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Anurag Kashyap has never failed in giving us some impactful movies. Daring auteur Anurag Kashyap adds a wholly original Indian perspective to the rich history of boxing and sports films with Mukkabaaz.
Aspiring boxer Shravan (Vineet Kumar Singh) slogs day and night to achieve his dream of being a recognized boxer. Things go awry when he falls in love with a high-caste, mute girl who happens to be the niece of his arch nemesis, the head of the state boxing federation. Shravan soon finds out that in India, boxing is about everything else but the sport, which is heightened by the volatile political climate of Uttar Pradesh.
The makers have released the first song of the film and it’s quite trippy & peppy. It is titled as Paintra. It gives a gist of the whole story of the movie. The track is sung by Divine while the music is directed by Nucleya and the lyrics are written by Vineet Kumar Singh.
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In the film set in Uttar Pradesh’s Bareilly and inspired by a true story, Singh plays boxer Shravan Singh who wants to take on opponents in the boxing ring but is instead forced to spar with a powerful and vengeful coach.
The movie has also been screened in the Special Presentations section at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival and the 2017 Mumbai Film Festival. Actor Vineet Kumar Singh, who plays the protagonist in Anurag Kashyap’s Mukkabaaz (The Brawler), which premiered at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), says after working so hard for the movie, he is not scared of any boxer now.
A strong social-political drama, the film is around the struggles of a boxer from a lower-caste and gives a peek into cow vigilantism. Vineet, earlier seen in Kashyap’s Gangs of Wasseypur and Ugly, plays the role of the film’s boxer hero Shravan.
In Toronto for the film’s premiere, Vineet narrated how he prepared for the role.”Sir (Kashyap) told me that when he orders action, there won’t be any stop (cut). I had to prepare so hard for the role,” he said, adding that the filmmaker’s words proved to be a tonic for him.
The Varanasi-born Vineet said the training for boxing has given him so much confidence that he feels that he can now take on any boxer. “I am not scared of any boxer now,” he said amid laughter. Kashyap said he specially picked Vineet for this action movie.
“It is my fourth film with Vineet. He took one year off and stayed in the village to prepare for the role of the boxer in the film. He got bloodied many times during the training and he also broke one of his ribs while preparing for action,” Kashyap said.
Mukkabaaz is Anurag’s third film to premiere at TIFF after That Girl in Yellow Boots (2010) and Gangs of Wasseypur (2012). Praising the filmmaker, Toronto film festival artistic director Cameron Bailey said: “Anurag is one of my favorite directors.”
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