Chak De India
- Mayank Shekhar

The big-ticket film this weekend is Shimit Amin's Chak De India. It's a Shah Rukh Khan starrer.

It is perhaps the first film since Ashutosh Gowarikar's Swades where Shah Rukh truly portrays a character. He is Kabir Khan, a former India player fallen from grace. He now has to prove himself as the coach of the national women's hockey team.

The story is loosely based on the life of one Mir Ranjan Negi, who was the disgraced Indian goalkeeper against Pakistan at the 1982 Asian games.

Talking of the protagonist again, or actually his name, this is also the first Yash Raj films product since Kabir Khan's Kabul Express that truly sticks to the sense and sensibilities of a storyline.

Now, the gem of the film lies actually in Jaideep Sahni's immensely bright yet mainstream piece of screenwriting. It's then about inspired touches of casting and acting of course.

Sixteen carefully selected but relatively raw players from different parts of the country make up the Indian Hockey Team. They come from everywhere, from Jharkhand to Manipur to Chandigarh.

On paper, they are unlikely to even match a European school squad. On the field, they are just a bunch of uncontrolled hooligans. The team members have a coach that pretty much no one can stand. But the coach has a task at hand.

The premise of course concerns a fun but a fairly predictably sports story of victory against odds. Which it is.

Yet, somewhere along the line, the film truly over-achieves its expectations. And that's because of the pertinent points it ends up making.

First a brilliant comedy and comment on the cultural divide and diversity of India. Second, a strong perspective on team and attitude building. Third, a sharp look at the way all largely 'unsponsored' sports, besides cricket, are run in this country.

Where an international sports tournament is seen as a sarkari tour for its administrators. And finally, the point on an unfair trial by the media, that the coach goes through in his playing days.

A loser coach with a losing team teaching us the art of winning is an established Hollywood genre. I can think of countless films that make up this variety: Wildcats, Young Blood, Hoosiers etc etc.

Of course you know the rag-tag Indian team will surprise you with its show. Amin's film lifts the genre though. And it does this purely through a uniquely realistic and local flavour, besides a sense of joy. The movie then both informs and entertains.

If I were you, I'd go for India. Or I'd go for Chak De India.

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