Faraaz trailer out: Hansal Mehta brings a tense, chilling real-lifer  

On July 1, 2016, five assailants took over the upscale Holey Artisan Cafe in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Entering with bombs, assault rifles, and other weapons, they opened fire indiscriminately. The crisis lasted well into the next morning, till an elite task force of the Bangladesh Army neutralized the attackers. A total of 29 people, a majority of them foreigners, were killed, one of the deadliest terror casualties in Bangladesh's history. 

Hansal Mehta's Faraaz presents a dramatised account of the above events. The film's trailer, lasting a tense 2 minutes and 7 seconds, was released on Monday. It offers a blow-by-blow breakdown of the terrorists' methods and motivations. It also maps the response of the police and the army (who led the rescue effort dubbed Operation Thunderbolt) as well as the courage and resilience of the hostages. 

The focus, emotionally, is on Faraaz (debutant Zahan Prithviraj Kapoor), a 20-year-old Muslim boy who was killed in the 2016 attack. Faraaz was the scion of a leading business conglomerate in Bangladesh. He was on his summer break from Emory University in Georgia when he was trapped in the cafe attack. 

“I want our Islam back from people like you,” Faraaz tells his captors onscreen, one of the several chilling and politically resonant lines in the trailer. 

Hansal has described Faraaz as a story 'of our polarised times'. The film is produced by Anubhav Sinha and T-Series in association with Mahana Films. It also stars Aditya Rawal, Juhi Babbar, Aamir Ali, Sachin Lalwani, Palak Lalwani and Reshham Sahaani. Faraaz is slated for release on February 3. 

You can check out the trailer here -