By Krittivas Mukherjee
Reuters
Tuesday, June 13, 2006; 10:00 PM

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Bollywood icon Amitabh Bachchan has finished shooting for a film about the obsessive love of an old man for a teenage girl, a story the director says was not inspired by the controversial 1955 novel "Lolita."

Director Ram Gopal Varma, known for unconventional films that break away from Bollywood's song-and-dance staple, says "Nishabd" (Silence) is about an old man's emotional tumult juxtaposed with awareness of his age.

"People say it is similar because it is about the love of an elderly man for a younger girl. My film is not an adaptation of Lolita," Varma said.

Indeed, Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita is a pubescent 12 while Varma's heroine -- played by newcomer Jiah Khan -- is 18, an age perhaps chosen to skirt trouble from censors and avoid hurting conservative Indian sensibilities.

"Wait for the surprise," Varma said, when asked if his heroine meets the same fate as Lolita, who dies in childbirth.

Nabokov's "Lolita" dealt with the love of a middle-aged man for a 12-year-old girl, for whom he coined the word "nymphet" to describe the intense attraction.

The story, considered scandalous in the 1950s, was rejected by several prominent American publishers before being finally published. The book generated controversy in Italy and was banned in France, Belgium, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. Elsewhere in the world, parts of it were censored.

Hollywood made two attempts to adapt "Lolita," including one by Stanley Kubrick, but neither was a big success. Both films were banned in India but the book is available.

Varma's "Nishabd" does not have any explicit sex scenes involving Bachchan, now 63, and the young actress.

It was shot for 20 days in southern India and is currently in post-production ahead of its release, scheduled for September.

"Bodies age, but feelings don't. So why should an older man's love age?" Varma said. "Older men fall in love with younger girls but because of their position and maturity they cannot do anything.

"Nishabd is the story of such a man caught between his rationality and his feelings for a young girl."