Dil Chahta Hai (2001)

Director:

Farhan Akhtar

Writers:

Farhan Akhtar (story)
Kassim Jagmagia (story)

Release Date:

24 July 2001 (India)

Genre:

Drama

Tagline:

Welcome to a summer of their lives you will never forget.

Plot:

The film is about three distinct characters, Akash (Aamir Khan), Sameer (Saif Ali Khan) and Siddharth (Akshaye Khanna), their individual relationships and the effect that these relationships have on them.

Plot Keywords:

Love | Understanding | Alcoholic | Divorce | Punch

Awards:

21 wins & 36 nominations

Cast

Aamir Khan	...	Akash Malhotra
Saif Ali Khan	...	Sameer
Akshaye Khanna	...	Siddharth Sinha
Preity Zinta	...	Shalini
Sonali Kulkarni	...	Pooja
Dimple Kapadia	...	Tara Jaiswal
Ayub Khan	...	Rohit
Rajat Kapoor	...	Shalini's Uncle
Suhasini Mulay	...	Sid's Mother
Ahmed Khan
Suchitra Pillai-Malik	...	Priya (as Suchitra Pillai)
Anjula Bedi
Rakesh Pandey
Samantha Tremayne	...	Deepa
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Mandala Tayde	...	Deepa - Girl at Chapora Fort (as Manadala tayde)

Also Known As:

Do Your Thing (USA) (TV title)

Runtime:

183 min

Country:

India

Language:

Hindi | Urdu

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital

Certification:

UK:PG | Singapore:PG | Malaysia:U | India:Unrated

Filming Locations:

Australia

Company:

Excel Entertainment

Trivia:

Shiney Ahuja was almost cast in the role of Siddharth.

Quotes:

Siddharth Sinha: Take this sand for instance, the tighter you try to hold it, the more it slips out of our hand.

Movie Connections:

Spoofed in Rang De Basanti (2006)

Soundtrack:

Dil Chahta Hai

A lovely episode of three lives

Just pitifully, we have lots and lots Hindi speaking people in town and they have been here for a very long time, still the local Chinese don't really care to know their culture, let alone watch good Indian movies. Perhaps there are more viewers in Tibet, Yunnan of China.

There are tons of "come of age" movies and this is a wonderful one, it's like a fresh air enters into a stuffy room when I was watching it. Unlike the Hollywood or Euro films, the difficulties that the three young men encounter are not presented in a realistic and sometimes brutal way but highly musical and artistic way. Besides the stunning length, this is another feature of Indian movies.

The boys are from middle class families, obviously, or even higher society. They have time and money to go to Goa to spend their holiday, go to chic places to spend their past time, have nothing to worry. Just like any well-to-do Asian families, (I mean those in Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, Japan....) the old man of the family would send their children to their own overseas company to receive "wilderness training" so that later they can take over the family business. Akash just cannot escape this and stays in Sydney.

Once again, the songs, the dances, the plot and the script are all marvellously put together. Who is able to resist pretty and young faces, right? Who wants to see the real McCoy of the true India? Movie is always a dream. Let's continue it

Bollywood is ushering itself into the world stage but it is still not a strong counterpart to Hollywood. There are many good Indian people people behind the scene of many big movies, directors, editors, script writers.... Yet, I am just wondering it would take how many years for the mainstream (like Hollywood) center to "digest" Indians after taking in Chinese like Jacky Chan, Jet Li, Chow Yun-fat, Tony Leung. Through Hollywood, the Indians actors would be more widely known because it is a place to rocket people's name over one night.

The 1994 Miss World Aishwarya Rai caused a frenzy in Cannes in 2002. I hope some male "Khan" would do so somewhere in Oscar or Cannes again because they do deserve it.