The obsession of ‘Invisible Superman’ in Bollywood!

Ever since Vikram Bhatt announced the making of his new film Mr. X starring Emraan Hashmi and Amyra Dastur there have been all sorts of rumors about the movie being inspired by Shekhar Kapur's MR. INDIA or plagiarized from Hollywood hit 'HOLLOW MAN'. However Mahesh Bhatt, who has produced the film, denies all allegations. 

In a candid interview Bhatt said, “Few people know that before Shekhar Kapur's made MR. INDIA, Vijay Bhatt, grandfather of Vikram Bhatt brought a revolution in Indian cinema by making Bollywood’s first movie with the concept of the invisible superhero called Mr. X (1937) inspired from Hollywood film Invisible man (1933).”


He added, “Later in 1957 it was my father Nanabhai Bhatt made another movie called Mr. X having same concept starring Ashok Kumar and Nalini Jaywant and Pran in the lead.” 

Recalling his early days Bhatt said, "I have the memory of going to the sets with my father during the shooting. As a child when I saw my father's film, I used to fantasize about turning invisible.” 

In fact Bollywood’s obsession with invisible superhero is not restricted with Mr. X (1957) or Mr. India (1987). In fact there are few more movies that adopted the same idea of invisible superhero. 

If readers could remember the super hit song ‘Mere Mehboob Qayamat Hogi… sung by Kishore Kumar. This song was from the movie Mr. X IN BOMBAY (1964) starring Kishore Kumar, Kum Kum and Madan Puri. 

Another movie called ELAAN was released in 1971 that had Vinod Khanna, Rekha and Madan Puri. The movie was directed by K. Ramanlal. 

However among all the movies made on this subject only Shekhar Kapur's MR. INDIA was hit, while the rest bit the dust.

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