Kanika Dhillon on Haseen Dillruba’s sequel, and how Taapsee Pannu’s character was ‘empowered’

Kanika Dhillon’s Haseen Dillruba recently won big at this year’s annual OTTplay Awards and Conclave. The film won Kanika the award for Best Dialogues (Film), and the filmmaker is already gearing up to bring the second instalment of the romantic thriller to the silver screen soon. The screenwriter recently opened up about the upcoming second instalment of the film.

In conversation with Mid Day, Kanika revealed that she certainly felt the pressure of delivering a worthy successor to the 2021 film. She said that she was being ‘hounded’ by stakeholders to finish the film, as everyone wanted a repeat of the success witnessed by the first movie.

Opening up about the 2021 film, Kanika spoke of how the film’s reception had been a ‘divided house’, and how the film had made a lot of critics uncomfortable. But Kanika was not perturbed by the reactions. Rather, she believed that art was supposed to make people uncomfortable and evoke an array of emotions in audiences. The screenwriter was pleased that so many people had debated the film.

On the character of Rani, played by Taapsee Pannu, Kanika disagrees with viewers’ notion that the protagonist was not empowered. The writer said that Rani had made a choice, and the fact that the choice was wrong did not make her any less empowered.

The fact that the film had gotten people talking had inspired Kanika when writing the sequel. “I felt empowered to write a more risqué story because of the recognition that came our way”, she said.

At the OTTplay Awards and Conclave 2022, Haseen Dillruba earned Pannu the award for Best Actor (Female) Popular (Film), and Harshvardhan Rane won the award for Best Actor In A Negative Role (Film).

Haseen Dillruba, which also stars Vikrant Massey, is available for streaming on Netflix.