Sarfarosh

John Matthew Matthan began working on Sarfarosh in 1992. Seven years were spent on research, production and post-production before the film finally released in 1999.

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Mukesh Rishi did not play the villain for the first time. The actor, who was widely praised for his performance, was also nominated in the Best Supporting Actor category at the 2000 Filmfare Awards.

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Sarfarosh is the second film Aamir Khan and Naseerudin Shah made together. Many people think it was their first collaboration, but that is not true, as they had worked together earlier on the art film Holi (1984).

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Aamir Khan was the only choice for the lead role.

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In the climax scene, the watching police officer reports that the police force will enter the fort within five minutes. Exactly five minutes later in the film, the police enter the fort.

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Naseeruddin Shah was especially praised for his role as a Muhajir (a Muslim Indian who migrated to Pakistan after the partition of India).

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In 1998, a right-wing political party in India had blocked the famous Pakistani ghazal singer Ghulam Ali from performing in Mumbai. Ghulam Ali, much loved on both sides of the border, continued his concerts in many Indian cities. As a distorted reflection of this event, Naseeruddin Shah plays a Pakistani ghazal singer who is revealed to be a terrorist in the film.

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Nawazuddin Siddiqui, then a very small actor, took on a minor prisoner role because the actor who was supposed to play it did not show up on the shooting day.

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This was the first time Aamir Khan played a police officer. He had previously played a commando in Baazi (1995). His second film as a police officer was Talaash (2012).

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Mukesh Rishi took on a major role in a film for the first time and won praise for his performance.

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Mukesh Rishi said the hardest part was that he did not know how to pray.

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The film was released during the Kargil conflict, when tensions between India and Pakistan were high.

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The Muslim Aamir plays a Hindu, while the Hindu Mukesh Rishi plays a Muslim.

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I just noticed a beautiful piece of symbolism in Sarfarosh. Gulfam Hassan commits suicide by stabbing himself in the throat with a bayonet. He wanted his legacy to be that of a true fankaar, but he was secretly selling firearms. The terrorist's instrument ultimately destroys the singer's instrument.

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Hoshwalo Ko Kya Khabar is considered one of Jagjit Singh's best ghazals.

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Director John Matthew Matthan and Aamir Khan had problems working with each other during the shoot and decided never to work together again.

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Manmohan Desai announced that his film Sarfarosh, starring Amitabh Bachchan, had been shelved. That was in 1979. Years later, Rajkumar Sanoshi started a film titled Sarfarosh with Bobby Deol and Pooja Bhatt. That was in 1994. The film was shelved and restarted as Vinashak with Sunil Shetty.

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John Matthew Matthan began working on the film in 1992. Seven years were spent on research, production and post-production. The film finally released in 1999.

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Aamir Khan enjoyed working with Mukesh Rishi on the film, as he had offered him the role of the Sikh striker Deva Singh Sodhi in the Oscar-nominated home production Lagaan (2001), but Rishi's dates could not be adjusted. Khan therefore offered the role to the other lead actor, Pradeep Rawat, who plays the crime agent Sultan in this film.

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The character of Veeran, the leader of a forest gang carrying out massacres, played by Govind Namdeo, was inspired by the real-life sandalwood smuggler and local terrorist Veerappan, notorious for his armed clashes with police in the forests of India's Karnataka state and adjoining regions. Veerappan was shot dead in 2004 by paramilitary forces alongside Indian police forces in the same region.

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It was remade in Kannada as Sathyameva Jayathe with Devaraj and in Telugu as Astram (2006) with Vishnu Manchu and Anushka Shetty.

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John Matthew was an advertising film producer, and before the film's premiere everyone questioned Aamir Khan's decision to work with an unknown, unproven director.

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The film was released during the Kargil war.

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The film took some key inspiration from Baazi (1995), another Aamir Khan film.

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Director John Matthew had planned to make a sequel to this film with John Abraham.

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The film was shot mostly in Mumbai and Rajasthan.

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Jeete Mandal, who had been Raj Kapoor's assistant editor for years, was also the editor of this film as well as of Raj Kapoor's Heena.

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This was Dinesh Phadnis's only Hindi film.

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The film was a major success at the box office.

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The film was released in cinemas in Canada.

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Seema's brother runs an audio cassette company called Hosh (sense). The ghazal singer Gulfam Hassan was introduced by performing the song "Hoshwalon…" (People with sense…).

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Sarfarosh 2 is coming, and John Abraham is honoured to step into the role of Amir, a character with a great past.

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This film came about during the Kargil conflict, when tensions between India and Pakistan were high.

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There was a shelved "Sarfarosh" film (1979/1980/1981) starring Amitabh Bachchan (in a triple role), Anita Raj (replacing Parveen Babi), Utttam Kumar, Rishi Kapoor, Ranjeeta Kaur (replacing Bindiya Goswami), Shakti Kapoor, Mukri Pran and Kader Khan. It was written by K. K. Shukla, produced by Subash Desai and directed by Manmohan Desai. The film was shelved due to many problems in the script. In 1984 it was restarted with Amitabh and Anita Raj. It was shelved once again.

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The script of Zameen was initially written as a potential sequel to Sarfarosh, which starred Aamir Khan and was directed by John Matthew. John liked the script but told Supran Verma that they needed a strong villain. Suparn Verma could not get the scriptwriting on the right track. Suparn later met Ajay Devgan, who told him to talk to Rohit Shetty. Rohit heard the script and liked it very much. He decided to make the script as "Zameen".

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Besides Pradeep Rawat, the film's other villains, Akhilendra Mishra and Shri Vallabh Vyas, also came aboard Aamir Khan's own home production LAGAAN (2001).

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Aamir has no scene with Govind Namdeo.

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Sonali Bendre was afraid of going underwater and could not shoot in Jo Haal Dil Ka.

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Naseeruddin Shah's character in this film may have been inspired by an incident in 1998 when a group of Shiv Sena workers disrupted a concert by ghazal singer Ghulam Ali at the Centaur Hotel in Bombay.

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According to sources, Rajesh Joshi, who played Bala Thakur, had a longer role in the film. However, due to his sudden death, his character was cut short.

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Naseeruddin Shah claimed that the censor board was unwilling to show him biting the goat at the interval point, and that the scene was therefore shown only as he attempts to perform the act.

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Aamir still has his biggest regret because he did not cut his rather unoriginal hairstyle for a police role.

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During the film's shoot, Aamir Khan offered the character of Deva to Mukesh Rishi. Mukesh Rishi also did script-reading sessions. However, due to date issues, he had to be dropped. Pradeep Rawat, who is part of this film, inspired Aamir Khan with his work and replaced Mukesh Rishi.

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