The promotional strategy behind the film Sanju has been unfolding like a compelling story. Ever since the movie's teaser was released on April 24 , director Rajkumar Hirani and his team have managed to keep fans intrigued by throwing in interesting tit-bits regularly— a new look of Ranbir Kapoor or a new character unveiled.
On Tuesday, a day before the launch of its trailer, however, Hirani left everyone with a cliffhanger. He shared a picture of a curly-haired Anushka Sharma who plays a cameo in the film, and didn't reveal the part she is playing. He said he will reveal it during the trailer launch. Speculation went rife. Will Anushka essay one of the most popular actresses of the 90s who had a steamy affair with Sanjay Dutt back then?
However, when the trailer released on Wednesday, there were too many other things that intrigued the audience, besides Anushka's cameo. Ranbir Kapoor's uncanny transformation into Dutt had been a talking point since the day one of his looks from the sets of Sanju leaked last year. It is evident that the actor Ranbir Kapoor has internalised the character so well that even in a trailer of few minutes, he has left a lasting impression.
The jail scenes particularly stand out. The trailer gives glimpses of Dutt's emotional turmoils—a scene in which he is stuck in a ward with a leaking drain pipe; in another, he's nude, being interrogated by the cops. In yet another shot, his plea is that "he is not a terrorist".
Last year, in an interview with THE WEEK, Ranbir said that Sanjay Dutt's life is a science fiction. “How can somebody go through so much and still be loved, still be controversial and still remain relevant? It was a big challenge and I really enjoyed working on it,” he said.
At the trailer launch when the cast and crew of the film spoke, they didn't hesitate in saying that Sanjay Dutt has led a life that's unimaginable. "When I and Abhijat (Joshi, screenwriter) used to leave from our house to listen to Dutt's story, we felt we haven't lived life. We felt like dwarfs," said Hirani during the trailer launch.
The trailer also features Vicky Kaushal as Sanjay Dutt's best friend and partner in crime, Paresh Rawal as father Sunil Dutt, and Sonam Kapoor as his love interest. In a way that deviates from the mainstream Bollywood norms, Hirani seems to have captured the darkness in Sanjay Dutt's life with a gripping honesty—the dangerous drug addiction, time in prison, and his evolution from a long haired, lopsided youngster with a goofy grin, to a bearded, hardened man often dubbed a terrorist by the tabloids. And as far as Anushka's character is concerned, Hirani revealed it's a compressed character based on him and Joshi. She plays a biographer in the film.
Biopics, as a genre in India, often turn out becoming hagiographies. The constant pleas by Ranbir on the screen that he is not a terrorist may give you an impression that the film is an effort to portray Sanjay Dutt in a positive light; producer Vidhu Vinod Chopra assures it isn't. That it is better if anyone makes any assumptions only after watching the film.
Since the trailer is gripping enough, we don't mind waiting for the film to curb any sort of curiosity we may have.