Never wanted to do a remake, says Anurag Kashyap on remaking Mirage as Dobaaraa

Anurag Kashyap’s Dobaaraa is the official Hindi remake of Oriol Paulo’s Spanish thriller Mirage (2018). But the filmmaker has said that he has made his own film from the original script. 

“I can’t make a film if I don’t make it as my own,” said Kashyap at the trailer launch of Dobaaraa. “The essence of the story is obviously taken from there. When we started the script, the film had not yet come out. The whole adaptation and everything came from the script and then we also had to keep in mind who we are speaking with as an audience.” 

Although Mirage was released in 2018, Kashyap said that the team of Dobaaraa never saw it while making their film. “So we worked [on the film] on our own,” he said. “We never referred to the original film, which is also why it is so different and everybody else is also reacting to it like that [at festivals].”

Starring Taapsee Pannu, Dobaaraa is a thriller about a woman who deals with preternatural forces and time travel.

Kashyap also admitted that he never wanted to do a remake but changed his mind for Dobaaraa. “I never wanted to do a remake in my life,” he said. “Taapsee had reached out to me asking me to read this script and find her a director for it. I didn’t read the script; I tried finding a director. When I read the script, I felt why am I searching here and there, main khud hi karta hoon [I should do it myself].” 

Produced by Ektaa Kapoor’s Cult Movies, Dobaaraa will be released in theatres on 19 August.