M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story

Plot

The movie follows the journey of Mahendra Singh Dhoni, a budding cricketer from Ranchi becoming the most successful captain of Indian cricket team. The movie begins its screenplay with the ICC Cricket World Cup Final (India vs Sri Lanka) in the Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai where Mahendra Singh Dhoni (Sushant Singh Rajput) is watching the match live on screen. He decides to take the stand, and tells the authorities that he would go for batting if the wicket falls down. Dhoni takes up his bat and leads down the stairs amidst the roar of the crowd. The movie then sets to a flashback in Ranchi, set on 7 July 1981, the day on which Dhoni was born.

Cast

Development

Development of a Dhoni biopic began after the 2011 Cricket World Cup Final and the discussion about the idea went on over the following years but however remained dormant. Then after a few years, Dhoni was at an airport when a kid approached him and asked him a question on motivation. Dhoni sat down with the young boy and spent 5 minutes answering the kid's question. His manager, Arun Pandey, asked why he spent that much time with the kid and Dhoni replied how his answer was pivotal in benefiting and motivating him. This incident then prompted Pandey to make a movie about him saying [to Dhoni] that his story has the power to motivate millions of kids like him. After the idea coalesced, Pandey began to convince Dhoni himself in order to adapt his life into a full-length feature film. When he was first approached on the idea of the adaptation, he became a little worried and questioned the need for it. But after being convinced by his peers, all he said was, "Don't misrepresent me. Show me as I am." It took Dhoni two years to finally agree the decision. According to International Business Times, the film carries a production budget of around ₹1.04 billion (US$15.6 million).

Writing

Pandey was attracted to Dhoni's story not because of his successful cricket career saying that "it's foolish to chase MS Dhoni's life story only because it's about cricket," but rather to instances and factors that made him the person he is today. Dhoni wasn't involved in writing the script. Pandey recruited a team of researchers who collated data and background informations while the director was busy directing Baby (2015). The filmmakers decided that they would only green-lit the film once they find a convincing story to tell after the research. Pandey met with Dhoni numerous times for a span of eight months despite their professional gaps and by the eighth month of their meetings in 2014, the main arc of the story began to form. His first meeting took place in Delhi during a cricket match. During their sporadic meetings, Pandey chose not to record and tape their conversations which prompted Dhoni to open up more.

Arun Pandey says 98% of the content in the film is reality. The team undertook two years of research on the various incidents and how they took place. Pandey says "such authenticity would be hard to find even in Hollywood." Pandey revealed several prominent aspects of Dhoni's life that were hidden before that Dhoni initially disdained cricket and had predilection for football instead, his signature "helicopter shot" was taught to him his friend Santosh Lal, he likes women who don't recognise him, he and Yuvraj Singh had close ties even before their respective stardom and it was he who ousted Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid from the team since he wanted to build a young team for the 2011 World Cup with better fielders and he wasn't too happy with the 'fitness' levels of the aforementioned cricketers.

Pandey decided to end the film with the 2011 Cricket World Cup Final since he felt "the arc of the story had a natural high at the 2011 World Cup win." He knew that they were chronicling almost 30 years of a sportsman's life "in a highly compressed manner" and said that had he extended the script to his sudden retirement during an ongoing series, the run time of the film would shoot up to six hours.

Pre-production

Neeraj Pandey was in the midst of shooting Baby (2015) when Arun Pandey, the manager of Dhoni, offered him an opportunity of making a biopic based on Mahendra Singh Dhoni. However, Pandey was sceptical and didn't wish to tackle such subject until he met Dhoni himself. It was only after meeting Dhoni personally – during the second schedule of Baby – that he was convinced to helm the film. Although to him, he treated the project not as a biopic, but more as an inspiring story. Pandey admits that he is not a fan of Dhoni and doesn't feel guilty about it. But he does have a predilection for cricket and other renowned cricketers like AB de Villiers and Sachin Tendulkar. He explained how not being a fan helped him direct the movie impartially, "I think if you are fan, as a director it would be difficult to be objective and impartial. A fan would only see positives. Even negatives will look like positives for him. So not being a fan helped me direct the movie impartially." It is the director's first biopic film.

Dhoni was a huge participant in the film's creativity. Every question that came to the director or any member of the team working on the script was directly answered by him. He would clear any doubts of the director and Rajput. However, he did not want the film to serve as a whitewash of his life, "One thing I told (Neeraj) Pandey is that this movie should not be to glorify me. It's about the journey of a professional sportsperson and that's what it should depict."

Casting

Director Pandey, who has not seen any of Sushant Singh Rajput's films, followed his intuition when it came to casting him. Rajput was always his first choice given how both Dhoni and Rajput hail from the same part of India, which made it easy for him to get the dialect right and the fact he has a predilection for sports like Dhoni. When he met Rajput and chatted with him for 15 minutes, he knew that the accent, the setting and the milieu they needed to capture would not be a problem. Rajput admits that he is a fan of Dhoni, and describes himself as an "ardent" cricket fan. Rajput's sister is a professional cricketer who once made it to the women's national team, while he himself wasn't very good at the sport no matter how hard he tried, even failing him to get selected for the school team.

He did not find portraying the character as tough due to fan's robust expectations but found it difficult to get his mannerisms right. He said that he did not pretend to be Dhoni, but actually felt like the cricketer while essaying the title role. In order to prepare for his role, he had to go through an exhaustive prolonged training for a period of 18 months before shooting began and watched his videos for hours, to a point that he subconsciously started picking up some of his traits. For instance, in order to grasp Dhoni's trademark "Helicopter shot," the team would carefully analyse it and fix the bowling machine into one spot and then play the same shot at least 200, 300 times a day for a week to a point that it came naturally to him. He also met Dhoni thrice before filming commenced. Former wicketkeeper Kiran More personally coached Rajput for thirteen months, including wicket-keeping and battling before he started learning Dhoni's body language. He practiced for four hours, starting at 6:00 every morning. Rajput described More as a "tough taskmaster," who treated him like a professional cricketer rather than an actor. Dhoni's batting style was scientifically analysed, learnt and practised and an analyst was called on board for this. Training sessions were recorded and compared with the cricketer's real game. It took a further six months for Rajput to feel confident that he looked and played like Dhoni.

Principal photography

The film was shot extensively in authentic and real-life locations where Dhoni spent much of his childhood and teenage years, with Pandey saying that 95% of the locations in the film as being authentic. In an effort to stay true to the crux of the biopic, Neeraj also shot scenes from the movie in Dhoni's real home in Ranchi, Jharkhand where his parents and brother Narendra currently live. Shooting also took place at Kharagpur railway station where Dhoni once worked as a Travelling Ticket Examiner (TTE), his old school, Jawahar Vidya Mandir and at the quarter number 142 of Mecon Limited he shared with his four roommates while studying engineering. The filmmakers were also shown his former social hangout as well as introduced to the food he liked eating whilst growing up. Dhoni's real school teacher was cast in the film.

Filming also took place in Aurangabad.

Rajput learned Dhoni's signature 'helicopter' shot by the end of the first day, but suffered hairline fracture and had to leave for two weeks.

Release

M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story received the widest release for a Bollywood film receiving a day-and-date release both in India and internationally in a total of 61 countries across approximately 4,500 screens worldwide on the week ending October 2 and was widely anticipated by fans of the cricketer. Fox Star Studios CEO, Vijay Singh, told Forbes magazine that Dhoni "is truly a role model for every Indian and cricket lover across the globe" and that the film is "a human story that will inspire audiences across the world."

However, the film was not released in Pakistan due to problems following the 2016 Uri attack Sabina Islam, media and marketing manager of the distributor IMGC Global Entertainment in Pakistan told The Express Tribune, "We wouldn't want to release anything that can aggravate the current situation of the two countries. Dhoni is India's hero so it's risky." The film was also not released in Punjabi and Marathi languages. This was because Fox had wanted to released the film day-and-date but a dubbed version in the two aforementioned languages could not be produced at that time.

Even though attempts were made later to dub and release the film in the Marathi language in the state of Maharashtra, this was however not possible. This was because Amey Khopkar, chief of Chitrapat Karmachari Sena, the film affairs wing of regional political party Maharashtra Navnirman Sena told the filmmakers that releasing the film in the language would cause unfair competition for regional movies by giving rise to a scenario where more filmmakers will release Hindi films dubbed in Marathi, prompting Pandey to scrap the plan.

The film was declared tax-free in Uttar Pradesh by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav a day after its release, and in Dhoni's home state, Jharkhand, a few days later. Maharashtra was also declared tax-free on October 5 by chief minister Devendra Fadnavis.

Marketing

The filmmakers organised massive promotions, which later helped the movie register good advance booking. A teaser trailer was released on March 15, 2016, in conjunction with the commencement of 2016 ICC World Twenty20. The first official poster was released on July 7, 2016, on Dhoni's 35th birthday. A second poster was unveiled on August 6. On September 12, Fox Star Studios released a promotional video entitled "Captain Curious", which shows Dhoni and Sushant Rajput engaging in a conversation. The short clip was written by What Works, shot by Shiraz Bhattacharya and released by Fox. In late September 2016, the cast flew to Chennai to promote the film where Dhoni and Rajput met veteran actor Rajinikanth at his residence and discussed about the film.

Maruti Suzuki released two MS Dhoni inspired special edition of Alto cars – the Alto 800 and Alto K10 – as part of the company’s association with the film. The two cars were unveiled by Dhoni and R S Kalsi, Maruti Suzuki India Executive Director of Marketing and Sales in Hyderabad on September 24. As a part of the association, Maruti Suzuki ran a series of customer engagement activities on social media.

The film recouped around ₹900 million (US$13.5 million) even before its release via multiple platforms and ancillary; ₹550 million (US$8.2 million) from satellite rights; ₹200 million (US$3 million) from endorsement brands; ₹100 million (US$1.5 million) for overseas distribution rights; and ₹50 million (US$750,920) for music rights.

Internationally, the film was released in 60 countries across 1,000 screens in conjuncture with its Indian premiere. According to Vijay Singh, that marks the biggest-ever release for a Hindi film in Tamil and Telugu and one of the widest for any Indian film internationally. It was released in key markets including the United States and Canada and the U.K. and in the other regular Bollywood diaspora markets in South East Asia, Africa and Europe. Through a chain of distributors the film also went out in non-regular Bollywood territories such as Japan, Spain, France, Hungary, Poland, the Philippines and the West Indies.

India

The film was released on Friday, September 30, across approximately 3,500 screens and delivered a strong opening of ₹213 million (US$3.2 million) on its first day, occupying 45–50% of the total marketplace which is the biggest opener of Sushant's career. Buoyed by excellent reviews, the film earned a total of ₹660 million (US$9.8 million) net the second biggest opening for a Hindi release this year behind Sultan and a personal best in the career of Sushant. The Tamil version of the film collected ₹70 million (US$1.0 million) in its opening weekend in Tamil Nadu, which is the highest for a film dubbed from Hindi in the state.

Following its sturdy weekend debut the film witnessed a sharp fall on Monday earning ₹85.1 million (US$1.3 million) and ₹₹75.2 million (US$1.1 million) on Tuesday. By October 11, the film had grossed a total of ₹1.16 billion (US$17 million) in India and is currently the fifth highest-grossing Hindi film of 2016 in India.

International

Internationally, the film made an estimated ₹219.2 million (US$3.3 million) in its opening weekend from 60 countries. It had stellar debuts in many markets, including $1.1 million in the U.S., $995,000 in the Middle East, $263,000 in the U.K. where it ranked at No. 9, and $194,000 in Australia for tenth spot. Most notably, the film received a limited release in the U.S. and Canada across 256 theaters and earned $1,108,650 at an average of $4,331 per theater, debuting at number 14 at the box office, becoming the third Bollywood film of 2016 to debut above $1 million, following Sultan and Fan.

Critical reception

The film received mainly positive reviews from critics who praised Neeraj Pandey's direction and the performance of Sushant Rajput as Dhoni, but received criticism for the lack of chemistry between the two leads, Pandey’s screenplay which ignored several controversies attached to Dhoni's career and for whitewashing the cricketer.

The film was notable for omitting certain aspects of Dhoni's life and in the realm of cricket that were deemed pivotal or noteworthy such as the 2009 ICC World Twenty20 press conference, where Dhoni brought the entire team and read out a statement of unity, the 2013 Indian Premier League spot-fixing and betting case and the alleged rift with Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir. The film also does not put forward Dhoni's take on the two-year ban imposed on Chennai Super Kings from playing in the Twenty20 which he captained at that time, which ultimately led to the Supreme Court asking N. Srinivasan to step aside as BCCI  President. Moreover, the film also doesn't provide any explanation to Dhoni's purchase (and eventual sale) of the 15% stake in the player management firm Rhiti Sports, or why he was named the vice-president of India Cements. While the film featured his sister Jayanti, there was no mention about his real life elder brother, Narendra Singh Dhoni, who is a politician. Chanchal Bhattacharya, a specialised cricket coach who used to train young cricketers in Dhoni's school campus pinpointed at a pivotal incident during Dhoni's days which was absent in the movie: Dhoni once scored a century for East Zone in a Deodhar Trophy against Central Zone. Karsan Ghavri, who was the coach of East Zone at that time, praised Dhoni's century saying that "this lad will represent the country one day."

The Hindu said, "of course such sanitisation makes the film lose out on interesting layers and complexity, but, curiously, the focused, unwavering eulogising of Dhoni also helps it get an unmistakeable emotional acuity." In a more positive take, Andy Bull of The Guardian said that not every aspect of Dhoni’s life could be included in the three-hour-and-10-minute-long biopic. He quoted John Briley's famous line from the script he wrote for Richard Attenborough's Gandhi: "No man's life can be encompassed in one telling. There is no way to give each year its allotted weight, to include each event, each person who helped to shape a lifetime."

Veteran actor Rishi Kapoor gave a positive of the film, praising the performance of Rajput in particular. Several professional Indian sportsmen and sportswomen such as cricketer Mohammad Kaif, and badminton player Saina Nehwal had high regards for the film.

The film garnered mixed response from international critics. Rachel Saltz of The New York Times gave a negative review of the film saying that "you don't have to understand cricket to enjoy a good cricket movie", e.g. Lagaan (2001), but one does "have be a cricket fan, and an indulgent one at that" for M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story. She found the term "hagiographic" unfit for the film and labelled the film as "long and languid." She concluded saying "I learned more about Mr. Dhoni — his enigmatic character and what marked him as a great captain — by reading about him after watching this movie than I did during three long hours."

Music

Amaal Mallik composed the soundtrack for M.S. Dhoni. Rochak Kohli composed one song as a guest composer. T-Series acquired the music rights for the film. The 8 song album features the voices of singers Armaan Malik, Arijit Singh, Siddharth Basrur, Rochak Kohli and Palak Muchhal; it was released in three different language versions: Tamil, Telugu & Marathi. Tamil lyrics were penned by P. Vijay, Telugu by Chaitanya Prasad & Marathi by Guru Thakur.

Soundtrack

Amaal Mallik composed the soundtrack for M.S. Dhoni. Rochak Kohli composed one song as a guest composer. T-Series acquired the music rights for the film. The 8 song album features the voices of singers Armaan Malik, Arijit Singh, Siddharth Basrur, Rochak Kohli and Palak Muchhal; it was released in three different language versions: Tamil, Telugu & Marathi. Tamil lyrics were penned by P. Vijay, Telugu by Chaitanya Prasad & Marathi by Guru Thakur. All lyrics written by Manoj Muntashir.