Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India

‘Chale Chalo’ was a documentary on the making of Lagaan, a curtain-raiser on the making of the soundtrack, deleted scenes and trailers. It received critical acclaim for Gowariker's direction, Khan's performance and the film's anti-imperialist stance. The film was the third highest-grossing Hindi film of 2001. Lagaan was screened at numerous international film festivals and garnered multiple accolades. It was the third Indian film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film after Mother India (1957) and Salaam Bombay! (1988). Lagaan became the most-awarded film at the 47th Filmfare Awards with eight wins, including Best Film, Best Director for Gowariker and Best Actor for Khan. At the 49th National Film Awards, the film won eight awards, including Best Popular Film. Lagaan was inspired by Naya Daur (1957), a sports drama film directed by B. R. Chopra. Director Gowariker has stated that it was almost impossible to make Lagaan. He went to Amir Khan, who agreed to participate after hearing the detailed script. Khan had initially rejected the idea of a "sporty" film, but was "himself in tears" upon hearing the full dialogued script. The film took approximately a year to plan, which included ten months for production and one month for the development of Khan's character, which the first-time producer found tiring. Khan obtained a crew of about 300 people for six months. Due to the lack of comfortable hotels in Bhuj, he hired a newly constructed apartment and furnished it completely for the crew. Security was set up and a special housekeeping team was brought to take care of the crew's needs.