M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story

Mahendra "Mahi" Singh Dhoni is born in Ranchi to Paan Singh Dhoni, a pump operator. At the age of fourteen, Mahi is chosen to play for his school's cricket team by coach Keshav Banerjee though he was a goalkeeper in the football team. Initially a wicket keeper, Mahi improves his batting skills and becomes a regular member of the team. Three years later, Mahi is selected for the Ranji Trophy but his draft notice is held up due to which he fails to report in time despite his friends' efforts. To content his father, he joins the Kharagpur Railway Station as a ticket collector and practices cricket after day-shifts. After participating in several tournaments, he gets selected for the Railways cricket team. He tries out for the India national under-19 cricket team but loses after Yuvraj Singh scores 301 for the Punjab team, but is selected for Duleep Trophy. Depressed by his job, Mahi quits and declares to his father that cricket is his only passion. He eventually gets selected into the India national cricket team and makes his debut. On a flight, he meets Priyanka Jha, a jovial office consultant, and befriends her. He scores a century after the meeting and they eventually fall in love with each other. On Valentine's Day, Priyanka buys a watch for Mahi but meets with an accident on her way back home, resulting in her death. Devastated, Mahi fails to play well in the 2007 Cricket World Cup. In due course, he moves on and becomes the captain of the team. Under his captaincy, the team wins the T20 World Cup and secures first rank in ICC Test Championship. In 2010, at a hotel, Mahi comes across Sakshi Singh Rawat, an intern, who doesn't recognize him initially. They start dating and Mahi proposes marriage to her and restrains her when she admits to thinking of buying him a Valentine's Day gift. After their wedding, Mahi begins training for the 2011 Cricket World Cup. At the world cup, after Virat Kohli's wicket, Mahi eases pressure with crucial innings and with four runs required, he hits a six and the match is won, while his friends and family watch and well up with emotion. In the post-credits scene, the real Mahi is shown walking by the boundaries after the team's victory in the world cup. == 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 remained dormant. Then, after a few years, Dhoni was at an airport when a child approached him and asked him a question on motivation. Dhoni sat down with the young boy and spent 5 minutes answering the question. His manager, Arun Pandey, asked why he spent that much time and Dhoni replied how his answer was pivotal in benefiting and motivating the boy. This incident then prompted Pandey to make a film about him saying [to Dhoni] that his story has the power to motivate millions of children like him. 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." 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. Pandey met with Dhoni numerous times over a span of eight months and by the eighth month of their meetings, in 2014, the main arc of the story began to form. Their 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. 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. 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." Every question that came from the director or any member of the team working on the script was directly answered by Dhoni. He would clear any doubts of the director and Rajput. 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 to get selected for the school team. 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 to 300 times a day for a week to a point that it came naturally to him. Former wicketkeeper Kiran More personally coached Rajput for four months, including wicket-keeping and batting before he started learning Dhoni's body language. He practiced for four hours, starting at 6:00 every morning. 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. with Pandey saying that 95% of the locations in the film were authentic. In an effort to stay true to the crux of the biopic, Neeraj also shot scenes from the film 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. Filming also took place in Jamshedpur with shots filmed at Keenan Stadium, and Aurangabad. Rajput learned Dhoni's signature 'helicopter' shot by the end of the first day, but suffered a hairline fracture and had to leave for two weeks. == Release ==

promoting the film at an event in September 2016. 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 2 October 2016. The film was also not released in Punjabi and Marathi languages. This was because Fox had wanted to release the film on the same 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. Marketing The filmmakers organised large promotions, which later helped the movie register good advance booking. A teaser trailer was released on 15 March 2016, in conjunction with the commencement of the 2016 ICC World Twenty20. The first official poster was released on 7 July 2016, on Dhoni's 35th birthday. 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 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 24 September. 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) 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 conjunction 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. == Reception ==

Box office India The film was released on Friday, 30 September, across approximately 3,500 screens and delivered an opening of on its first day, Buoyed by positive reviews, the film earned a total of net the second biggest opening for a Hindi release in 2016 behind Sultan. The Tamil version of the film collected in its opening weekend in Tamil Nadu, which is the highest for a film dubbed from Hindi in the state. Following its weekend debut, the film witnessed a sharp fall on Monday earning and ₹ on Tuesday. By 11 October, the film had grossed a total of in India and is currently the fifth highest-grossing Hindi film of 2016 in India. International Internationally, the film made an estimated in its opening weekend from 60 countries. It had successful 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. becoming the third Bollywood film of 2016 to debut above $1 million, following Sultan and Fan. Critical response The film received mainly positive reviews from critics. The film was noted for omitting certain aspects of Dhoni's life and in the realm of cricket that were deemed 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 include 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. The film also does not 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." Veteran actor Rishi Kapoor gave a positive review 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. 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 to 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 by 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 10-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 and Marathi. Tamil lyrics were penned by P. Vijay, Telugu by Chaitanya Prasad and Marathi by Guru Thakur. The background music was composed by Sanjoy Chowdhury. == Accolades ==