The patriarch of a rich family is mysteriously murdered within his mansion. Everyone member of his family is a suspect, including the help. A sharp-tongued, intelligent cop comes to investigate the murder and ends up playing mind-games with the suspects. If you look at the aforementioned plot points, you can either think I am talking about Rian Johnson's brilliant Knives Out, starring Ana De Armas, Daniel Craig and Chris Evans. Or what you can derive of the plot of Raat Akeli Hai, the trailer of which has dropped online recently. Raat Akeli Hai Trailer: Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Radhika Apte's Murder Mystery Will Intrigue the Agatha Christie Fan in You (Watch Video).

Raat Akeli Hai is the directorial debut of Honey Trehan, popular casting director in Bollywood. It is a murder mystery, starring Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Radhika Apte in the lead, along with Shweta Tripathi, Shivani Raghuvanshi, Nishant Dahiya, Aditya Srivastava and Tigmanshu Dhulia. Raat Akeli Hai is part of the 17-film and series announcement by Netflix India made on July 16, and is the first film to release among them. Netflix India Announces 17 Original Projects Including Janhvi Kapoor's The Kargil Girl, Sanjay Dutt's Torbaaz And It's Time To Store Some Popcorn at Home! (Watch Video).

Before we proceed ahead, do check out the intriguing trailer of the film first:

Even since the trailer broke out, there has been comparisons with Knives Out made on Twitter, though most of the Tweeple agree that Raat Akeli Hai is darker in its essence, while Rian Johnson's film was lighter in tone.

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But the fans seem to have forgotten that Knives Out itself was a tribute to the old whodunits, most based on Agatha Christie novels. Like, for example, Murder on The Orient Express or Death on the Nile.

Watch the Trailer of Knives Out here:

There is no denying the Agatha Christie influence in Raat Akeli Hai, but apart from that, it is hard to say that the film is a remake of Knives Out. In fact, the first movie that came to my mind after watching its trailer was Robert Altman's 2001 film Gosford Park, that also dealt with the murder of a rich and despicable industrialist, where the whole family and the servants come under the needle of suspicion. And yes, even Gosford Park is inspired by the Agatha Christie novels, even if it isn't a direct adaptation. Like Knives Out and Raat Akeli Hai.

Watch the Trailer of Gosford Park:

What also helps Raat Akeli Hai's case of not being a remake of Knives Out is that it was in the making for two years. As per a report in DNA that came out in August 2018, it mentions how Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Radhika Apte are part of the film.

In fact, Nawazuddin had completed the shoot of the film in April 2019, while Knives Out came out in September 2019.

So, at this point, we can only conclude that both Knives Out and Raat Akeli Hai share a similar inspiration, rather than the former being inspired by the latter. Raat Akeli Hai is streaming on Netflix from July 31.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jul 17, 2020 02:27 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).