Why 'Sachin: A Billion Dreams' left me dissatisfied
Sachin: A Billion Dreams is a documentary not a feature film, although the filmmakers may not want to project it that way. They are looking to break the glass ceiling with a full blown theatrical release, even though historically docu-features cater only to a niche viewership.
Can it succeed? The film starts with the theatrics of a naughty school boy Sachin as the first half hour is dramatised around his early years living in a closely knit middle class Maharashtrian household.
Director James Erskine does well capturing the middle class essence of his growing up years, having shot at the very colony of Marathi literary stalwarts, Sahitya Sahwas, where Sachin was born.
His initiation to cricket guided by elder brother Ajit and his first cricket learnings under the tutelage of Sir Ramakant Achrekar have all been public knowledge and in the absence of new anecdotal story-telling, the film does well to breeze past this phase.
The rest of the film revolves around Sachin's career as an international cricket star, aided by real match footage acquiring which was the only real expenditure for the filmmakers for an otherwise inexpensive film.
As the film moves from one cricket series of significance to another through his record-breaking career, the detailing serves an opportunity for cricket fans to relive the celebratory Sachin days of Indian cricket.
For casual cricket fans, some of the nuances may be difficult to comprehend and therein lies the limitations of this docu-drama in being a mass seller.
Sachin's voice is aided by narrators Harsha Bhogle, the co-writer of his autobiography, Boria Majumdar and Australia-based cricket writer Gideon Haigh to take us through the many highs and passing mentions of a few lows using archival broadcast news footage.
The portrayal of Sachin's debut tour of 1989 to Pakistan is captivating, with Wasim Akram and Javed Miandad sledging the 16-year-old and him conquering fear.
The film attempts to traverse through India's progress from being a closed economy to a privatised one, moving from the 1990s to the 2000s using clips of news anchors Prannoy Roy to Rajdeep Sardesai and finance minister Manmohan Singh to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, symbolising Sachin as that one big constant through these years.
The unseen footage from the Tendulkar family album, where father Sachin is having some tender moments with his children Sara and Arjun lighten up the film.
Yet, for a documentary that follows a chronological portrayal of his international career with his desperation to win a World Cup for India as a thread, there are many misses that could have made it more complete without it losing the reverential tone.
Little insight into what left the most intelligent of cricket brains with the bat in hand, a failure while having two cracks at captainship of his country sticks out. The narrator does blame former captain Azharuddin in failing to come to terms with a younger Sachin at the helm during his first term, but it appears at best a flimsy attempt.
Instead, a more honest assessment of the disarray in Indian cricket at the time and where he went wrong as captain could have been a selling point of the film.
The match fixing episode is featured like a news capsule with Sachin's defence to constant criticism of not saying enough on the subject being: "What would I say if I didn't know what was happening, what would I say without any proof?"
The Multan test declaration by Rahul Dravid, with Sachin stranded at 194, gets no mention. Greg Chappel is denounced but only with the aid of a Harbhajan Singh sound-byte.
The story of the 1996 World Cup semi-final and 2003 World Cup final losses carries the viewer to the eventual realisation of his dream with the 2011 World Cup win. The drama and emotions captured measure up to the highly successful film on MS Dhoni.
The most trying phase of his otherwise illustrious career, the last leg where Sachin had to wait for an entire year to complete the most talked about milestone in cricket history, his 100th tonne gets no mention. His low key exit from one-day cricket, a format which he practically ruled for a great part of his career, is also given the miss.
For a man whose achievements, longevity and significance in Indian cricket will never be surpassed, the film has many inspiring moments.
But for legacy's sake, the film refuses to open up any layer of Sachin's life that would point to a human flaw and how it was overcome. His fans call him God, the film goes along with that.