Ever since the first trailer for the Ajay Devgn- and Amitabh Bachchan-starrer aviation thriller Runway 34 (2022) was released, audiences have been remarking about the film's similarity to two of last decade's acclaimed Hollywood aviation thrillers — the Denzel Washington-starrer Flight (2012) and the Tom Hanks-starrer Sully: Miracle On The Hudson (2016).
Asked about this at a recent media interaction, the actor, who has also produced and directed the film, shot back: "Not every aviation thriller is a remake of Flight and Sully."
About the film's actual inspiration, Devgn said, "I can only say our film is based on a true incident, so there is no question of it being a remake of any other film.
"This story came to me three years ago," he continued. "I really liked the story and told the writers to make a few changes in the script. At that time I was not planning to direct it. After almost a year, during the pandemic, I suddenly remembered about this script. I called them, we met and started working on it. After two or three months the script became so interesting that I decided to direct it myself."
Runway 34 was earlier titled as Mayday. The makers decided to change the title last year. Asked the reason for the change, Devgn said, "Mayday is the final distress call made by the pilot of an aircraft facing an emergency situation. But most people did not know what it meant.
"We initially thought we would give them a brief idea about the terminology through some promos," he continued. "Then one day I was sitting with a very educated senior man and he casually asked, 'Yeh Mayday Labour Day pe hai kya [Is your film based on International Labour Day]?' I was stunned. I thought if such an educated and knowledgeable guy doesn't know what Mayday is, I better change the title. The film's story revolves around runway 34, so we thought let's go with that title."
Runway 34, which also stars Rakul Preet Singh, Boman Irani and Angira Dhar, is scheduled to be released on 29 April.