Biografia

Stunning visuals

Wide angle tracking shots

Works frequently with the producer and a friend in personal life Ritesh Sidhwani. Till now, as of 2009, he has produced all the films directed by Farhan

Frequently works with the music director trio of Shankar Mahadevan, Ehsaan Noorani and Loy Mendonsa credited as Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy. Till 2009 they have composed music in all the films that Farhan has directed (O Que o Coração Deseja (2001), Um Soldado Apaixonado (2004), Don (2006)) and starred in (Rock On!! (2008) and Luck by Chance (2009))

Most of his movies feature a protagonist who is a coming of age person, who is very naive and immature and through the course of the film has a drastic transformation mentally turning out to become a very mature and responsible character (e.g. O Que o Coração Deseja (2001), Um Soldado Apaixonado (2004) and Rock On!! (2008))

He is exactly one day older than actor Hrithik Roshan, who's a close friend in personal life.

In an interview on the talk show "The Lounge" with Simone Singh (on the Indian channel CNBC-TV18), Akhtar said that when he left college, he spent about two years at home and did nothing productive. During those two years, he watched about two films daily. Akhtar said that it was this period of his life which allowed him to connect with Karan Shergill, the protagonist of Um Soldado Apaixonado (2004). Lakshya, which film Akhtar directed, begins with Karan as a young, unemployed slacker who stays at home, sleeps late, and has no ambition or aim in life.

He loves to write poetry in English and Urdu.

Farhan did something very unconventional in Bollywood by singing all his songs himself for the movie Rock On!! (2008) as the movie featured him as a rockstar. Before this movie a very few other actors have done something similar but just for one song and that too experimentally, but Farhan by using his own voice corrected an age-old error which had become a norm of Hindi movies, i.e. the voice of the actor changing during songs because of a totally different voice of playback singer lending his/her voice in the song for the actor on screen.

He directed the music video for the 1998 hit song "Breathless" from the debut album of Shankar Mahadevan, which made him famous. Later on Farhan Akhtar and Shankar Mahadevan went on to collaborate in every movie Farhan directed, with Shankar composing the music for his films as the trio Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy (Shankar Mahadevan, Ehsaan Noorani and Loy Mendonsa).

[on his suddenly isolating from the outer world during the shooting of Ligando para Mim (2010) - June (2009)] It was the nature of the character I was playing. He's a guy lost in his world. So I was making an effort to isolate myself. Lately I've just been switching off from the world for the sake of my character. If you want to call it method acting, so be it.

[(February 2009) On the title sequence of his sister's film Luck by Chance (2009), which presents very humanely the crew working behind the scenes in films] At the end of the day when you are working, that's the truth of it. I mean glamour is something that comes from adulation by people who idolize their stars from watching their movies. That adds to glamour. But when you are working, today especially, unlike before in 1994 when I was an assistant, there was a lot more hierarchal kind of a system, you couldn't really go upto the lead actor and start talking to them, but now everyone treats each other with a lot more respect, they understand that someone is putting on manual labour. It's not 'creative' labour though but at the end of the day he is working really hard to make sure your film looks a certain way. We wanted that to put this in a bit of focus in this film.

[(February 2009) On why his film Luck by Chance (2009) was found too slow paced by viewers] It's a different pace, I agree. All films will have a different pace. It's important for the audience to view a movie as it is meant to be. You can't go in to a movie with a pre-conceived notion that I want to go in and have fun or something. You have to understand what a film is. Life, 'as' a film, unfolds at a different pace depending on different kind of stories. The movie is a lot about introspection. It's dealing a lot with what's going on within people's lives, within their characters. And there are so many characters, it's not a linear story with one person being followed through and through so it will take a little bit of time to build up. Because in the first half you are catching up with so many different characters, 'establishing their lives', so it may seem a little scattered which at times may be a little exhausting to watch but that's the nature of the story and you can't escape that.

[February 2009] I personally feel that since we (the Indian audience) are used to watching a certain kind of entertainment (the typical traditional bollywood movie) it'll take time for everybody to move on from expecting a routine typical Indian movie and accept a different kind of a movie like say Rock On!! (2008) or Quarta-Feira (2008). It will take a while for such movies to maybe attain a huge blockbuster status but, slowly but surely, people will realize that okay we need to apply ourselves to watching a movie.

[Feb. 2009 - on being asked if he'll act some time in a movie directed by himself] No. I don't intend on directing myself in a movie. At least not in a near future.