The 60s era mystery thriller will soon become a franchise.
By Tathagata Mitra
BANGALORE: There is good news for Himesh Reshammiya. Not only has his latest tryst into Bollywood turned into a hit, but now the word is that it will be screened in Norway at the Bollywood film festival.
The festival director of Norwegian Bollywood Festival recently sent an invitation to the producer of The Xposé, Rakesh Upadyay, for attending the film festival and having the film as the closing film for the festival, which is to be held on September 11.
This will be the 12th year of the film festival which will start on November 5 through November 11.
The film’s entire cast and crew, which includes Himesh and Punjabi music artist Yo Yo Honey Singh and director Anand Mahadevan will be attending this film festival in Norway. The mystery thriller set in the 1960s earned mostly positive reviews from the critics and audiences and went on to earn more than 40 crores at the box office in five weeks.
According to the latest sources, The Xposé producers, among whom is Himesh’s father, Vipin Rashammiya, are trying to turn it into a franchise, by cooking up plans for a sequel to this murder mystery. Himesh recently confirmed the plans for the sequel stating that the sequel will have state-of-the-art visual effects, better music and great locations. Mahadevan has said the sequel will have a bigger ensemble cast than the first film.
According to a report by The Indian Express, Himesh recently spoke about his film, “The Xposé is my dad’s first film as a producer and I am extremely happy that I have given him a hit and add to that, a franchise. The process of getting into the character of Ravi Kumar has been a long and hard process, but the success has given us full confidence to go ahead with a sequel and we will definitely surprise the audience with double the energy in the second installment.”
As far as franchises go in Bollywood, it’s definitely a new thing. Back in 2006, we had just two franchises, Dhoom and Krrish. Now, eight years later there is the Don franchise, Dabangg franchise, Raaz, Housefull, Murder and even Hate Story. So if that is an indication of anything, franchises do work in Bollywood. There is no reason to say the same won’t be true for The Xposé.