Anup Bhandari: Kiccha Sudeep's Vikrant Rona is a different story in the Rangitaranga cinematic universe

When the trailer of Vikrant Rona came out, eagle-eyed audiences couldn’t help but notice a few similarities with filmmaker Anup Bhandari’s debut movie, Rangitaranga. They pointed out that the line Gara Gara Gara Gaggara Jarba… was used in the earlier film too, while a split second shot of a news clipping also had a Kamarottu reference (Kamarottu is where the story of Rangitaranga unfolds). Some others also noted that a mysterious well was also a part of both films. Yet despite these seemingly in-your-face clues, Anup never openly addressed these rumours, leaving it to the sensibilities of his audience to gather whether there is a connect or not.

Now that the film has been in theatres for three days, Anup is finally talking about, especially since a segment of the audience has taken to social media about the similarities between both the films. Speaking to an online news portal, Anup explained that Vikrant Rona is a different story in the Rangitaranga cinematic universe. The challenge, he said, was in telling a new story within a familiar premise, with the idea being presenting the universe on a larger scale with new characters. Anup, in fact, sees the comments about the similarities as a positive sign and that audiences today are smart and sharp. The filmmaker says that he’s got several messages from audiences appreciating how he’s connected the two films, like, for instance, the character playing the driver Fakruddin (Pakru) has a son called Rafique, who, in turn, is a driver in Rangitaranga.

When asked whether it would have helped if he had divulged this connect prior to the release, Anup disagreed and said that it would be wrong to underestimate audience. The filmmaker is sure that audiences figured the connect between the two films with the tiny bread crumbs that he put in the trailer of Vikrant Rona.