OTTplay Awards 2022: Know Your Winners: Best Director (Film) to Shoojit Sircar for Sardar Udham

Shoojit Sircar has won the award for Best Director (Film) for Sardar Udham at the recently held OTTplay Awards and Conclave 2022. The biographical historical drama stars Vicky Kaushal in the titular role in the movie that has been written by Shubhendu Bhattacharya and Ritesh Shah. The filmmaker graced the country's first pan-India OTT awards to receive the honour.

The winning speech

Casting director and filmmaker Mukhesh Chhabra presented the award to Sircar. The Sardar Udham director stepped on a stage and shared a heartfelt note after receiving the accolade. Beginning his speech by saluting our freedom fighters, the movie maker said, "Good evening and thank you so much, everyone. We are celebrating 75 years of our independence. And I think as we are celebrating our freedom, I think we should not forget, and remember and salute our revolutionaries, because of whom we are celebrating cinema and standing here. And I salute Shaheed Udham Singh and Shaheed Bhagat Singh because I have been a follower of them."

Furthermore, he added, "I went to a college, which is Shaheed Bhagat Singh's because since my school days I have been his true follower." "During the lockdown, I made two films and my producer friend - Ronnie Lahiri and Sheel Kumar decided to release the films on OTT platform with Amazon Prime and I received a lot of flags and lot of criticism that why am I releasing a film on an OTT platform, which was shot for cinema. And we all know the reason why this film was released on an OTT platform, the situation was like that. And I am so glad that there is an award ceremony for OTT films and they are giving me an award for an OTT release. So, thank you so much Hindustan times," he added.

He also shared, "Thank you to my entire crew and cast, my producer friends, everyone for standing with me for this difficult film which I have tried to make is Sardar Usham Singh. Thank you so much."

About the film

The 2021 film follows is based on the life of Udham Singh, a freedom fighter from Punjab who assassinated Michael O'Dwyer in London to avenge the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre in Amritsar. Not only then, but the extraordinary Indian revolutionary gets praised and remembered for his courageous deed.

Vicky essays the titular role, while Sardar Udham also features Amol Parashar as Bhagat Singh, Shaun Scott as Michael O'Dwyer, Stephen Hogan as Detective Inspector Swain and Banita Sandhu as Reshma among others.

About Shoojit Sircar

Sircar forayed into direction with the 2005 Hindi romantic war drama Yahaan, however, he rose to prominence with the 2012 Ayushmann Khurrana and Yami Gautam starrer Vicky Donor for which he received the National Film Award for Best Popular Film. He also received immense praise for directing the political action thriller Madras Cafe in 2013.

The ace filmmaker is currently gearing up for a film named The Umesh Chronicles, which revolves around an urban woman, walking a line between tradition and modernity and not fully at ease in either, but making her own space between the two. The upcoming venture is set to feature Amitabh Bachchan and Babil Khan.