Cocktail 2 has been released in theaters from today. Reports and reviews say that the chemistry and screen presence of Shahid Kapoor, Kriti Sanon and Rashmika Mandanna is attracting the audience. The director of the film is- Homi Adajania. What is the story of Cocktail 2 – head to the theater to know it in detail. But everyone must have noticed one special thing in the promotional material of the film, and that is – spiritual sequel. How many people know what spiritual sequel means? How different is it from any normal feature film or even from the films coming in any series/part.
Let us explain to you with some examples. First of all let me tell you that cocktail 2 It has been described as the sequel to 2012’s Cocktail. 2012’s Cocktail was also directed by Homi Adajania but the cast was different, like Saif Ali Khan, Deepika Padukone and Diana Penty etc. The names of the characters of these three actors in the film were Gautam, Melanie and Meera respectively. Now the characters played by Shahid, Kriti and Rashmika in Cocktail 2 are named Kunal, Elli and Diya respectively. The story of Cocktail 2 is also completely different.
new face, old title
Now this question may come in anyone’s mind that if the actors, characters and story are different then how is this a sequel. Obviously, to avoid this difficult question, the producer and director resorted to spiritualism. As spiritual belief says that the soul does not die, it only changes another body. In the same way, spiritual sequel means a different entry of the theme and characters of the film.
The aim of a spiritual sequel is to provide the audience with the same experience as the earlier film. In this, the basic story of the previous film is not taken forward. Based on the theme and backdrop of 2012’s Cocktail, a new story with new actors has been offered. That’s it, the spiritual sequel is done. That means the face of the film is new and the title is old. This gives newness to the audience.
New formula for franchise success
In fact, this is a unique mantra of movie marketing. It is being tried very well for the last several years. There is a race to make sequels or next parts of superhit films. Many franchises have got success in this. Franchise of blockbuster films is the new formula for success. Box office standards say that there is less risk in this and the audience can be easily wooed. Therefore producers adopt it easily. In the coming time, there is a lot of talk about the sequel of big hit films like Company and 3 Idiots, while there is also a possibility of the next part of Don 3 and Hera Pheri 3. These are all superhit franchises.
If seen, directors-writers have more creative freedom in spiritual sequels as compared to series or parts. Because in series or part films the original story is expanded. The difference between the two can be understood from the franchises of two big successful films. For example, Vidya Balan’s Bhool Bhulaiyaa is a kind of spiritual sequel, where the previous story does not move forward but the story changes in all three parts.
Of course the actors, characters, setting and subject are the same. Whereas Shraddha Kapoor and Rajkumar Rao’s Stree 2 takes forward the story of Stree 1. Similarly, in Dhurandhar 2, the story of Dhurandhar 1 is expanded, while in Kalki 2, the story after Kalki 1 will be shown. Similarly, you can watch both parts of Bahubali or both parts of Kantara.
Some Popular Spiritual Sequels
Check out the names of some more spiritual sequel films in Hindi – Vidya Balan’s Kahaani Aur Kahani 2, Sanjay Mishra’s Vadh Aur Vadh 2, Good News after Bad News, Paresh Rawal’s Oh My God after Pankaj Tripathi’s Oh My God 2, Akshay Kumar’s Housefull or Welcome series, whose sequel Welcome to the Jungle is also going to come. So, the sequel of Munna Bhai MBBS is Lage Raho Munna Bhai, after which the Jolly LLB franchise has also been a blockbuster. Films like Dabangg, Krish, Aashiqui, Golmaal, Race, Raaj, Dhoom, Murder, Sarkar, Sarkar Raj are also perfect examples of successful sequels.
After all, where did this concept of spiritual sequel come from? To understand this, let’s go back a bit. It is believed that it formally started in Hindi by Rajkumar Hirani with Lage Raho Munna Bhai, which was a superhit film of the year 2006. Earlier in 2003, he had written a new history of success at the box office by making Munnabhai MBBS with Sanjay Dutt and Arshad Warsi. There was similarity in the storyline, actors and setting of both the films. This experiment was so successful that it became a new trend in the industry. Both Hirani’s films became cult classics.
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Seeds of Spiritual Sequel
After this, a new trend started in the film industry which progressed much further. But the seeds of this spiritual sequel can be found in history. In yesteryear, many other films were also made on the same theme. This can be seen clearly in love stories films. The theme of Rishi Kapoor-Dimple Kapadia’s cult film Bobby was also in Kamal Haasan-Rati Agnihotri’s Ek Duje Ke Liye.
Similarly, we can call Shaan the spiritual sequel of Ramesh Sippy’s Sholay. There was a dacoit of the jungles while there was a don of the city in pride. Many times it used to happen that the later film whose seeds were taken from the earlier film became an all-time blockbuster compared to the earlier one. For example, take Shakti Samant’s China Town with Shammi Kapoor, the seeds of Amitabh Bachchan’s Don and Shatrughan Sinha’s Kalicharan can be found in it. We can also find the seeds of the concept of spiritual sequel here,
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