MUMBAI: Producer Sohail Makhlai got the shock of his life recently. He had no idea his 2010 thriller Knock Out was being remade into Telugu until he saw a film being shot on a street in Bangkok recently with a phone booth erected in the middle of the location, playing an important part in the shooting.
Curious and somewhat suspicious, Makhlai inquired about the shooting and was told it was a Telugu film with the superstar Jagpathi Babu in the lead.
That’s how Makhlai got to know that his thriller Knock Out was being made into Telugu.
Makhlai tells Businessofcinema.com, “I had no clue our film was being made into Telugu with such a reputed Telugu actor. During a visit to Bangkok recently I came to know by chance about it. I wish they had taken our permission. Imagine, the Telugu film would have been completed and quietly released and maybe I’d have never come to know.”
Makhlai is in consultation with his Knock Out hero Sanjay Dutt on this rather strange case of an unofficial remake of their film. Various legel possibilities are currently being explored.
Ironically Knock Out had gotten itself into a serious plagiarism charge during its release. The film was said to be an unofficial remake of the 2002 Joel Schumacher film Phone Booth.
Says a source, “Imagine Schumacher strolling on the streets of Mumbai into a shooting where he saw Dutt shooting in a phone booth. He would’ve probably wondered if that’s his film they were doing. That’s the experience which Makhlai went through when he ran into the Telugu star Jagpathi Babu shooting in Bangkok.”
