Dilwale

About the film

Dilwale (transl. Big-hearted) is anthological 2015 Indian Hindi-language romantic action comedy film directed by Rohit Shetty, who co-produced the film with Gauri Khan under Red Chillies Entertainment. The film stars Shah Rukh Khan, Kajol, Varun Dhawan, and Kriti Sanon, alongside Boman Irani, Varun Sharma, Johnny Lever, Pankaj Tripathi, Mukesh Tiwari, Kabir Bedi, and Vinod Khanna, in his final film appearance before his death of 27 April 2017.

Dilwale was released theatrically on 18 December 2015, coinciding with the Christmas weekend, and received mixed reviews from critics who praised the chemistry between Khan and Kajol, but criticised the screenplay and runtime. Nonetheless, the film emerged as a commercial success, grossing ₹376.85 crore (US$58.74 million) worldwide to rank as the third highest-grossing Hindi films of 2015 and thirteenth highest-grossing Indian film overseas. At the 61st Filmfare Awards, Dilwale received 5 nominations, including Best Actor (Khan) and Best Actress (Kajol).

Plot

2015: Veer Bakshi and Raj Bakshi are brothers working as car tuners in Panaji. Veer helps Ishita and damages the car of a customer in the process. To discipline him, Raj makes Veer fix the car at night. Veer falls asleep while fixing the car and wakes up to find that the car's sound system has been stolen. Veer soon gets into a tussle with "King", a drug baron, whose henchmen threatened Ishita, and he is injured and gets admitted to the hospital. Raj learns about this and thrashes the gang members, with the help of his friends Shakti and Anwar. Raj burns their stash and reveals himself as "Kaali". King suspects Raj to be Kaali due to the tussle between King and Veer. However, Raj's humbleness convinces King that he is harmless and makes a deal to fix their car in exchange for their safety and protection.

2000: In Sofia, Kaali and Veer are sons of Randhir Bakshi, a crime boss. Kaali comes across Meera during one of their chases with Randhir's rival Dev Narayan Malik. Kaali falls in love with her and the two begin to spend time with each other. During a shipment delivery to Randhir, Kaali gets attacked by Dev's henchmen and Meera reveals herself as Malik's daughter. Meera spares Kaali's life as it was her birthday. Kaali confronts Meera, chases her car and saves her life when she almost falls off a cliff. Overcome by remorse, Meera declares her love for Kaali, who eventually forgives her. Kaali and Meera reveal their relationship to Randhir and Dev, who agree to meet each other. However, Dev tries to kill Kaali and his father in a shootout. Dev and Randhir end up shooting each other to death. Meera sees Kaali holding a gun next to Dev and assumes that Kaali has betrayed her, where she shoots him. Kaali survives and is convinced by Shakti and Anwar to forget about the past and start a new life with his brother Veer, while Meera also starts a new life.

2015: Veer discovers that his friend Siddhu was the thief who stole the car's parts and had been giving them to his boss Oscar, but spares him as Siddhu reveals that he did this for his girlfriend Jenny. Veer proposes to Ishita. Raj learns about their relationship and decides to meet Ishita's sister, who is actually Meera. Upon meeting Raj, Meera immediately forbids Ishita from meeting Veer again. Veer and Ishita try to figure out why their siblings dislike each other so much, so Veer and Siddhu try to confront Shakti (Siddhu's brother) and Anwar. Veer and Ishita scheme together to rekindle Raj and Meera's relationship. Raj's lieutenant Mani steals one of King's cars and brings it to the shop. Veer, Mani and Siddhu discover drugs in the car's decklid and burn them.

Production

In January 2015, Rohit Shetty announced a project with Shah Rukh Khan in the lead which would be their second collaboration after the 2013 film Chennai Express. Shetty stated that he would start filming in March 2015. Shetty paired actress Kajol with Khan, making it the seventh time they were cast opposite each other. He also signed actor Varun Dhawan who was reportedly playing Khan's brother, while actress Kriti Sanon was signed opposite him as Kajol's sister.

Principal photography began on 20 March 2015 with Dhawan in Goa. Khan and Kajol first joined the crew for filming in Bulgaria in June 2015. Later that month, the first song from the film was shot with Dhawan and Kriti Sanon, in Bulgaria. The schedule there was wrapped up by late July. In August 2015, a romantic song featuring the lead pair was shot in Iceland. The entire team then left for Hyderabad in early September to shoot what was touted to be the final schedule of filming. However, the work in Hyderabad was completed by late October, and filming officially came to an end with a brief schedule in Goa, the same location where it was started. In December, after the promotions had commenced, another song was shot in haste. It featured all four lead actors and had to be played simultaneously with the end-credits.

Music

The soundtrack was composed by Pritam, with lyrics written by Amitabh Bhattacharya. The background score was composed by Amar Mohile. Vocals for Khan were provided by Arijit Singh.

A track titled "Gerua" was released on 18 November 2015 as the first single prior to the soundtrack album's release. The second single to be released was "Manma Emotion Jaage" which was released on 26 November 2015. The album features seven tracks and was released on 4 December 2015 by Sony Music India. Sony Music India acquired the music rights of the film for a record ₹190 million (US$2.96 million).

Key details