Aamir Khan and his cousin, filmmaker Mansoor Khan, are coming together two decades after their last collaboration to produce Junaid Khan and Sai Pallavi starrer Ek Din but it’s not just that. A recent report reveals that Aamir and Mansoor may already have their next project in mind — an adaptation of the latter’s novel One: The Story of the Ultimate Myth.
In a recent conversation with The Hollywood Reporter India, Aamir expressed his admiration for Mansoor’s book and praised the depth of the plot as well as the characters. “I love what the book is saying, and I love the characters he’s written — not just the two lead characters, but all the characters actually. I think it’s a fantastically written book,” he said.
Aamir clarified that the project is still in the early stages, with both of them yet to work on the screenplay. “It’s not an easy book to adapt to a screenplay but I have been telling Mansoor for the last few years since I read the book that this is something I would like to work on. Now whether we succeed in converting it into a screenplay that works for us, I don’t know,” he said.
Aamir, however, reiterated that the intent is serious. “I certainly want to give it a shot,” he said, revealing that once Ek Din releases, he plans to spend time with Mansoor in Coonoor to brainstorm the adaptation.
Mansoor, on the other hand, said that the book is not specifically tailored to India, rather has a premise which would click with the world as a whole. The filmmaker also revealed that One took him two decades to write, and while he has not directed a feature since the Shah Rukh Khan starrer Josh in 2000, he noted that this adaptation would mark his return as a director. “I will have to. I hate to direct, but I will have to,” Mansoor said.
One: The Story of the Ultimate Myth tells the story of Sonal, formerly a sociology professor and firebrand activist, who is battling memory loss and acute depression and Abhay, a once-celebrated genetic engineer, and a paranoid fugitive hiding from an establishment whose scientific paradigm he once challenged. “To the world they both are insane, but the truth is deeper. Abhay shares his most closely guarded thoughts with Sonal, in the form of a book. It is a radical, paradigm-shifting perspective, and the two misfits discover that they are kindred souls, forced to doubt their own sanity by a deluded culture,” reads the synopsis.
Mansoor and Aamir worked on two films, Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak (1988) and Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar (1992). Their last collaboration was Jaane Tu... Ya Jaane Na in 2008.