Director Shankar has announced that his next film will be the Hindi remake of his 2005 Tamil film Anniyan, starring Ranveer Singh in the lead. This film will be produced Dr Jayantilal Gada of Pen Studios. Referred to as a “pan-Indian entertainer”, the film will go into production only in the middle of 2022. The film will be co-produced by God Bless Entertainment.
Shankar is also directing the sequel to the 1996 film Indian, which has been put on hold. The film’s producer Lyca Productions has approached the Madras High Court seeking to restrain the director from signing up on other projects without completing their film Indian 2.
Indian 2 will star Kamal Haasan, Kajal Aggarwal, Nedumudi Venu, Siddharth, Rakul Preet Singh, Bobby Simha, Priya Bhavani Shankar, Samuthirakani, Delhi Ganesh and Vivek among others. Indian 2 that was announced way back in 2017, went into production in 2019. Early 2020, the film’s shooting came to an abrupt halt following a freak accident that killed three crew members on the set. The film’s shoot is yet to be resumed.
In this moment, no one will be happier than me, bringing back the larger than life cinematic experience with @RanveerOfficial in the official adaptation of cult blockbuster Anniyan.@jayantilalgada @PenMovies pic.twitter.com/KyFFTkWGSL
— Shankar Shanmugham (@shankarshanmugh) April 14, 2021
Lyca Productions, in their petition alleged that the movie has not been completed despite spending Rs 236 crore, which is beyond the initial fixed budget of Rs 180 crore. The production house also informed the court that the director received Rs 14 crore out of the agreed remuneration of Rs 40 crore and therefore should not be allowed to work on other projects without completing theirs first.
Anniyan, an action drama starring Vikram and Sadha in the lead, went on to become a commercial success in Tamil cinema. The film's lead character suffered a psychological condition known better in popular culture as multiple personality disorder. The film was also dubbed and released in Telugu and Hindi as Aparichithudu and Aparichit in 2006.
Notably, it was rumoured earlier that Shankar was looking to work on a multi-starrer and had apparently approached KGF fame star Yash to play one of the leads in the film. However, no confirmation on this was made.