Apoorva Lakhia

Biography:

Apoorva Lakhia hails from Ahmedabad, India, where he spent his formative years. He received his education at the Lawrence School, Sanawar. Instead of completing a filmmaking program at New York University, he decided to drop out in order to assist Mira Nair in her work on the movie “The Perez Family.” During this time, he also served as an assistant on various American films, including “The Ice Storm,” “A Perfect Murder,” and “Addicted to Love”.

Before embarking on his journey as a film director, Apoorva gained valuable experience as an assistant director on Ashutosh Gowariker’s epic period film “Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India.” His Hollywood experience caught the attention of Aamir Khan, who was looking for someone with expertise in Hollywood-style filmmaking for “Lagaan”.

Farhan Akhtar, in particular, recommended Apoorva due to his prior work with Hollywood casts and crews. Additionally, he worked as the second assistant director on the film “Kama Sutra: A Tale of Love” in 1996.Apoorva made his directorial debut with the 2002 film “Mumbai Se Aaya Mera Dost.” He followed it up with “Ek Ajnabee” in 2005, which featured Amitabh Bachchan and Arjun Rampal in leading roles and was a remake of the 2004 American film “Man on Fire”.

His third film, “Shootout at Lokhandwala,” boasted a star-studded cast and was released on May 25, 2007. It was based on real-life events involving underworld gangsters Maya Dolas and Dilip Buwa. Later in 2007, he directed the short story “Sex on the Beach” as part of the anthology film “Dus Kahaniyaan”.

His subsequent project was “Mission Istanbul,” released in 2008, featuring Vivek Oberoi, Sunil Shetty, Shriya Saran, and Zayed Khan. Notably, North American producer Vikas Kohli of Fatlabs studio collaborated with Mika Singh on the soundtrack for “Mission Istaanbul.”Apart from directing, Apoorva also wrote the story for “Hide & Seek” in 2009, which was directed by Shawn Aranha.

He served as both writer and director for all of his films, starting from his debut until “Mission Istanbul.” In 2010, he made his acting debut in the movie “Knock Out,” where he played a negative role alongside Sanjay Dutt and Irrfan Khan. In 2013, he directed a remake of the influential film “Zanjeer” with Telugu actor Ram Charan, a project funded by Aaditya Kulshreshtha. Then, in 2017, he helmed the film “Haseena Parkar,” which depicted the life of Dawood Ibrahim’s sister and starred Shraddha Kapoor alongside her real-life brother Siddhant Kapoor in leading roles.