Abbas-Mustan, the duo known for making suspenseful and stylish thrillers, had a surprise in store for their fans when they announced their first digital venture, Penthouse, in 2020.
The film, starring Bobby Deol, Arjun Rampal, Sharman Joshi, Mouni Roy, Tisca Chopra, and others, was a remake of the 2014 Belgian film, The Loft. The plot revolves around five married men who share a penthouse to secretly meet their mistresses, but their fantasy turns into a nightmare when they find a dead body of a woman in the loft.
The film was announced in March 2021 to be streaming soon and initially slated to be a Netflix original, but things took an unexpected turn when the streaming giant reportedly backed out of the project in July 2022. As per a media report in Mid Day, over a year after Penthouse makers and streaming partner Netflix parted ways, the film’s makers are in talks with JioCinema.
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Penthouse makers in talks with Jio Cinema
A source reveals, “Thrillers are Abbas-Mustan’s forte, and in the same vein, the Bobby and Arjun-starrer has been designed as a slick murder mystery. The producers have initiated talks with JioCinema. There is interest around the project since it is the director duo’s maiden OTT film.”
Netflix pulled the plug on Penthouse for not meeting their standards
According to sources, during 2022, Netflix India started re-examining its content pipeline after the controversy surrounding Tandav and decided to scrap some of the films that did not meet their global standards. Netflix India mercilessly cut down on the projects they were not satisfied with. And one of the first Netflix Originals to be trimmed off the slate was Abbas-Mustan’s thriller film, Penthouse.
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“Netflix has backed out of Penthouse, starring Bobby Deol, Arjun Rampal, and Sharman Joshi. The OTT service is no longer putting up any projects that don’t meet their expectations and is instead lining up projects that are packed with only global-standard content. They are scrapping all the projects that haven’t turned out as envisioned. Abbas-Mustan’s Penthouse was a keenly-awaited, high-profile project that promised to be a slick and stylish whodunit that would keep the viewers on the edge of their seats till the very end. But that hasn’t translated well on screen, and hence Netflix has decided to not premiere it even though they had announced the film amidst much fanfare last March,” said a source close to the development.
Abbas Mustan clear air about film lying in can since 2021
Abbas Burmawalla rubbishes the rumours, saying, “People assumed we completed the film by 2021. But the truth is, we only began shooting from 2022 while post-production went on till this year. We had put up a huge set in 2020 [in Goregaon], but we had to dismantle it during the pandemic. We finally got to shooting only when the pandemic was over.”
On asking if the murder mystery is headed to JioCinema, and the director says, “We have delivered the final product to the producers. We’ve heard that they took the rights back from Netflix, and are in talks with JioCinema currently. Now, it’s up to them when they want to release the film.”
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