Bollywood actress Sonam Kapoor, the daughter of Anil Kapoor, and acclaimed director Shekhar Kapur expressed their disappointment at not being informed or consulted about a new ‘Mr India’ film being made. The 1987 blockbuster, starring Kapoor as lead, was a path-breaker in Bollywood.
Sonam called the development ‘underhanded’ and ‘disrespectful’ to the artists involved in the original.
“My father didn’t even know that the film was being remade, we found out about it through social media when Ali Abbas Zafar [director] tweeted it. It’s quite disrespectful and underhanded if it is true and no one bothered to consult my father or Shekhar uncle, two people who played a major role in making the film what it was and is,” she said on her social media handles.
Last week, director Ali Abbas Zafar and producers Zee Studios made the announcement of a trilogy, calling it a re-imagining of the iconic 1987 blockbuster ‘Mr India’. Their version will feature superheroes, they claimed.
‘Mr India’ remains an iconic Bollywood sci-fi fantasy that released in 1987 starring Anil Kapoor and the late actress Sridevi.
Director Kapur threw his weight behind Sonam’s thoughts and condemned being kept in the dark.
“No one has even asked me or mentioned to me about this film called ‘Mr India 2’. I can only guess that they are using to title to get a big weekend. For they cannot use the characters/story without permission from the original creators of the film,” said Kapur on his Twitter handle.
Javed Akhtar, the co-writer of the original ‘Mr India’, feels that the makers behind the sequel aren’t legally bound to inform the artists from the original.
“Today Shekhar Kapur is offended because no one has consulted him about this new project. Why should they? They may or may not be morally bound to inform the people involved with the original film. But they are not legally bound to do so. And where was his sense of creative outrage when he had disregarded the bound script of ‘Mr India’ that we had given to producer Boney Kapoor and Shekhar? Shekhar chose to do his own thing back then. Today when other people are doing the same he is upset,” said Akhtar in an interview with journalist Subhash K Jha.
Reports that Shah Rukh Khan will play the villain and that Arjun Kapoor or Ranveer Singh will play the part played by Anil are doing the rounds now.
Last week, Shariq Patel, CEO of Zee Studios, had stressed that the trilogy isn’t a sequel of ‘Mr India’.
“This is not a part 2 or a remake of the older film as recently reported in some sections of the media, but a reimagining of the iconic classic,” said Patel.
