Shekhar Kapur says Masoom sequel will explore the ‘fundamental idea of what is home’

Shekhar Kapur has shared details about the highly anticipated sequel to his 1983 film Masoom. The director had revealed last month that the sequel would be titled Masoom… The New Generation. Plot details of the film have been kept under wraps. (Also read: Shekhar Kapur reveals he is dyslexic, had attention deficit disorder too: ‘Would have not made any films…’)

About Masoom

Masoom had starred Naseeruddin Shah and Shabana Azmi in lead roles, and revolved around a married couple and their two daughters whose lives take a turn with the arrival of a boy who is the man’s son from an earlier affair. It featured Jugal Hansraj, Aradhana and Urmila Matondkar as child actors. Upon release, the film received critical acclaim and went on to win 5 Filmfare awards.

Masoom sequel theme revealed

Now, as per a report by Variety, Shekhar Kapur has revealed the theme of the sequel and said that the story will revolve around a couple in their eighties who are in a crumbling house and will be about “generational change.” He said, “When you talk to people about home, the first thing they say is that it is property, it is real estate and the second thing they say is ‘What’s it worth?’ The real estate value of your house becomes much more important than what the essential idea for home is. And home is, what is it? It is memories – people growing up, the walls have memories, the sofa where you sit down is a memory. Everything is a memory. So I’m taking that fundamental idea of what is home.”

Shekhar on the idea behind the Masoom sequel

The director also added that he is interested in making a film where he could tell a simple story with complexity. “I was looking to do a film that I could go back to being naive, almost, because Masoom was from somebody who’d never made a film before, didn’t know how to make a film, went in and made a film, had nothing, no technical competence or experience or skill to fall back on – so just fell back on telling a real human story… Whenever I look back, and even when I look at What’s Love Got to Do with It?, I realize what I was doing then and I’m doing now is making all characters very human, because that’s how I see them – very human. So Masoom is the way of going back to just making the stories of the simplicity of being human and the complexity of being human but staying human and the story being human,” Kapur said.

Earlier this year in May, Shekhar Kapur had taken to Twitter and talked about his diagnosis of dyslexia. He also mentioned that he had attention deficit disorder, ADD, which is common in dyslexia. Shekhar’s last directorial outing was What’s Love Got to Do with It? The film featured Shabana Azmi, Emma Thompson, Lily James, Shazad Latif, Sajal Aly, Oliver Chris, Asim Chaudhry, Jeff Mirza, Alice Orr-Ewing, and Rahat Fateh Ali Khan.