Kaakka Muttai, one of Tamil cinema’s most acclaimed films in 2015, is being remade in Marathi, with the title Half Ticket. The film is directed by Samit Kakkad, director of the 2012 dance film Aayna Ka Bayna. Speaking to Silverscreen, Samit said, “After watching Kaakka Muttai, I felt that it was a universal subject. The producer, Nanubhai Jaisinghani, and I decided that the film has to be told, and I expressed my happiness to direct it.” As an official remake of Kaakka Muttai, Half Ticket will be distributed by the same distributors, Fox Star Studios. This will be their first Marathi film.
When asked about what sparked his interest in a Marathi remake of Kaakka Muttai, Samit says, “The story relates to Mumbai so much! And Mumbai is known for its vast slums like Dharavi, where these days there are tours taking place around it. Mumbai is a city where the rich and the poor are immediate neighbours. It was a challenge shooting in the slums, but the journey has been a memorable one. And we have tweaked a few elements of the original to suit the Maharashtrian culture.”
The best part of Kaakka Muttai was the performance of the child stars Ramesh and Vignesh, who play brothers in the film. Though Samit could not reveal the identity of the actors cast for Half Ticket, he said they had been selected after auditioning 400 entries. “The children do not have prior acting experience, so they had to take up a workshop. I used to take them to slums and make them talk to different people, make them do some tasks like selling something to people and so on.”
Half Ticket is in the final stages of production.
