Zapatlela

Zapatlela (1993)

झपाटलेला

Om Phat Swaha

After being shot in a toy store, a gangster transfers his soul into a doll. Lakshya, a puppetry master receives this doll as a gift, which unleashes terror upon the city.

Date of release
1993-04-16
TMDB
7.8 / 10 (11)
Runtime
2h 30m
Genres
Horror, Comedy
Director
Mahesh Kothare
Collection
Zapatlela Collection

Casting

Interesting facts

Zapatlela (transl. Possessed) is a 1993 Indian Marathi-language horror comedy film directed and produced by Mahesh Kothare under Jenma Films International. The film stars an ensemble cast of Mahesh Kothare, Laxmikant Berde, Pooja Pawar, Kishori Ambiye, Madhu Kambikar, Jairam Kulkarni, Vijay Chavan, Ravindra Berde, Raghavendra Kadkol, Bipin Varti, and Dilip Prabhavalkar made a cameo appearance and provided the voiceover for the puppet Tatya Vinchu in the film. The practical effects for the puppet were created by Ramdas Padhye, a renowned ventriloquist and puppeteer. A sequel titled Zapatlela 2 was released 20 years later in 2013 in 3D format.

Production

This film was inspired from the 1988 Hollywood movie Child's Play, a film by Don Macini. It was a horror film. As in Zapatlela, it opens with a serial killer (Charles Lee Ray) transferring his soul into a doll, Chucky after being shot by a police officer, and is given to a child, Andy Barclay, who is not believed to when he claims that the doll is alive.

Mahesh Kothare said he wrote the story of Zapatlela in a hotel room in a week. Name of the main antagonist, notorious criminal Tatya Vinchu, Kothare developed from the amalgamation of his make-up man's name 'Tatya' and 'Red Scorpion', which he had seen in his childhood. The evil puppet Tatya Vinchu and Lakshya's naughtiest puppet Ardhavatrao are both created and operated by Ramdas Padhye, a ventriloquist.

Laxmikant Berde signed in the lead role, making his fifth collaboration with Mahesh Kothare. Kothare wrote the role of Gauri with Nivedita Joshi-Saraf in mind, but turned down the offer due to she got married and the offer went to Kishori Ambiye. Priya Arun was the first choice for the role of Aavdi but she also turned down and the offer went to Pooja Pawar.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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