Ashkay Kumar and Preity Zinta, who play a husband and wife, filming for Jaaneman in New York in Oct 2005. Photo Credit: LawrenceSchwartzwald/Splash News

Jaaneman’s debutant director, Shirish Kunder, is the husband of choreographer Farha Khan, who in turn is producer Sajid Nadiadwala's sister. No wonder Sajid reportedly told Kunder to treat this as his home production.

Editor turned director Kunder claims Jaaneman will be a film the like of which has never seen before, not even in Hollywood! The script, screenplay, story, dialogues are all his and he is also the editor and director of the film.

Jaaneman is a romantic comedy starring Salman Khan, Preity Zinta and Akshay Kumar. The film was budgeted at Rs 40 crore but has gone well over that figure because of delays in shooting. It was to go on floors in July 2005 but its filming got delayed by two months because of the controversy that ensued from Salman’s alleged phone conversations with Aishwarya Rai. At that time many people had feared that Preity Zinta will opt out of the film as Salman had allegedly directed profanities towards her during his conversation. On the contrary Zinta continued with the film maintaining that the authenticity of the tapes had not been established.

The film started its shooting in Mumbai but soon had to move to New York to avoid the media glare that followed the Salman tape controversy. However, the travails did not end for the filmmakers. During its shooting in New York Salman Khan had to shave off his head because of hair problems. As a result the shooting came to a halt. Salman eventually underwent hair transplant treatment. Talk about bad hair days Salman Khan will be seen in three different hair styles in Jaaneman , out of which one is a bald head!

Jaaneman has been filmed using Super 35 cinemascope, an advanced style of filmmaking with great flexibility with visuals, something the film relies on heavily. Akshay Kumar, who plays the role of an astronaut from NASA, is a geek in the film. Preity who plays Akshay’s wife says she is a fun character in the film. Six feet tall Anupam Kher plays the role of a dwarf suggesting that director Shirish Kunder really played around with the new technology that he got to lay his hands upon.

Jaaneman has got an unprecedented offer of Rs 8 crore for theatrical distribution in Mumbai, which is a record of sorts, says the producer. Mumbai is one of the most lucrative territories for Bollywood. Times of India reported that the last film sold for such a high price was Rang De Basanti for Rs 4.75 crore with prints. (It managed to rake in Rs 8 crores.) Shah Rukh Khan’s blockbuster Main Hoon Naa was sold for Rs 3.5 crore.

No release date has been fixed for the film as yet but the producer says it'll be sometime in August 2006. Since 2006 is a year of big Bollywood releases, Nadiadwala does not want the release of Jaaneman to clash with another biggie. The film’s music is expected to be released in end of July 2006.

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