It's a mad rush to Shundi

If Bhooter Raja was there today, he would have died one more time. At least three sets of people are after his three boons that made Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne famous the world over, and all of them are connected by a common thread that I can no longer call love for cinema. Not so long back, I had told you how Anindya Chattopadhyay was in talks with Arijit Dutta to resurrect the two characters immortalised on screen by Satyajit Ray. Ray’s Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne was produced by Nepal Dutta, grandfather of Arijit and proprietor of Purnima Pictures, and the exhibitor has nostalgic reasons to come up with a 2.0 version of the fantasy-musical. Even as Anindya develops the script, megastar Prosenjit Chatterjee is looking at a modern version of the story. He recently announced to the world that he has been in talks with Sandip Ray and even released the first poster of the film. Though the director of his mega venture is not locked yet, industry insiders tell me that Prosenjit had offered Anindya the venture!
The third party in this drama is a young director called Pavel. In 2016, he got his story titled Abar Hirak Deshe registered with The Film Writers Association, Mumbai, and has since been skilfully working on the film’s storyboard. Gossip mongers say Pavel was in touch with Prosenjit two years back and not only narrated him the story but vouched to make the film for him and no one else. Should the three individuals make their own versions of Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne, it will be a bigger battle than Byomkesh Bakshi’s. But then, for the aam Bengali, Shundi in summers is not a bad idea after all!