Are biopics in Bollywood made to better up the images of famous personalities?

Meetali Asiwal

Thinker | Posted on 16-Jul-2018

Very well said, that biopic should be on someone who is capable to inspire us and whose life motivates us. Like “Bhaag Milka Bhaag”, “Mary Kom”, etc., which are both inspirational and motivational, and teaches us a way of life leading to success.

In this chain of biopics, one more is soon to be got added, and that is the biopic of Sunny Leone, “Karanjeet Kaur: The Untold Story of Sunny Leone”. The trailer of the movie has just been released and it’s already surrounded by controversies.

The speaker of SGPC (Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee), Diljit Singh Bedi, has expressed certain problems on naming the film as “Karanjeet Kaur”. According to him, naming the film thus is playing with the feelings of Sikh community.

The movie is expected to tell the “untold story” of a Sikh girl named “Karanjeet Kaur”, which has never got attention because of the image of “Sunny Leone”. To correct this image, this movie is being made, but I don’t think there is any problem in that.

What matters in a biopic is not whether the motive behind it is for the person or for the public, what matters is how much truth is being hidden while “documenting real life truth”. In the movie “Sanju”, a lot of filtering happened to glorify someone who does not desrve to be glorified. But in case of Sunny Leone’s biopic, the motive is lifting the veil from the hidden truth and there should not be any problem in that.

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आकाश जैस्वाल

Entertainment Journalist | Posted on 16-Jul-2018

Biopic is the new trend in Bollywood. After the success of Milkha Singh’s life-story “Bhaag Milkha Bhaag”, we have seen a chain of biopics in Bollywood. The most recent movies exemplifying this trend are “Sanju” based on Sanjay Dutt’s life, and “Surma” based on hockey player Sandeep Singh’s life. But there’s always a controversy behind such movies, that they are made with a hidden motive which is to better up the image of the central character.

The same rumours are in the air for the movie “Sanju”. On one hand, the fans of Sanjay Dutt are showering love on the movie, and on the other hand, some people are condemning and questioning the movie. The skeptical ones say that Rajkumar Hirani made the movie to correct the otherwise controversial image of Sanjay Dutt. According to them, this has made a joke of media and administration.

Whenever a biopic is made, the main focus and the center of attraction is the person whose life has been chosen to be recreated on screen. Hence, the attention has to be paid on whether the concerned person even deserves this or not. The main aim of any biopic should be the documentation of the “real” biography of a person so that it can become a piece of inspiration and motivation for the masses. Only the ones who have achieved enough to become a motivation should be taken as the subjects of movies which concern and claim the real life documentation.

If this genre of art is being used for personal reasons like glorification of the person’s life and acts to better up his image for the public, then sadly the genre loses its true essence. To talk about Bollywood, however, most of the biopics so far have been made keeping in mind the public good only.

Preeti Taneja

Entrepreneur | Posted on 17-Jul-2018

I have a different opinion Meetali,….Biopics are made of personalities that inspire others but with too much commercialization, the essence of biopics has been lost. Sunny Leone suggested that she had to get into **** industry because her family was facing financial crisis and she had no choice!!! Now this is crap…. There are millions of options to get out of financial crisis and trillions of people are facing this issue on day to day basis, but by choosing right way, they come out of it also. Whosoever faces financial crises, doesn’t have to be porn! What message is this biopic giving? Come what may, do whatever you can do, you should become rich and it doesn’t matter how you do it!

On a broader note, I have no problem in someone choosing to be **** , it’s their life, but these movie makes shouldn’t make Indians a sentimental fool. This one is definitely not a biopic. She is building her image and producers know that people will go to watch the movie, not to hear her story, but to see her.