The 2015 Malayalam hit Premam will now be made into a Bollywood film. The original movie, written and directed by Alphonse Puthren, was also released in Tamil and Telugu.
Arjun Kapoor has been roped in to play the lead, reported The Times of India and Abhishek Kapoor will be directing the film. In the Malayalam original, Nivin Pauly played George, the goofy, loveable, mildly clueless protagonist. A coming-of-age romantic drama, Premam brought back simple story telling that was the hallmark of Malayalam cinema in the 80s.
The three actresses to play the leads in the Bollywood version haven’t been finalised. In the original, they were played by Anupama Parameswaran, Sai Pallavi and Madonna Sebastian – who all made their Malayalam debut in this film. It would be interesting to see if we will get to see newcomers or if the director will go with safe choices such as Parneeti Chopra or Alia Bhatt.
The film, which was produced on a low budget of around Rs 5 crore turned out to be one of the highest grossing Malayalam movies ever made. It was produced by Anwar Rasheed under the banner of Anwar Rasheed Entertainment. The film became the second highest grossing Malayalam movie in 2015, but the release of Oppam and Pulimurugan made Premam the fourth highest-grossing Malayalam movie of all time with a global collection of Rs 60 crores.
Recommended
Abhishek Kapoor has directed films such as Rock On and the coming-of-age drama Kai Po Che. Arjun Kapoor, on the other hand, has a series of movies in the pipeline, including two with his Ishaqzaade co-star Parneeti Chopra, namely Sandeep Aur Pinky Faraar and Namastey England.
Previously, there was a Telugu remake of the movie that came out in 2016, with Naga Chaitanya in the lead. The Telugu version was directed by Chandoo Mondeti.
There isn’t a tentative date announced on when the movie will go on the floor. But hopes are high for Arjun Kapoor fans that the actor will be seen in three different getups for the film.