A filmy tribute to Charlie Chaplin

Director Bhavna Talwar is converting Happi, her homage to Charlie Chaplin with Pankaj Kapoor as a desi Chaplin, into a black-and-white format, which she feels best suits the theme of the movie.

"It seemed like a mad and expensive thing to do. But it also seemed right for the theme. If we're doing a homage to Charlie Chaplin, we need to take it to highest threshold that a homage could go," said Talwar.

"When we saw the finished product and how profoundly sincere a tribute Pankajji had paid to Chaplin, we couldn't resist turning it into black-and-white because that was the colour complexion of Chaplin's cinematic world," she added.

A filmy tribute to Charlie Chaplin

The film is about survival of a social misfit and Talwar shot and completed Happi with Pankaj playing a neo-Chaplin going through a series of almost-silent Chapliesque adventures in Mumbai.

The film was to be released on Chaplin's birth anniversary on April 16, has now been postponed, with very good reason.

While Happi is being converted from its original colour to a black-and-white format, old Hindi classics in Hindi Mughal-e-Azam, Naya Daur and Hum Dono were converted from the original black-and-white to colour.

Bhavna admits it's been an arduous journey.

"We've gone from frame-to-frame with our colour revision. We also got a new editor Sreekar Prasad to re-edit the black-and-white material. Now, in the non-colour version, Pankajji will be seen paying the ultimate tribute to Chaplin."

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