By Screen Shot
Ranveer Singh is winning accolades for his performance as Kapil Dev, but others too have added all to the ‘Kapil’s Devils’. On June 25, 1983, the Lord’s Cricket Ground witnessed 14 men beat the World Champions West Indies, putting India back onto the cricket world stage.
83, the film, begins at the BCCI office, where the invitation letter for the World Cup for the Indian team has arrived and conversations there reveal that the country has no hope of the Indian cricket team winning the World Cup. Before the World Cup, the Indian team had poor performances in other series.
In the eyes of the whole world, they were a negligible team. After they lost the first two matches in the World Cup, this belief was cemented further. But, then came the match versus Zimbabwe. Even this looked like not going India’s way, with just nine runs on the scoreboard and four wickets down. That was when Kapil, the captain of the team, took matters into his own hands. It was his brilliant and unbeaten 175 that not only turned the match, but probably also India’s fate in the tournament.
Actually, this is most intriguing, because this was one match that had not been broadcast and not recorded at all. Hence recreating this match was difficult anyway, relying on photographs and what Kapil and other team members said and no video at all. Recreating that and the entire journey through the Cup was credit to Kabir Khan.
83 was a tough film to make and despite the presence of competent actors, the film would’ve fallen flat had the execution of the sports-saga been inferior. He has balanced the drama on pitch and off it, the tears, the laughter, and the dressing room stories skilfully.
Singh is known to have received special training from Kapil Dev before the shooting began. The star cast was also trained in the camp at Dharamshala Cricket Stadium, under the guidance of former cricketers Balwinder Sandhu and Yashpal Sharma. Yashpal, unfortunately died of a heart attack on July 13 and could not see the final film. Kapil Dev said he hoped the focus was not just on him, but on the entire squad.
He has been quoted as saying: “We know what we did. It is difficult to judge what they are going to put in and make. So you sit and give your side of the story and let them do it, they are smart people, they have done enough research.”
Movie : 83
Release : At Movie Theatres (December 24).
Director : Kabir Khan
Writer : Sanjay Puran Singh Chauhan, Vasan Bala
Producer : Deepika Padukone, Sajid Nadiadwala, Kabir Khan, Vishnu Vardhan Induri
Production House : Reliance Entertainment, Phantom Films, Kabir Khan Films.
Filming Location : Major shooting of the film started in England in May 2019. The cast of ’83 flew to London on 28 May. Principal photography began in June at locations in Glasgow, Dulwich College in London, Edinburgh cricket club, Nevill Ground at Royal Tunbridge Wells in Kent and The Oval cricket ground.
Music : Arijit Singh, Pritam
Star Cast :
-Ranveer Singh as Kapil Dev
-Deepika Padukone as Romi Dev
– Raj Bhasin as Sunil Gavaskar
-Saqib Saleem as Mohinder Amarnath, Jiiva as K. Srikkanth
-Jatin Sarna as Yashpal Sharma, Chirag Patil as Sandeep Patil
-Dinkar Sharma as Kirti Azad
-Nishant Dahiya as Roger Binny
-Hardy Sandhu as Madan Lal
-Sahil Khattar as Syed Kirmani
-Ammy Virk as Balwinder Singh Sandhu
– Addinath Kothare as Dilip Vengsarkar, Dhairya Karwa as Ravi Shastri
-R Badree as Sunil Valson, Boman Irani as Farokh Engineer
-Kapil Dev as Cameo role
-Pankaj Tripathi as PR Man Singh
