Dukaan vs Mimi: Comparisons hurt more than help, admit Siddharth-Garima | Exclusive

Despite Dukaan predating Mimi, the surrogacy theme led to unwanted parallels that overshadowed their original story, Siddharth Singh and Garima Wahal reveals.In Pune, they clarified key differences and how star power and timing impacted reception.

Q. Dukaan, at its release, was often compared to Kriti Sanon’s Mimi. Has this comparison helped generate attention for you, or has it discouraged viewers?

Siddharth: I don’t think it got us any traction because Mimi wasn’t a legendary film like Sholay, and being compared to it brought us numbers. Just because Kriti won a national award for it, so people started calling it a great film, but Mimi was an OTT release, so there is no way to determine whether it was a hit or a flop.Garima: Honestly, we don’t think it is a great film. Although Dukaan was written and registered before Mimi, we didn’t have someone like Dinesh Vijan on our side. So he ended up making it before us. And also, they had a bigger star as their lead, and that did not really matter, as we were aware that these two are distinctly different films. They were remaking a Marathi film, Mala Aai Vhhaychy!, whereas we were working on our original story. A remake will always be different from an original. But for the larger audience, it will be two films about surrogacy. So it did us more harm than good.

People made comparisons, calling it a second Mimi. But whoever saw this film was convinced that it was nothing like Mimi. Before this surrogacy, as an industry, was refered to as Chori Chori Chupke Chupke.