National award-winning Khasi language film Onaatah has been adapted in Marathi as Mann Udhan Vaara. This is the only second time after Assamese film Chameli Memsaab, 1975, that a Northeast film has been remade in another language.
Produced by Satish Kaushik and directed by Sanjay Memane, the Marati version of Onaatah is all set to release on October 11.
Onaatah, originally directed by Pradip Kurbah, won the best Khasi language film at the 63rd National Film Awards.
“I think it is a very important bridge for the Northeast region with the rest of the country in terms of cinema. I wish to see more films from Northeast being adapted into different languages of the country,” Kurbah told The News Mill.
The film is about a young woman who retreats to a small village by the hills, where she finds hope, love and new purpose after seeking to heal following a traumatic assault.
In 1975, Assamese film Chameli Memsaab directed by Abdul Majid, which was a love story based on a tea estate of Assam, was remade in Bengali and Hindi.
National award winning film critic and filmmaker Utpal Barpujari, while congratulating Kurbah, said that this is a positive move for the region. Borpujari said that the universality of the subject has caught the attention of the filmmakers from other parts and hence the re-making happened.
“For the last several years, the films from the region are getting good attention. This is a positive development. This will further help in getting the attention,” Borpujari told The News Mill.
Apart from the national award, Onaatah won the Audience Choice Award at Indian film festival, Toulouse and selected for Indian Panorama at the 47th International Film Festival of India. In Prag Cine awards, Onaatah won the best film, director and actress awards.
“It is the content. I think that films from our region have been able to draw attention recently. And talking about cinema in Meghalaya, it is still at a very nascent stage but now it is growing. We are proud to have a filmmaker like Dominic Sangma who have taken cinema from our region to different part of the world and there are many more promising filmmaker who are coming up,” Kurbah added.
Ma’ama by Dominic Sangma won the national award as best Garo language film this year.
