Producer: Bobby Bedi, Deepa Sahi
Director: Ketan Mehta
Cast: Amir Khan, Amisha Patel, Rani Mukherjee
Music: A R  Rahman

Aamir Khan returns back on screen after a hiatus of four years with another period flick ‘Mangal Pandey’. This is his subsequent historic film after ‘Lagaan’. The film is by Ketan Mehta and highlights the milieu of Barrackpore in 1857 and the momentous war against the Britishers called the first War of Indian Independence. In the film Mangal Pandey played by Aamir and his band of revolutionaries confront the British to free India from their clutches. The film is produced by Bobby Bedi and Deepa Sahi and the star cast reads Aamir, Rani Mukherjee, Amisha Patel, Toby Stephens and Kiron Kher.

After extensive research the film ‘Mangal Pandey’ has been sketched out. Ketan and production designer Nitin Desai carried out the research on the life. The task was no easy for very little on the life of the great freedom fighter was known. The two-and-half-hour film is true and the realistic portrayal of the life of ‘Mangal Pandey’. However Aamir believes that the film doesn’t have its limitations for being just a patriotic film, but it’s a true representation of ones struggle for freedom. Freedom never loses its essence and so the film is even relevant today.

Aamir Khan, the versatile and perfectionist actor had almost found himself on the verge of getting an Oscar for his film ‘Lagaan’. He is hopeful about this film too though he hasn’t thought about receiving an Oscar for this film yet. He is specially stretching on the element of entertainment for the people with this film. He wants to enliven the majestic character of Mangal Pandey and his sacrifices for the freedom struggle. He plays the hotheaded character of freedom fighter Mangal. Aamir grabbed the film as soon as he heard the story for he was so much moved by it.

Rani, who is in her career best, performs the role of a prostitute. She gets into the mould of a different person once again. Amisha can be seen in the role of a young widow who is saved form the ritual of by a British officer Toby Stephens. She later falls in love with him. Toby Stephens is a British actor of ‘Die Another Day’ fame.

Director Ketan Mehta had etched out the script in 1988 and many changes in the script have taken place since then. He had made a simple patriotic fervor script. However now the film has been built on an extensive canvas. The screenplay is by Farrukh Dhondy of Kisna fame. The extensive shooting of the film has taken place in Pataudi in Haryana, Pune and Satara in Maharashtra and Kolkata.

The film has music by A R Rahman and he has tuned seven songs penned by Javed Akhtar. The recording of the songs have taken place in Prague and have been built in a huge scale.

The film has been made in Hindi and English and will be released all over the world on the August 12.