Ranbir Kapoor to play Sanjay Dutt in Biopic

The most recent Bollywood bio-pic would have to be MARY KOM about an Indian Boxer played by Priyanka Chopra. However, director Rajkumar Hirani, known for his MUNNABHAI films, will helm a biographical film about the life of Bollywood superstar Sanjay Dutt. And most recently, Ranbir Kapoor has been tapped to portray the Khalnayak on the big screen.

This is quite possibly unprecedented in Bollywood that an official biographical film is being made of a successful mainstream actor, portrayed by another mainstream actor. While not many details are known about how the film will be approached, Hirani is said not to be starting the film until after Sanjay Dutt release for current jail time he is serving for his involvement in terrorist attacks years ago.

Speaking of which, it begs the question of how in depth and honest this biopic will truly be. Sanjay Dutt is the first ever ‘star kid’ in Bollywood, with a storied career with many ups and downs, and a dark past. Despite all this, he’s still considered one of the best and most versatile actors of the industry, having many successes and probably the only actor in the industry to have the most successful comebacks over and over.

Director Rajkumar Hirani’s films have thus far been light hearted stories with heart, it’ll be interesting to see him tackle the dramatic and rocky life of Sanjay Dutt. Providing Dutt with his last comeback with the MUNNABHAI franchise, which happened to also be Dutt’s father, the late Sunil Dutt’s last movie, Hirani may have some insight into how to showcase Sanjay Dutt’s life on the big screen. Ranbir Kapoor did a similar fictional biopic of a musician in Imtiaz Ali’s ROCKSTAR, so it will be interesting to see him portray the legendary actor through all this good and bad times.

No word on when the biographical film based on Sanjay Dutt’s life is expected to start production.