Farhan Akhtar’s debut film as actor, The Fakir of Venice, due to be released in India

Besides Lucknow Central (2017), actor Farhan Akhtar has lined up another film for 2017. Director Anand Surapur’s The Fakir of Venice, based on a real-life experience of filmmaker Homi Adajania.

Co-starring actor Annu Kapoor, the black comedy will feature Akhtar as a man who convinces a poor man to pose as a fakir for an installation project at a European art festival.

The poster for the film shows the city of Venice with two hands seeming folded in prayer with the tagline, “Watch the con unfold from Mumbai to Venice”.

Surapur is also producing the project with Punit Desai. The long-delayed film will finally premiere after being shown at special screenings and film festivals outside India. Interestingly, Akhtar had shot for this before his films Rock On!! (2008) and Luck By Chance (2009) came out. Surapar had revealed to an online magazine that Farhan made his acting debut with The Fakir of Venice.

The trade magazine, The Hollywood Reporter, which reviewed the film when it was screened at the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles, said of Akhtar that he was “talented and handsome enough to have a huge career ahead of him”.

Adajania wrote the story for a magazine and later Surapur happened to come across and approached him for the rights of the story. In an interview with the tabloid, Mumbai Mirror, Adajania had said, “Many moons ago, after college, I had taken an unemployed building painter to be a part of an art installation for one of the world’s biggest art festivals. It was a pretty bizarre experience and the film is loosely based on it. I am the supposed con-man-with-a-conscience and the fakir is a fake.”

Adajania, who recently saw the film this year, told Mumbai Mirror that the film is due to be released soon.