Stand By is about football and the central plot is that we have an Indian coach who aspires to make his team an international standards. Even this film has differences with the Indian sporting body and an effort to keep it purely on merits of the footballers and get politics out of the game.
National award winning director Sanjay Surkar shows how the influence of powerful politicians plays a key role in a team selection and how the rich-kids or the influential ones get a chance to play, whereas the really talented guys slog it out to make a mark.
Stand by is a story of two friends Rahul (Adhinath Kothare) and Shekar (Siddharth Kher), who play football for the state of Maharashtra. Their lives change as this beautiful game turns ugly and the fate of the footballers is no longer decided on merits.
The thick friends share a common passion – football. While Rahul is rooted to the ground, Shekhar the son of a millionaire father Dalip Tahil, has a carefree attitude in life.
An influential business icon wants to see his son in the national football team. This leads to feud with his son’s best friend as he too is a budding soccer aspirant.
Both are talented footballers, while Rahul makes it to the list riding on his merit, Shekhar’ care-a- damn attitude on the field loses him a place in the national football team. The illustrious father of this rich kid leaves nothing unturned to get his son included in the national team.
Things come to such an extent that the influential father plans to kick Rahul out of the team and get his son selected in whichever twisted way possible.
There is a conspiracy to exclude Rahul and the film has its highs and lows that disturb you especially the matter of rivalry between one-time-close buddies
Standby moves at a steady good place and the pace is maintained throughout.
Why is there an obsession with songs with our bollywood films? An item number in this film about sport??? Such things leaves one irritated in this otherwise well made film.
The thick friends share a common passion – football. While Rahul is rooted to the ground, Shekhar the son of a millionaire father Dalip Tahil, has a carefree attitude in life.
An influential business icon wants to see his son in the national football team. This leads to feud with his son’s best friend as he too is a budding soccer aspirant.
Both are talented footballers, while Rahul makes it to the list riding on his merit, Shekhar’ care-a- damn attitude on the field loses him a place in the national football team. The illustrious father of this rich kid leaves nothing unturned to get his son included in the national team.
Adinath Kothare and Sachin Khedekar are just awesome. Sachin Khedekar as the upright father with a dream for his son is willing to sacrifice even his life.
Siddharth Kher delivers a decent performance. Stand By has what it keeps it in bollywood – the cheers and tears in the film.
What follows is a dirty game of cheap politics that has marred our sports administration for years and never allowed the sport to develop thereby ruining lives of young and talented sportsmen and the lovely sport of football in our country.
Stand By explores the aspect of human relationships – What happens when one man’s passion becomes the other man’s obsession.
Cast of Stand By:
Adinath Kothare – Rahul Narvekar
Sachin Khedekar – Damodar Narvekar
Dalip Tahil – Jayprakash Verma
Avtar Gill – Shrivastav
Nagesh Bhonsle – Satam
Siddharth Kher – Shekhar Verma
Surendra Pal – Tiwari
Manish Choudhary – John Williams
Yana Gupta appears in an item number
Credits & Crew of Stand By:
Banner – BRC Production
Producer: Prakash Choube, Sagar Choube
Director: Sanjay Surkar
Lyricist – Swanand Kirkire
Music Director – Aadesh Shrivastav
Cinematography – Sanjay Jadhav
Choreography – Remo D’Souza
Stand By – movie review