Mimic Mess: Poster Spoof

By: Praveen Lance Fernandes, IndiaFM
Saturday, November 11, 2006
The world is full of impersonators - Elvis Presley, Amitabh Bachchan, Marilyn Monroe - all have quite a few. But what if an Indian actor suddenly decides to ape a Hollywood personality? Can he pull it off? Who should you blame? Do you blame the actor for taking up such a role? Do you blame the director for making such a film? Or do you blame the publicity guys for their lack of creativity? Ahem! IndiaFM brings to you a small list of celebrities who really had no clue of what they were doing.

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When Diana Hayden did a JLO!

If you look at these pictures with a passing glance you might say that they belong to the same movie. Look carefully - Surprise! Surprise!

OK, so what if former Miss World had a bad debut in Khalid Mohammad's Tehzeeb (2003)? She got an author backed role in her next release Ab...Bas (2003). The film was a complete remake of the Jennifer Lopez starrer Enough (2002). Bollywood has had its share of 'inspirations' but even an Indianized version should somehow seem a bit original.

But in the case of Ab... Bas there seems to be no creativity or originality anywhere. The original title was literally translated into Hindi, the publicity campaign ripped off as well (check out the picture). The only thing that was original was Diana's acting skills which she could not ape from JLO.

Same dress clothing and same screenplay, however could not really produce the same box-office results.

National Award winning actor Dimple Kapadia made a comeback of sorts in Farhan Akhtar's Dil Chata Hai (2001). Her performance was appreciated in the film and in her following release - Leela as well. So she signs up for Hum Kaun Hai? (2004), a film inspired from the Nicole Kidman starrer The Others (2001). The film had Dharmendra and Amitabh Bachchan in a special appearance but sank without a trace.

Not long after (1 year to be precise) Manisha Koirala comes up with Anjaane - The Unknown. Again a lift of the same film! Manisha Koirala's career was (and still is) in the slump for the past few years and nothing really solid came her way. So she decides to do a Nicole Kidman. One really fails to understand what Manisha was thinking while signing up for the film especially since it had low production values and even low-graded special effects. Probably a major chunk of the budget might have been the DVD of the original film. No wonder she refused to promote the film.

Trivia: That little girl in Dimple's arms is Hansika Motwani who will make her debut as the leading lady in Mithun Chakravarty's son Mimoh's debut film He - The Only One.

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