At a time when Shah Rukh Khan’s upcoming movie Pathaan has faced massive outrage on social media over its song Besharam Rang, the actor today criticised social media saying it spreads negativity. Shah Rukh Khan made the comments while addressing the inauguration of the Kolkata Film Festival today, which was inaugurated by Amitakh Bachchan in presence of Mamata Banerjee and a host of other movie stars and dignitaries.
After addressing the crowd in Bengali, which he said was prepared by Rani Mukherjee who was also present on the stage, Khan moved onto the topic of cinema and social media. He said that cinema is perhaps the most important medium of modern times. “Cinema, and the advent of articulation of social media platforms, have now become the foremost expression of human experience, and emotion,” Shah Rukh Khan said.
After he went to say, “the collective narrative of our times is shaped by social media. And contrary to belief, that the spread of social media will affect cinema negatively, I believe cinema has even more important role to play now.” After this, Shah Rukh Khan proceeded to criticise social media, saying that “Social media is often driven by a certain narrowness of views, that limits human nature.”
#WATCH | Social media often driven by a certain narrowness of view that limits human nature to its baser self…I read somewhere-negativity increases social media consumption…Such pursuits enclose collective narrative making it divisive & destructive: Shah Rukh Khan at Kolkata pic.twitter.com/LO1X5YUXh4
— ANI (@ANI) December 15, 2022
The filmstar further added he has read somewhere that negativity increases social media consumption, and thereby increases its commercial value as well. He added that such pursuits enclose collective narrative, which makes it divisive and destructive.
Shah Rukh Khan said that cinema exposes the vulnerability of human nature by telling stories in the simplest form. Therefore, it is placed to sustain a collective counter-narrative ‘that speaks to the larger nature of human kind its baser self,’ He added.
Kolkata Film Festival is being held after a gap of three years due to the Covid-19 pandemic, and it saw a grand opening ceremony. While Amitabh Bachchan inaugurated the event, Shah Rukh Khan, Jaya Bachchan, Rani Mukerji, Arijit Singh, Shatrughan Sinha, Mahesh Bhatt, Kumar Sanu, Saurabh Ganguli and several other dignitaries were present at the event.
