Munna Bhai M.B.B.S.

Munna Bhai M.B.B.S.
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Rajkumar Hirani
Screenplay by	Rajkumar Hirani Vidhu Vinod Chopra
Dialogues by	Abbas Tyrewala
Story by	Rajkumar Hirani
Produced by	Vidhu Vinod Chopra
Starring	Sunil Dutt Sanjay Dutt Gracy Singh Arshad Warsi Boman Irani Rohini Hattangadi Jimmy Sheirgill
Cinematography	Binod Pradhan
Edited by	Pradeep Sarkar Rajkumar Hirani
Music by	Score: Sanjay Wandrekar Songs: Anu Malik
Production companies	Entertainment One Vinod Chopra Films
Distributed by	AA Films (India) Eros International (Overseas)
Release date	19 December 2003 (2003-12-19) (India)
Running time	157 minutes
Country	India
Language	Hindi
Budget	₹100-120 million[1][2]
Box office	est. ₹562.8 million[1]

Munna Bhai M.B.B.S. (translation: Munna Bro M.B.B.S.) is a 2003 Indian Hindi-language satirical comedy drama film written and directed by Rajkumar Hirani in his directorial debut and produced by Vidhu Vinod Chopra under the production banner of Vinod Chopra Films. The film was released in India on 19 December 2003, and is the first installment of the Munna Bhai film series before its sequel, Lage Raho Munna Bhai (2006). Considered to be a cult film in the Hindi cinema and loosely inspired from the 1998 American film Patch Adams, the film stars Sunil Dutt in his final film role as the father to his real-life son, Sanjay Dutt, who stars as the titular character of Munna Bhai, a gangster in the Mumbai underworld. Gracy Singh portrays the female lead, being replaced by Vidya Balan in the sequel, and Arshad Warsi portrays the role of Munna's sidekick, Circuit, while Boman Irani, Rohini Hattangadi and Jimmy Sheirgill also appear in the film. In the film, Munna tries to please his father by pretending to be a doctor, but when a doctor, Asthana (Irani), exposes Munna's lies and tarnishes his father's honour, Munna enrols in an Indian medical college with the help of Circuit. Chaos ensue when Munna, on finding that Asthana is the dean of the college, vows revenge, while also sparking a romance with a house doctor, Suman (Singh), unaware that she is Asthana's daughter and his childhood friend, "Chinki".

The film was a major critical and commercial success, and went on to win the 2004 National Film Award for Best Popular Film, and several Filmfare Awards, including the Best Film (Critics) and Best Screenplay. At the box office, it achieved a silver jubilee status (25-week run) being one of only eight Hindi films to have achieved this status since the year 2000.^[3] In its 26th week of release, the film could still be found playing on 300 screens throughout India.^[4] The film's release was also accompanied by a mobile video game based on the film by Indiagames.^[5]

Hirani revealed in an interview in September 2019 that production on the third Munna Bhai film starring Dutt in the title role will begin in towards the end of 2020.^[6]

Plot

Murli Prasad Sharma, also known as Munna Bhai, is a street-wise Mumbai Hindi-speaking gangster, who runs an extortion racket on the streets of Mumbai, and is supported by his loyal sidekick, Sarkeshwar, also known as Circuit, who does most of his work for him. Every year, Munna's parents, Hari Prasad and Parvati, leave their home village and travel to Mumbai to visit their son, whom they are extremely proud of, for having apparently fulfilled their expectations and become a doctor running his own fully-functioning hospital named the "Shri Hari Prasad Sharma Charitable Hospital". Munna cannot bear to shatter his parents' dreams, and so whenever they come to visit him, he and Circuit set up this medical masquerade by having their building dressed up as a hospital, and all their henchmen take turns acting as doctors, patients and hospital staff. This works for many years, until one of the annual visits of Munna's parents culminates in Munna's father, while on a walk in a Mumbai park, bumping into an old accquaintance, Dr. J. C. Asthana, who founded the first hospital in Munna's village years ago.

Munna's father learns that Asthana's daughter, "Chinki", is also a doctor and proposes to him to arrange her marriage with his son to which Asthana agrees. Munna, remembering that Asthana's daughter was his childhood friend, asks "Chinki" to reject him over a phone call, in an attempt to prevent his parents from discovering the truth. However, when his housemaid reacts shockingly to Munna's photograph, Asthana realises the truth, and exposes Munna's real occupation to his parents, and insults him for being ignorant of their son's life. Humiliated and aghast at their son's lack of a real vocation, Munna's parents cut their visit short and leave the city to return home to their village. Munna, in grief and despair, drunkenly decides that the only way to redeem himself and take revenge against the spiteful Asthana for insulting his father is to become a doctor in reality and obtain a medical degree of MBBS. The next day, Munna and Circuit arrive at the "Imperial Institute of Medical Studies", one of the most prestigious medical colleges in Mumbai, to make enquiries, when they learn from Dr. Rustom Pavri, a faculty member of the institute, that Munna must write and pass an entrance examination with a mark above 90% to gain admission. Munna and Circuit repay Rustom for this helpful advice by holding his old, carrom-obsessed father as their hostage, and blackmailing Rustom into assuming Munna's identity, and writing and passing the entrance examination for him.

However, Munna immediately creates chaos on his very first day at the institute; he frightens a doctor into treating Karan, a youngster having attempted suicide (the doctor had initially refused as Karan's mother had not filled out the necessary administrative forms); his class mistakes him for their professor; he moves into a hostel room and takes it over completely; he scares the senior students when they attempt to rag him; and on top of that, he discovers that the dean of the institute is none other than Asthana himself. Later on, though, the carefree Munna also develops a friendly relationship with Dr. Suman, another faculty member of the institute, who turns out to be Asthana's daughter. Unaware that Suman and his childhood friend "Chinki" are one and the same, an ignorance that Suman hilariously exploits to a point where he is bluffed into believing "Chinki" is not his type anymore, Munna decides to confess his feelings for Suman and abandon his personal feud against "Chinki" and Asthana.

As time progresses, Munna's antics make him popular with his students; he arranges Circuit to bring an extra dead body to the institute for dissection purposes (a concept which fails as Circuit kidnaps a Chinese tourist and Munna himself is unable to dissect the dead body); he meets Karan, the suicidal patient he had saved earlier, and cheers him up with a song; he effusively thanks an old, hitherto underappreciated janitor, Maqsood Bhai (Surendra Rajan), cheering him up significantly; and he argues with a doctor for treating Anand Banerjee, a patient who has been brain-dead for 12 years, like a dead body, and takes Anand into his own personal care, and attempts to treat him in his own empathetic and compassionate style. Although these antics slowly endear Suman to Munna, her father considers Munna a troublemaker and seeks to rusticate him. He sets up the most difficult examination in the history of the institute to prove Munna unqualified and get rid of him, which leads Munna to send Circuit to pay a visit to Rustom's father once again.

Although he has no medical skills, Munna transforms those around him with his "Jadoo Ki Jhappi" ("Magical Hug") – a method of comfort taught to Munna by his mother – and the compassion he shows towards those in need. Despite the institute's emphasis on mechanical, cartesian, impersonal and often bureaucratic relationships between doctors and patients, Munna constantly seeks to impose a more empathetic and almost holistic regimen around himself. He enforces the regime of "common-sense treatment" and uses old-fashioned kindness and love to "cure" many patients at the hospital, encouraging the patients themselves to make changes in their lives, so that they do not need medicines or surgery. Asthana - who perceives all this as symptoms of chaos - is unable to prevent it from expanding and gaining ground at his college. He begins laughing in a way that implies that he has gone extremely insane, as an attempt to practice "laughter therapy", which serves more to convey his anger than diffuse it. Later, Munna's meets one of Suman's patients, Zaheer Ali, a depressed young man, who has been diagnosed with stomach cancer. Munna arranges Circuit to bring a stripper inside the patient ward to entertain Zaheer, cheering him up significantly.

At the same time, Rustom's dying father is also admitted to the institute, where even his son is unable to save him, but Munna and Circuit are able to bring life back into him with the help of carrom, which earns him Rustom's respect and leads Zaheer to consider Munna an almost "divine" man. Meanwhile, Asthana tries several times to rusticate Munna but is often thwarted by Munna's wit or the affection with which the others at the institute, including, to some extent, Suman herself, regard Munna, having gained superior self-esteem by his methods. When Asthana learns about the stripper episode, he sees this as a potential reason to rusticate Munna on disciplinary grounds, but is unable to do so as Munna manages to stay on by throwing himself over a ledge and severely injuring himself, thereby confining himself to the institute's hospital. However, when Munna does recover, the hospital staff, patients and students stand in Asthana's way and refuse to let Munna leave, prompting Asthana to challenge Munna to take a test in front of him and the entire institute the next day to keep his enrollment, and everyone accepts the challenge.

Later that night, Munna is busy memorizing the answers for Asthana's questions, kindly provided by Rustom in gratitude for saving his father, when Suman brings the distressing news of Zaheer having collapsed to a worsening health and called for Munna. Zaheer believes that Munna will save his life, but unfortunately, he breathes his last in Munna's arms. The next morning, Munna begins answering all the questions well, but Asthana intervenes and announces he will ask all the forthcoming questions, shocking everyone. Munna, already shaken by Zaheer's death, is eventually unable to answer and is shamed into leaving the institute. He confesses the truth to everyone and breaks down about his guilt to Zaheer, his parents, and everyone he cared for. Everyone except Asthana is moved to tears by his speech. In the moments immediately following Munna's departure, Anand miraculously awakens from his vegetative state, and Suman, at this point, realises Munna as the miracle behind Anand's recovery, and gives a heartfelt speech wherein she criticises her father for having banished Munna, pointing out that doing so is as good as banishing hope, compassion, love, and happiness from the institute. Asthana eventually realises his folly.

That night, Munna and Circuit drown their sorrows in alcohol, but when they reach home, they are surprised to find Munna's parents waiting for them with open arms. Although Munna was not successful in becoming a doctor, the news of his "miraculous" treatments reached his parents and they returned from their home village. Munna is then amused to find out that "Chinki" is in fact Suman herself. In the end, Anand, restored to normal mental health, narrates to a few children at the hospital through a series of photographs what happened to all the characters; Munna and Suman got married and opened a hospital in Munna's home village, where they implemented Munna's ideas daily, while Asthana is revealed to have picked up Munna's lingo there as the head doctor, who also implemented the fun-oriented methods used by Munna earlier. Meanwhile, Circuit also got married after a year and was blessed with a son nicknamed "Short Circuit". The medical institute, under Rustom's management since Asthana's retirement, also begun to imitate Munna's radical methods of treatment. Thus, in addition to the birth of Munna and Suman's offsprings, earned Munna the nickname "M.B.B.S." ("Married With Bouncing Babies And Smiles") even though he did not become a doctor.

Cast

• Sunil Dutt as Shri Hari Prasad Sharma; Munna's father
• Sanjay Dutt as Murli Prasad Sharma (a.k.a. Munna Bhai); a gangster and medical student in Mumbai
• Gracy Singh as Dr. Suman Asthana (a.k.a. Chinki), Asthana's daughter and a doctor
• Arshad Warsi as Sarkeshwar (a.k.a. Circuit); Munna's sidekick
• Boman Irani as Dr. J. C. Asthana; Suman's father and the medical institute dean
• Rohini Hattangadi as Parvati Sharma; Munna's mother
• Jimmy Sheirgill as Zaheer Ali; Suman's terminally ill patient and Munna's friend
• Kurush Deboo as Dr. Rustom Pavri; a faculty member of the medical college
• Yatin Karyekar as Anand Banerjee; a brain-dead patient and Munna's friend
• Nawazuddin Siddiqui as a pickpocket who tried to steal Hari's wallet at the railway station (cameo appearance)
• Rohitash Gaud as the Coconut seller in the park
• Neha Dubey as Shalini; Suman's friend and fake Chinki
• Mumaith Khan as Nandini (a.k.a. Reena), the cabret dancer in the song "Dekh Le" (cameo appearance)
• Priya Bapat as Meenal; first year medical student
• Pushkar Shrotri as a professor in the medical institute
• Vishal Thakkar as Karan; the suicidal patient at the institute
• Anuradha Chandan as Karan's mother
• Khurshed Lawyer as Nagrajan Swami; Munna's roommate and friend
• Bomi Dotiwala as Rustom's carrom-obsessed father

Production

In an interview, Hirani discussed how the idea for the film emerged from his interaction with some friends who were medical students.^[7] Later, he also had the opportunity to interact with a lot of medical professionals when some members of his family became sick. These experiences gave birth to the idea for the film.

Hirano initially conceptualised the tale of Munna Bhai M.B.B.S. as a series, and approached R. Madhavan to play the lead role. The actor turned down the offer citing that he was busy with other commitments.^[8] After Hirani chose to make into a film, during the scripting stage, he wanted Anil Kapoor to play the lead role.^[7] However, Shah Rukh Khan was later cast as Munna along with Sanjay Dutt as Zaheer but due to his back problems Khan was forced to turn down the film.^{[9][10][11][12][13][14]} Nevertheless, the end credits of the film thank Khan for his inputs into the script.^[7] Hirani also narrated the script to Aishwarya Rai during the time he was in talks with Shahrukh Khan.^[7] Khan and Rai were working together on Devdas at the time. Vivek Oberoi was considered for the role, but in the end Sanjay Dutt took the role as Munna, which ultimately gave him an image make over and helped change the public perception of the controversial superstar;^[15] his real-life father Sunil Dutt returned to the silver screen after 10 years to play Munna's father. This is the first and only film in which real-life father and son Sunil and Sanjay appear together, although they both appeared in Reshma Aur Shera (1971), Rocky (1981) and Kshatriya (1993) but not in any scenes together.^[16][17]

The original choice for Circuit's role was Makarand Deshpande. Arshad Warsi took over the role which proved to be a turning point for his career.^[18] The scenes of the Medical College were shot at the Agriculture College of Pune and Grant Medical College Mumbai.^[19]

The film has a similar premise to the 1998 American film Patch Adams, starring Robin Williams. The producer Vidhu Vinod Chopra, however, denies there being a resemblance, and says that he had not watched the film before the release of Munna Bhai.^[20]

Hirani did not have a big budget to shoot the film. As a result, he had to change the way certain scenes were shot. For example, the film ends with stills of Munna Bhai's wedding. Hirani was told that setting up a wedding stage and making a wedding outfit for Gracie Singh would cost him several thousand rupees. To save on some of that money, Hirani arranged to have the stills shot on an actual wedding stage set up for a real wedding near the sets. The production team reached an agreement with the wedding hall management and used their stage after a wedding ended.^[7]

Music

The music is composed by Anu Malik. Lyrics for the songs are penned by Abbas Tyrewala and Rahat Indori. According to the Indian trade website Box Office India, with around 1,000,000 units sold, this film's soundtrack album was the year's one of the highest-selling.^[21]

Accolades

Munna Bhai M.B.B.S. was the recipient of a number of awards. At the 50th Filmfare Awards, it received the Best Film (Critics), Best Screenplay, the Best Dialogue, and Best Comedian (for Warsi) in addition to four other nominations. It won a number of awards at the 2004 Zee Cine Awards including Best Debuting Director, Best Actor in a Comic Role (for Warsi), Best Cinematography, and Best Dialogue.

Other ceremonies include the 2004 National Film Awards where it won the National Film Award for Best Popular Film and the 2004 International Indian Film Academy Awards where it won the IIFA Best Comedian Award.

Sequel

In February 2004, after the success of Munna Bhai M.B.B.S., Rajkumar Hirani decided to work on his next project. He, along with his co-writer Abhijat Joshi, started to write the script of their new film. They didn't wanted that script to include Munnabhai but after they wrote it, the script eventually turned out to be of Lage Raho Munna Bhai. Sanjay Dutt, Sunil Dutt, Arshad Warsi and Boman Irani were to reprise their roles but after the death of Sunil in May 2005, Hirani decided that the film will only have Sanjay & Warsi to reprise their characters from Munna Bhai M.B.B.S. and other actors like Boman Irani and Jimmy Shergill were cast in new roles. Lage Raho Munna Bhai was released on 1 September 2006 and turned out to be a huge success. Munna Bhai part 3 is still in making.

Remakes

The film was remade in Tamil as Vasool Raja MBBS (2004), in Telugu as Shankar Dada M.B.B.S. (2004), in Kannada as Uppi Dada M.B.B.S. (2007) and in Sinhala as Dr. Nawariyan (2017).

References

External links

• Official Website
• Munna Bhai M.B.B.S. at IMDb
• Munna Bhai M.B.B.S. at Box Office Mojo
• Munna Bhai M.B.B.S. at Rotten Tomatoes
• Munna Bhai M.B.B.S. at Rediff.com