Vidhu Vinod Chopra’s 12th Vikrant Massey and Medha Shankar starrer Fail is celebrating one year of its release today, October 27, 2024. The film was highly praised for its authentic story and the compelling performances of each character. On this special occasion, let us take a look again at some interesting things related to the film which you might not know.
12th Fail is a biographical drama film based on the life of IPS officer Manoj Kumar Sharma, who failed 12th.th Examination. Nevertheless, he faced all the difficulties and overcame the pressures by cracking the country’s toughest competitive exam, UPSC. It also shows how his now wife Shraddha Joshi became his support and biggest motivating factor in his journey.
1. Rajkumar Hirani was to direct 12th fail
According to 12’s official IMDb pageth Vikrant Massey and Medha Shankar starrer Fail was earlier supposed to be directed by Rajkumar Hirani. However, during the process of writing the film with new writers, Vidhu Vinod Chopra became so attached to the characters that he became interested in directing the film himself.
Chopra was initially hesitant to direct the film, as he had not directed any such film before. However, when he saw Massey’s trial, he was determined to direct it himself.
2. Comprehensive casting process
12th Phel had to go through an extensive casting process where at least 35+ actors were tested for the lead roles of Shraddha Joshi, Pritam Pandey, Gauri Bhaiya, Ranveer, Pushpa and Dadi, which were eventually casted by Medha Shankar, Ananth V Joshi, Played by Anshuman Pushkar. , Geeta Aggarwal Sharma and Sarita Joshi.
Interestingly, it was only Manoj’s character for which only one actor was tested.
3.Actors like Sanjay Dutt, Anil Kapoor and Farhan Akhtar were considered for the role of Dushyant Singh
Many illustrious actors like Sanjay Dutt, Anil Kapoor, Farhan Akhtar, Javed Jaffrey and Ram Charan were considered for the role of DSP Dushyant Singh. However, this was ultimately done by Priyanshu Chatterjee, as the producers thought that a cameo appearance in a film would be too distracting to be authentic.
It is noteworthy that Priyanshu Chatterjee and Vidhu had worked together in the 2020 film Shikara.
4. Vikrant Massey did not wear makeup to get his village look
Massey’s immense dedication towards the film can be gauged from the fact that she did not wear any make-up in the film. The actor achieved the perfect village look by sunbathing in the village for several weeks, wearing a vest daily to lighten his skin.
In an earlier interview with GQ India, Vikrant shared, “I spent about a year and a half preparing for the film, and the three months leading up to the shoot were filled with extensive workshops and reading sessions. I needed to lose weight and tan my skin. While tanning, my skin actually burned, and I was terrified that we would have to postpone our shoot by a few weeks.”
5. Medha Shankar actually sang in the film
One of the important scenes of Dilli Haat shows Shraddha singing a song during the Truth and Dare game. Interestingly, the actress actually sang this song live on location. During early film screenings, a section of the audience thought that this playback was too perfect like a recording. Thus, the sound editors were asked to deliberately change the level of her singing to make it more authentic.
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