Filmmaker Ashutosh Gowariker’s Lagaan has completed 25 years this year. More than two decades after Lagaan redefined Indian cinema and earned an Academy Award nomination, filmmaker Anurag Kashyap has reflected on what made the film feel special long before it reached theatres. Recalling the buzz surrounding the ambitious period drama, Anurag said the scale of the production, director Ashutosh Gowariker’s dedication, and the use of sync sound, a rarity in Hindi cinema at the time, convinced many within the industry that something extraordinary was being made.
Anurag Kashyap recalls anecdotes about Lagaan
In a chat with Aamir Khan Productions, Anurag shared a hilarious anecdote about why Lagaan stood out for him even before the release and said, “What stood out for me before even watching the film, Ashu (Ashutosh Gowariker) went to Kutch to shoot with a head full of hair, came back bald. The first thing was the way they were shooting the film. We heard that they were doing sync sound, and sync sound was something that was absent at that time. I think it restarted with Lagaan, and Dil Chahta Hai.”
He added, “And I was very determined when I was doing Paanch, I said I also want to do sync sound. The way they went about the film changed a lot of things in this industry. A very organised way of shooting, controlling your budgets, the process of making that film has taught the whole industry a lot.”
Anurag recalled that Lagaan had an unusually long production process, with filming lasting six to eight months. He said that many people in the industry were eagerly awaiting the film’s completion and release, a process that took more than a year. During that period, he was performing in a play produced by Aamir Khan at Mumbai’s Prithvi Theatre, while several members of the theatre team were also involved in Lagaan.
Anurag remembered watching the film on its opening day at Gaiety Galaxy and admitted that there was considerable anxiety about how audiences would respond to a period drama with a runtime of nearly three hours and forty minutes. However, as the film progressed, those concerns quickly disappeared. He said that by the halfway mark, viewers were no longer simply watching the story unfold on screen; they felt emotionally invested in the cricket match and began cheering for the characters as though they were spectators inside the film itself.
He recalled predicting an Oscar nomination for the film as a joke and said, “And when Kachra comes to bowl and all that, we were like literally off our seats. And I was literally excited and I said this film is going to go to the Oscars. And that was like a joke. And then after that, we heard that it was screening at Locarno at Piazza Grande, and from that screening, the noise that it created was something else. And we were very happy because you know the film had released with Gadar. And most of the mainstream popular audience was going for Gadar.”
He concluded, “But it was always like you’re in the stadium watching, you’re in the film. And this was the first film that had that kind of an impact in a very, very long time. If Lagaan had not worked, then we as filmmakers would not have been able to make films like Wasseypur and all. That kind of duration, length, like if you hold on to the story of the film and you don’t feel like it’s three hours and forty minutes. Today the industry that we are working in are like children of Lagaan in a way.”
About Lagaan
Released in 2001, Lagaan is one of the most acclaimed films in Indian cinema. Directed by Ashutosh Gowariker and produced by and starring Aamir Khan, the period sports drama features an ensemble cast including Gracy Singh, Rachel Shelley, Paul Blackthorne, Suhasini Mulay, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, Raghuvir Yadav, Rajesh Vivek, and Yashpal Sharma. Set in British-ruled India, it follows a group of villagers who challenge British officers to a game of cricket to avoid paying oppressive taxes, known as “lagaan.”
The film was praised for its storytelling, performances, music by A. R. Rahman, and its unique blend of sports, drama, and patriotism. Lagaan became a major commercial and critical success, winning several awards and earning a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, making it one of only a few Indian films to achieve that distinction.