Kuch Kuch Hota Hai

After the experience of assisting and acting in Aditya Chopra's directorial debut, the romantic drama Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995), Karan Johar was encouraged to try his own hand at directing. With Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, he chose to pair up the same lead actors, Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol, for his own romance film.[4] During the filming of Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, Khan had also encouraged Johar to make his own film, and said that he would be willing to star in it.[5] They were signed by producer and his father Yash Johar in early 1997.[6] Yash Johar officially announced the film in October 1997 at Mehboob Studios in Bandra.[7]

Johar first wrote a story, which was a love triangle between a tomboy, a very pretty girl, and a slightly insensitive boy, but he shelved the idea because he was not very satisfied with it. Then he wrote another plot about a widower and his child, which he shelved as well. Eventually, he decided to merge the two stories into one. He explained in an interview with Rediff.com: "It was about the trauma of a widower and his little child. How the child really wants a mother and how she brings her mother into her father's life. Then I thought: Why not bring a youth aspect to the story? Why not a flashback? That's how the story got made."[5] The story also includes a "personal desires vs. parental loyalties" theme and has some "East meets West" themes, but instead of the characters going abroad, it creates a virtual West inside India.[8]

This film marked Karan Johar directorial debut

Karan Johar was certain from the beginning that he wanted to cast Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol in the lead roles, having observed them during the making of Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge.[9] It took longer to fill the role of Tina. The role was written with Twinkle Khanna in mind, but she turned it down.[10] Other actresses such as Urmila Matondkar, Tabu, Shilpa Shetty, Aishwarya Rai, Raveena Tandon and Karisma Kapoor were offered the role but also turned it down.[10] Aditya Chopra and Shah Rukh Khan noticed Rani Mukherji's acting in Raja Ki Aayegi Baraat (1996), and suggested her to Karan Johar. He thus signed her, giving a boost to her career.[11][12] Saif Ali Khan and Chandrachur Singh were initially offered the role of Aman, but they both turned it down, thus prompting Johar to rope in Salman Khan.[12]

Johar, who is also a costume designer, wanted to set a new level for style in Hindi cinema with this film. He and his friend Manish Malhotra, the film's costume designer, made trips to London for costumes, much to the chagrin of his father and producer Yash Johar, who was concerned about the budget. Many of the costumes in the film prominently displayed logos from designers such as DKNY and Polo.[13] In addition to the designer fashions, Johar also created a somewhat fantastical world where the students speak Hinglish and enjoy a pristine college campus, where there is no crime or hate, and traditional Hindu values are pervasive.[14] Johar admitted that the look and feel of the college scenes in the film were patterned after Beverly Hills 90210, saying, "The art, the costumes, tilt toward the West, but the soul of the film is Indian."[15] He hired Sharmishta Roy as art director, and told her to produce something similar to Riverdale High School of the Archie Comics, with some 90210 influence as well. Johar said of the outcome, "If you see KKHH, Shahrukh plays Archie, Rani Mukherji plays Veronica, and Kajol played Betty. It was exactly that. And the principal looked like Weatherbee, and Ms. Grundy was Archana Puran Singh."[16] Johar also hired Farah Khan to do the choreography, Jatin–Lalit to provide the music, Santosh Thundiyil as cinematographer, and Nikhil Advani as his associate director. Shabina Khan assisted Manish Malhotra with costume design.

Filming began on 21 August 1997. The crew was young and inexperienced to the point where Shah Rukh Khan had to explain basic technicalities of filming. Khan later said, "Karan makes no bones of the fact that his technical knowledge of filmmaking was not at its peak when he made the biggest hit of the decade."[13] The entire film was shot in nine and half months[5] with a substantial part of it shot in Mauritius.[17][18] The title song was filmed over a ten-day period.[19] in several picturesque locations in Scotland,[20] including Eilean Donan, Glen Coe, Loch Lomond and Tantallon Castle with the nearby Bass Rock as a backdrop in one scene.[21][22] The scenes from the summer camp in Shimla were filmed at Wenlock Downs in Ooty, Tamil Nadu.[23]

During the bicycle sequence in the song "Yeh Ladka Hai Deewana", Kajol lost control of her bike, fell flat on her face, and was knocked unconscious while also injuring her knee. During the promotional Making of Kuch Kuch Hota Hai TV special, Kajol stated that the accident was her most memorable part of shooting the film because she doesn't remember it.[24] During preparation for the reunion scene where the two leads met after more than 8 years apart, the director told them to improvise and rehearse the reactions that they might use, but he secretly taped them and was so happy with the result that it was put into the film.[25]

While comparing the film to Dil To Pagal Hai (1997), Nikhat Kazmi of The Times of India gave Kuch Kuch Hota Hai 3.5 out of 5 stars. She especially liked the performance of Kajol, and thought that the film would appeal to young and romantic viewers primarily for its "MTV ambience" and "Valentine's Day flavours". On the negative side, she said "The second half, however, gets drowned in a sea of emotions. Too many people begin to cry a bit too much."[35] Anish Khanna of Planet Bollywood rated the film 9.5 out of 10 stars, calling it "pure escapist cinema at its best." He praised the cinematography, choreography, set decoration, and also raved over Kajol's performance, along with her onscreen chemistry with Shah Rukh Khan. Overall, he said, "Karan Johar makes an impressive directorial debut, has a good script sense, and knows how to make a film with S-T-Y-L-E."[36] In contrast to these views, the reaction of Sujata C J, writing for Rediff.com, was that the film was very disappointing, with many cliches and a bad storyline, though Santosh Thundiyil and Sharmishta Roy were praised for their camerawork and art direction, respectively.[37] Nandita Chowdhury in a review for India Today, said that Karan Johar was almost able to rekindle the Khan-Kajol magic of Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, and that overall the film was "a good distraction".[18]

In January 2023, IndieWire ranked Kuch Kuch Hota Hai as the world's best romantic comedy (rom-com) on Netflix, above Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010) at number two and Notting Hill (1999) at number three. IndieWire writers Kate Erbland and Alison Foreman called Kuch Kuch Hota Hai "a love triangle for the ages" and said it is "a bittersweet and bubbly story of young love, missed opportunity, and female friendship" with "what’s quite possibly the most romantic gazebo scene of all time."[38]

There were great expectations for Kuch Kuch Hota Hai leading up to its premiere, because it re-united the Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge team of Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol, and specifically concerning the debut of Karan Johar, whether he would be in the same league as Aditya Chopra as a first-time writer/director.[36]

According to Box Office India, the film grossed ₹80.12 crore (US$19.41 million) in India and $6.3 million (₹26.61 crore) in other countries, for a worldwide total of ₹1.06 billion (US$25.69 million), against its ₹10 crore (US$2.42 million) budget. It became the third film to gross over ₹1 billion (US$24.23 million) worldwide in the 1990s, after Hum Aapke Hain Koun..! (1994) and Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge.[39] It had a worldwide opening weekend of ₹8.06 crore (US$1.95 million), and grossed ₹15.13 crore (US$3.67 million) in its first week.[3] It is the highest-grossing Bollywood film of 1998 worldwide. It also became the third highest-grossing Indian film then, behind Hum Aapke Hain Koun..! and Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge.[40][41]

It opened on Friday, 16 October 1998, across 240 screens, along with Bade Miyan Chote Miyan, and earned ₹87 lakh (US$210,818.63) nett on its opening day. It grossed ₹2.74 crore (US$663,957.53) nett in its opening weekend, and went on to record the second-highest first week of the year with collections around ₹5.64 crore (US$1.37 million) nett, after Bade Miyan Chote Miyan which grossed ₹6.33 crore (US$1.53 million) nett.[42] The film earned a total of ₹46.86 crore (US$11.36 million) nett, plus a distributor share of ₹29.88 crore (US$7.24 million), and was declared an "All-Time Blockbuster" by Box Office India.[3] It is the highest-grossing film of 1998 in India.[43]

It had an opening weekend of $800,000 (₹3.38 crore) and went on to gross $1.3 million (₹5.49 crore) in its first week. It became the first film to cross $5 million mark outside India, and became the highest grosser at that time. According to Box Office India, the film earned a total of $6.3 million (₹26.61 crore) overseas.[3] According to the book Global Bollywood, the film grossed $8 million in overseas markets outside India.[44] It became the second Bollywood film to break into the UK box office top 10 after Dil Se.. which was released the same year, and went on to gross $2 million.[45][46] It was a bigger box office success than Titanic when it was screened in Indonesia.[47] Overseas, It is the highest-grossing Bollywood film of 1998.[48]