The Longest Yard

The year was 1911. When Calcutta’s Mohun Bagan Club defeated British Army’s East Yorkshire Regiment to win the IFA Shield for the first time,it was more than just a victory for the club. The bare-footed Bengalis,who represented a tortured country,had just raised their heads. Times changed,and the game slipped away — from the public’s recall,from the government’s agenda,from the sports hall of fame and from the country’s conscience. But for years now,director Sanjay Surkar has sat in the stands,even empty ones,and watched the game religiously. Give or take a few wins,the game of football,as he knew it,has been on a standby for a long time,and Surkar felt he had to do something about it. So when a friend narrated a four page story based on the game,the politics gobbling down its vitals and the players’ plight,Surkar got working. “I took the story to real football players,coaches,the people who love this game,and they all agreed with the script,” says the four time national award-winning Marathi filmmaker,whose Bollywood debut Stand By,released this week. The film deals with the state of affairs concerning football,the lack of will to work for neglected sports,the political interference,the biases,the under-cutting,and how in the end,the game becomes the victim .

“We are a cricket obsessed nation,and in the process we don’t realise what we have lost. Many years back,it was hockey and football that reigned the world of sports in this country,but they are nowhere today. My film is an effort to bring forward all these points,” says Surkar,who took four years to finalise producers for the project. “It’s not the players,but the game that’s on a stand by mode,” he says.

The film,with its relatively new cast,has actors Adhinath Kothare and Siddharth Kher in the lead roles. Surkar agrees that it was a risk to pick such a subject for a Bollywood debut and that too with newcomers. “Ever since I started making films in 1991,I’ve always been involved with issue-based subjects,scripts and stories that drive home a point,and with Stand By,I wanted the same effect,” says the filmmaker,who consciously avoided big names for this project. “Most of the current Bollywood crop is above 30 years of age and I wanted young lads,who would look like rugged football players and would not overshadow the story as the script is really important here,” says Surkar.

Surkar put the actors through rigourous two-month training and shot while the actors and players played the real game. “There is an innocence about sports and sportspersons. They are there for pure passion of it and messing it with dirty politics is uncalled for. Stand By is not a Chak De,nor is it like Goal or Cycle Kick,” he says. It only highlights that while cricket is a gentleman’s game,football is a man’s game,” explains Surkar,who will release Santa Tukaram in Marathi later this year.