PNC to produce the animated version of Shakti Samanta's Howrah Bridge

By Subhash K. Jha Bollywood Hungama News Network

The death of Shakti Samanta has triggered off an unexpected yearning for the Bengali filmmaker's cinema.

At least three major filmmakers in Mumbai including the maestro of poetic cinema considered by many to be the best filmmaker of the post-Raj Kapoor generation are seriously looking at remakes of Shakti Samanta's 1971 classic Amar Prem.

The enterprising Pritish Nandy Communications has already got the ball rolling. They have roped in actor-director Rajat Kapoor to direct an animation version of Shakti Samanta's 1958 thriller Howrah Bridge.

The project has long been in pipeline. Producer Pritish Nandy feels the time to pay an animation homage to one of Hindi cinema's most endearing and enduring creators is now.

"A straightforward remake is a long stretch. Where will get an Ashok Kumar and Madhubala to do a new-age feature version of Howrah Bridge? Rajat Kapoor has directed A Rectangular Love Story for us. And he's the right person to do the animation film. An animation film takes very long to complete. Howrah Bridge is an especially intricate work."

Interestingly Karan Johar is producing an animation version of his own film Kuch Kuch Hota Hai with the original voices of Shah Rukh and Kajol doing the dubbing. The big question about the animation version of Howrah Bridge would be who would dub for Ashok Kumar and Madhubala?

The names being most prominently bandied are Ashok Kumar's nephew singer Amit Kumar and the silken-voiced Vidya Balan. Sushant Singh is the idea choice to dub for the villain K.N. Singh while Mallika Sherawat would lend her throat for Helen

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