You must have seen Bollywood actress Anushka Sharma on her screens recently in India-New Zealand cricket match. Perhaps you have not paid attention, but Anushka has been seen on the big screen, it has been more than 7 years. She was last seen on the big screen in Shah Rukh Khan starrer ‘Zero’ (2018). But the amazing thing is that despite being away from the screen, Anushka’s name is counted in the big actresses of the industry.
One of the major reasons to believe that Anushka has blockbuster films like ‘Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi’, ‘PK’, ‘Sultan’ and ‘Sanju’, which once used to stand her in Deepika Padukone’s competition. On the other hand, Anushka did not miss out on using her character in films like ‘Sui Dhaaga’ and ‘Pari’. The film Lavors, which started this expert, still consider it a Cult thriller. This film is ‘NH 10’.
Why was an iconic film NH 10?
Anushka Sharma starrer ‘NH 10’ was released on 13 March 2015 and this year the film is going to complete its decade. Ten years ago, Anushka’s film itself came as a unique reving thriller. Female lead films did not have the same violence like ‘NH 10’. The way Anushka appeared in action in this film from above was a lot of raw and dreaded image. Alia Bhatt’s ‘highway’ was released a year before ‘NH 10’ on the story of the road trip’s plan deteriorating.
In that film, Alia’s character and her fiance leave Delhi for a highway ride and they encounter a Kidnapping gang running from Mewat. Alia, who has been kidnapped, is seen developing a new look of seeing the world and life while in the possession of the kidnappers. Anushka’s story was similar in ‘NH 10’, but after the basic plot, the lead characters of both stories move differently.
In ‘NH 10’ also, the lead character i.e. Anushka leaves on a road trip with her husband. On one dhaba, both of them collide with a couple and in the process of saving them, they become witness to their honor killing. Honor killing is powerful people and now they fall behind this couple and kill Anushka’s husband. Anushka’s character is trapped in such a swamp of crime and criminals, who are operating indiscriminately under the guise of social honor.
When there is no option left, there is something that those who see on the screen still do not forget. Anushka Sharma’s character ‘NH 10’ is seen taking revenge for her husband’s death from those gangsters. In the film, the way Anushka tortured and kills gangsters, people did not see any actress till then. This film was able to show many themes like Patriyarki, Gender Struggle, Garib-Amir, Village-Shahar in a very accurate way in limited time.
‘Patal Lok’ before ‘Patal Lok’
Director Navdeep Singh had directed ‘Manorama Six feet under’, one of Bollywood’s best noer films in 2007. But his next two films ‘Basra’ and ‘Rock the Shaadi’ were closed after the shooting started. In an old interview, Navdeep had told that after the closure of two films, he understood that bringing a story from paper to screen is a big task in Bollywood.
Navdeep and his writer Sudeep Sharma used to have some problem in whatever they were writing. So he approached Anushka Sharma with the story of ‘NH 10’ written by Sudeep. With the intention that the top actress agrees, it would be easy to find the producer from above, it was easy to shoot and the budget would seem less. But Anushka refused because she was busy with Anurag Kashyap’s ‘Bombay Velvet’.
Then this script was picked by Rajkumar Rao and Freida Pinto, but both of them also refused. Anurag Kashyap, director of ‘Bombay Velvet’, spoke to Anushka about the script and director of ‘NH 10’, then Anushka again read the script. This time she agreed not only to work in the film, but also to produce it.
Anushka started her production house clean slate film from ‘NH 10’ (now she runs her brother). Later, Anushka also produced ‘Patal Lok’ from her production house, whose writer was Sudeep Sharma, who wrote ‘NH 10’. Navdeep Singh, director of ‘NH 10’, was a development consultant on ‘Patal Lok’.
Savitri-Satyavan caught in Mewat’s gangsters
In an interview, Navdeep Singh described the story of Anushka and her character in ‘NH 10’ as an inspiration from the mythological story of ‘Savitri-Satywan’. But the twist in this story was a little different level. Just as Savitri did strict penance to make her dead husband revive, similarly Anushka’s character in ‘NH 10’ faces tough challenges to save her husband. But here he had to do not do penance or worship, but rather terrible violence.
When Anushka was surrounded by boys crowd
One of the big reasons for the feel of ‘NH 10’ is real was that it was shot on real locations. In an interview, director Navdeep had told that he did this film in Mewat area of ​​Haryana, adjacent to Delhi, which has been notorious for terrible crimes and gangsters. At the time of the shoot, such a crowd used to gather many times which was difficult to remove and they used to get angry when they tried to remove.
During the promotion of ‘NH 10’, actor Darshan Kumar had told in an interview that once the boys on the shoot had become quite aggressive. Some of the crowds gathered at the locations of the shoot started stunting on the bike to impress Anushka and some started firing in the air. Seeing this, everyone was so scared that finally the shoot of that day had to be canceled. Navdeep Singh had told that about 2000 people had gathered on the set that day.
The ‘NH 10’ finally shot in 44 days was prepared in such a way that its violence became the bone of the censor board. Anushka’s film was first scheduled to release on 6 March. But the censor spoke to remove many scenes and dialogues from the film, which Navdeep was not very happy about. In an interview, he said that the cuts that the censor board has installed has lightened the film as well as its flavor.
According to the director, ‘NH 10’ was lightened by the censor. But still people were speechless to see the kind of action Anushka did in the film. Such violence was not seen much in the mainstream films of that time. But here Anushka was doing this as an actress in ‘NH 10’, Anushka did all this action herself from above.
Made in a budget of about 18 crores, ‘NH 10’ had collected more than Rs 32 crore at the box office and was a successful film. For some time, many films on the lines of ‘NH 10’ have tried to show women in a reference drama, but the way Anushka starrer film was a hit, so far no other female lead action has been done.
