The Different Faces of Bodyguard

Salman Khan's Bodyguard, which releases on August 31, has been made in four languages in all -- three of them by the same director, Siddique. We take a quick look:

Bodyguard in Malayalam (Dileep, Nayantara)

When director Siddique made a Malayalam film titled Bodyguard, starring Dileep and Nayantara (who returned to the home scene after a fairly long gap), he might not have thought that the film would spawn different versions in different Indian languages.

The story was simple, yet infused with a rosy romance between a man who is obsessed with heroism, and the daughter of the man he is sworn to protect.

Bodyguard worked because it managed to strike a balance between hard-core action and love. Its hero was a man who was sworn to protect his idol, but was caught by the lovely, unknown female voice at the other end of the telephone. He tries to unearth her identity and the consequences are sometimes hilarious and, once, disastrous.

With liberal doses of humour, which is Dileep's forte, plenty of sentiment and a neat twist at the end, the film achieved its place in 2010 as a romantic hit.

Then came the Tamil version, Kaavalan, starring Vijay and Asin (on a comeback trail from Hindi films). It gained notoriety right from the beginning because of its original title, Kaavalkaran, borrowed from a hit film of MGR. The title landed the makers in a morass of trouble before it was changed.

The Malayalam original was altered slightly by Siddique, who directed the Tamil version as well, to give more scope for Vijay's star status. Here, he was more assertive than the heroism-obsessed Dileep, though the humour remained intact.

Kaavalan proved an important turning-point for its star-cast: Vijay was staging a comeback as a soft, romantic hero, his previous action avatars having failed at the box office. His political aspirations were put to the test as well, as the release of the film ran into huge complications.

All was well in the end, though. Vijay is back in the forefront of Tamil cinema.

Hitting the screens on Wednesday is the Hindi version of Bodyguard. Siddique is the director again. Siddique said that Salman and Kareena were a delight to work with, and that the Hindi version will turn out to be, like the others, a hit.

With music by Himesh Reshamiyya and Pritam and background score by Sandeep Shirodkar, Bodyguard, with its combination of humour and romance is expected to do well.

Not surprisingly, there's a Telugu version also in the making. It is not directed by Siddique but by Gopichand Malineni (who earlier delivered Don Seenu). It sports a truly enviable star-cast consisting of Venkatesh and Trisha, reprising the roles of the bodyguard and his anonymous lover.

And this version is titled Ganga, in yet another deviation from the original.