Bhatt and Mohit Suri finished the film later. Basu underwent chemotherapy and is on medication.His latest film is Kites, starring Hritik Roshan, Barbara Mori and Kangana Ranaut. But this film also failed to meet the expectations.