Shootout at Wadala

About the film

Shootout at Wadala is a 2013 Indian Hindi-language crime action film written and directed by Sanjay Gupta. The film stars Anil Kapoor, Ronit Roy, John Abraham, Tusshar Kapoor, Manoj Bajpayee, Kangana Ranaut and Sonu Sood and Mahesh Manjrekar. It is a prequel to the 2007 film Shootout at Lokhandwala. In the film, Manya, a diligent student, lands in prison for killing a gangster who attacked his brother, Bhargav, who eventually dies. Soon, Manya escapes jail and forms his own gang to seek revenge.

Based on the book Dongri to Dubai: Six Decades of the Mumbai Mafia by Hussain Zaidi, the film dramatises the encounter by Bombay police in which gangster Manya Surve was shot dead. It took place at the junction adjacent to Dr. Ambedkar College, Wadala, Bombay on 11 January 1982.

Plot

The film opens with gangster Manya Surve, mortally wounded in a police encounter, recounting his life story to police officer Afaaque Baaghran.

Once a promising college student, Manya's life changes after he becomes involved in a murder linked to his elder brother Bhargav's underworld activities. Arrested and imprisoned in Yerwada Central Jail, Manya befriends fellow inmates Munir and Veera. Following his brother's death in prison, he transforms into a hardened criminal, eventually escaping from jail with Munir.

After failing to gain acceptance from Mumbai's powerful Haksar brothers, Manya forms his own gang and rises rapidly in the underworld. He eliminates several rivals, including gangster Bhatkar, and takes revenge on Inspector Ambolkar, who had publicly humiliated him. Amid escalating gang wars, Manya reunites with his former lover Vidya Joshi, but their relationship deteriorates due to his criminal lifestyle.

Controversy

During production, director Sanjay Gupta retained references to underworld figures despite concerns over potential legal and security implications. In early promotional material, Sonu Sood's character was identified as "Dilawar Imtiaz", a character reportedly based on Dawood Ibrahim. However, on 27 January 2013, Balaji Motion Pictures released a revised theatrical trailer in which most character-identifying dialogue was removed. The appearance of the character based on Dawood Ibrahim was also significantly reduced, and several character names were changed in the promotional material, although John Abraham's character name remained unchanged in the film.

Soundtrack

The music of the film is composed by Anu Malik, Anand Raaj Anand, Meet Bros Anjjan and Mustafa Zahid.

Reception

The film received a mixed reception from critics.

The ratings for the film provided by the reviewers have been tabulated. Below the table lies a collection of excerpts from the reviews, which can be matched to the respective rating as given in the table by seeing the source.

Box office

Shootout at Wadala had an opening of around 65% occupancy and went on to collect ₹101.9 million (US$1.1 million) on first day. The two-week domestic distributor share is ₹ 255.0 million approx. The final total came out to be ₹820 million (US$8.6 million).

Shootout at Wadala collected $900,000 over its first weekend. Its final overseas collection was US$1.625 million.

Shootout at Wadala was made with a budget of ₹50 crore (US$5.2 million) of production costs. The prints and marketing budget was ₹15 crore (US$1.6 million).

Future

Director Sanjay Gupta has stated his plans to make the third installment to the franchise, Shootout at Byculla based on the JJ Hospital shootout in 1992 by Dawood Ibrahim's D Company against the Arun Gawli gang for the latter's killing of Ibrahim's brother-in-law Ismail Parkar (the husband of Haseena Parkar). He has also said that he will restart his movie Alibaug, starring Sunny Deol, Govinda Ahuja, Emraan Hashmi and turn it into the third sequel of the Shootout film series. Also, actors Abhishek Bachchan, Shabir Ahluwalia and John Abraham have been rumoured to star alongside each other. Abraham will portray a real encounter specialist Vijay Salaskar. The project is currently untitled, but it has been reported to be an "epic revenge saga".

Key details