Saif the producer inspired on Clint

Saif started his Illuminati Films, after hearing the story of how Clint Eastwood started his production company

Not many people know that Saif Ali Khan is a huge fan of Clint Eastwood and has even styled his production company Illuminati Films after the Hollywood actor's production house Malpaso Productions.

Says a source close to Saif, "Clint is Saif's favorite actor and he has grown up watching Clint's films. He also has a vast DVD collection of all of his films and has adorned his Bandra office with his posters."

According to the source, "Saif was toying with the idea of launching his own production house but was wary of taking the first step. Then one day Saif saw Clint's interview in which he narrated how he started his production house. When Clint mentioned to a friend that he wanted to produce films, his friend replied 'malpaso', which means a bad step in Spanish. But instead of deterring Clint, it spurred him to make movies he believed in and that's how he launched Malpaso Productions."

The source adds, "Saif was fascinated by the story and he woke up his business partner Dinesh Vijan in the middle of the night. He suggested to Dinesh to start working on the venture even though people may think it's a bad step."

The next step was finalising a name for production house. Says the friend, "Saif is fond of reading Dan Brown's novels and he loved the term Illuminati from Angels And Demons."