From Parineeta, Laaga Chunari Mein Daag to Helicopter Eela: A look at Pradeep Sarkar's films

Late filmmaker Pradeep Sarkar had directed several movies from Parineeta, and Laaga Chunari Mein Daag to Helicopter Eela. Here's a look at some of his films. ...read more

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Published on Mar 24, 2023 04:37 PM IST

Parineeta is a 2005 musical romance film adaptation of Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay's 1914 Bengali novel of the same name. This was Pradeep Sarkar's first directorial based upon a screenplay by the film's producer, Vidhu Vinod Chopra. The film stars Vidya Balan, Saif Ali Khan, Sanjay Dutt, Raima Sen, Sabyasachi Chakrabarty and Dia Mirza.

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Pradeep Sarkar in an interview with Businessofcinema.com in 2007 had said about Parineeta, "In my films, the place where people stay also becomes a character, the place is like a moving factor which helps to carry forward the story. I shot Parineeta in Kolkata because I knew the place inside out."

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Laaga Chunari Mein Daag is a 2007 drama film directed by Pradeep Sarkar and produced by Aditya Chopra. It stars Jaya Bachchan, Rani Mukerji, Konkona Sen Sharma, Anupam Kher, Kunal Kapoor and Abhishek Bachchan. 

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Speaking with Businessofcinema.com in 2007 Pradeep Sarkar had spoken about Laaga Chunari Mein Daag. He had said, "I shot Laaga Chunari Main Daag in Benaras because I had shot 7-8 music videos there. The local people, the food, the small-small lanes, animals add a lot to the movie. Moreover if you don't take your actors to a real location, it looks like they are acting in limbo. In an air conditioned studio they may not emote well."

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Lafangey Parindey is a 2010 romantic drama film directed by Pradeep Sarkar and produced by Aditya Chopra. The film features Neil Nitin Mukesh and Deepika Padukone in the lead roles. The story of the film is partially inspired from the 1978 American film, Ice Castles and the 1999 Tamil film, Thulladha Manamum Thullum.

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The film also stars Kay Kay Menon, Piyush Mishra, Manish Choudhary and Namit Das. In the film, Deepika plays an aspiring skater who dreams big. However, she loses her eyesight in an accident. Later, Neil's character helps her train.

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Mardaani is a 2014 action thriller film directed by Pradeep Sarkar and produced by Aditya Chopra. The film stars Rani Mukerji, with Jisshu Sengupta, Tahir Raj Bhasin and Saanand Verma in supporting roles. The story revolves around a cop Shivani Shivaji Roy (Rani) who uncover secrets of human trafficking while solving a case of kidnapped teenage girl.

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The film received positive reviews and emerged a commercial success. Rani was lauded for her performance. Mardaani had a sequel titled Mardaani 2 which released in 2019.

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Helicopter Eela is a 2018 comedy-drama film directed by Pradeep Sarkar. It features Kajol in the lead role as an aspiring singer and single mother. It is based on the Gujarati play Beta, Kaagdo, written by Anand Gandhi.

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Talking about the film with Mumbai Mirror, Pradeep had said in 2017, "I was offered the script around four months ago. It took me a while to understand the Gujarati tone but eventually I fell in love with this extremely emotional story which boasts of some really strong characters and there's a chance of people getting really close to them."