Bollywood never misses a good, spicy story, especially of the David vs Goliath variety. So it's hardly surprising to note that it has found an ideal candidate for a movie in superboxer and supermom Mary Kom. The Olympic bronze medal winner's life story fits the requirements of a masala film like a glove: she comes from Manipur, a 'remote' part of India (so remote that even Big B made a mistake while tweeting after her London victory) and had a challenging life before she became an Olympic champion. Mary Kom has been approached by Sanjay Leela Bhansali for a biopic.
While that could be a box-office KO punch, what is slightly disturbing is the fact that Mary Kom thinks that she should play a role in the biopic. Ideally, she says, she wants to be in the "opening sequence of the film, just like the old lady in Titanic who narrates her life story". While we admire her hugely and are not averse to seeing use her fighting skills on screen and also prancing around trees in the arms of one of the Khan tribe, we think the better way of increasing her fan base would be to concentrate on her sport and get us a few more medals in future. We assure her that it does not always need the real sportsperson to play a role in a biopic: Will Smith did a fantastic job in Ali, and so did Irrfan Khan in Paan Singh Tomar.
The real challenge is finding an actress among our lovely leading ladies to play Mary Kom. Can't see too many of them wanting to swing around the ring, make-up running down with perspiration. But then, Hillary Swank did it in Million Dollar Baby, so our lasses should not shy away from the challenge. As for our Mary, she should just stay in the ring and run rings around her opponents than try to get the box-office cash registers ringing.
{{/usCountry}}The real challenge is finding an actress among our lovely leading ladies to play Mary Kom. Can't see too many of them wanting to swing around the ring, make-up running down with perspiration. But then, Hillary Swank did it in Million Dollar Baby, so our lasses should not shy away from the challenge. As for our Mary, she should just stay in the ring and run rings around her opponents than try to get the box-office cash registers ringing.
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