Hichki (Hindi pronunciation: [ɦɪtʃʰkɪ]; transl. Hiccup) is a 2018 Indian Hindi-language comedy-drama film co-written and directed by Siddharth P. Malhotra, and produced by Aditya Chopra and Maneesh Sharma under the former's banner of Yash Raj Films. Based on American motivational speaker Brad Cohen's 2005 autobiography Front of the Class, it stars Rani Mukerji in her comeback appearance as Naina Mathur, an aspiring teacher who was continuously rejected by many schools because of her Tourette syndrome until she is accepted at the St. Notker's School, her alma mater. She is assigned to teach students from a nearby slum in the class 9F, which was created by the Government of India to fill quota for the underprivileged.
Malhotra faced struggles finding a studio to finance Hichki, since the film, which had begun scripting in 2013 after he acquired the rights to Front of the Class, was felt to have been lacking potential for the box office. Chopra and Sharma later insisted on producing Hichki with Malhotra as director. Principal photography was handled by Avinash Arun and took place in Mumbai between April and June 2017, with Meenal Agarwal as the art director and Vaibhavi Merchant providing the choreography. After the filming ended, the film was edited by Shweta Venkat Matthew. Jasleen Royal and Hitesh Sonik composed the soundtrack and background score respectively.
Hichki was released on 23 March 2018. Made on a production cost of ₹200 million (US$2.8 million), the film went on to become a commercial success and had a total gross of ₹2.1 billion (US$29 million); most of the revenues came from China. It received mixed-to-positive critical reviews, with praise mostly directed towards Mukerji's performance. She received nominations for Best Actress at the Filmfare Awards, International Indian Film Academy Awards, Screen Awards, and Zee Cine Awards as well as winning an award of the same category at the Indian Film Festival of Melbourne, where it was screened. The film was also shown at the International Film Festival of India, the Shanghai International Film Festival, and the Giffoni Film Festival.
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