After the success of Sanju and the critical acclaim for Soorma, the biopic as a genre is quite hot. So enters Richa Chadha with her own starring biopic, based on the life of the South actress, Shakeela. Shakeela was known for playing the lead in many softcore movies in Malayalam cinema, which used to rule the industry in the early part of the last decade.

The movie, directed by Indrajit Lankesh, is touted to be made on the lines of Vidya Balan's The Dirty Picture, which was a fictionalised take on the late South siren Silk Smitha. Richa is playing Shakeela in the movie, and now we have the first look of hers in the film. Since Shakeela is a Keralite in real life, Richa Chadha is seen in a traditional kasavupattu saree.

While she does nail the Mallu look, people who are aware of Shakeela's filmography will be wondering why she doesn't look anything like Shakeela. Here's another picture of Richa with the real Shakeela -

And a picture of Shakeela in her younger days -

Well, there is a reason for this stark difference in the look. Speaking about her look and the role, Richa says, "The challenge for the look of the film but also a good one is that the story traces the journey of Shakeela's younger days to her becoming a popular figure. Thus the looks span over years and years and with each passing time her look changed and thus to show that is challenging but also for me as an actor its gratifying that I get to grow with the real character on celluloid. Shakeela is still a legend and we wish to do complete justice to her when the film is ready."

The actress has begun shooting for the film in a small town in Karnataka called Tirthahalli.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jul 27, 2018 11:38 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).