Bollywood's love for Bengal

After the success of films such as Kahaani, Vicky Donor and Barfi! last year, Bollywood filmmakers’ romance with Kolkata continues this year too, with as many as five forthcoming films being shot in the capital of West Bengal.

After the success of films such as Kahaani, Vicky Donor and Barfi! last year, Bollywood filmmakers’ romance with Kolkata continues this year too, with as many as five forthcoming films being shot in the capital of West Bengal.

While parts of Akshay Kumar’s last release Special 26 were also shot in Kolkata, other films that are being shot there include Tigmanshu Dhulia’s Bullet Raja starring Saif Ali Khan and Sonakshi Sinha, Ali Abbas Zafar’s Gunday that has actors Arjun Kapoor, Ranveer Singh and Priyanka Chopra in the lead, Ranvir-Sonakshi starrer Lootera, made by Vikramaditya Motwane, parts of Shoojit Sircar’s upcoming flick Madras Cafe starring John Abraham and Nargis Fakhri, and the sequel to Sujoy Ghosh’s Kahaani.

Makers say that it’s the classic panoramic old world charm coupled with cheap labour and a talent pool of local actors in the city that takes them to Kolkata.

“People have exhausted Mumbai locations while a lot still remains to be explored in Kolkata,” says filmmaker Shoojit Sircar, who recently shot a sequence in Kolkata for Madras Cafe.

Agrees filmmaker Sujoy Ghosh, who is scripting the sequel to Kahaani. “I re-discovered the charm of the city I grew up in, and hence I will continue to enamour people with it even in the sequel,” says Ghosh.