5 National Award winners for Nikhil Advani's D-Day

20 Mar 2013

D-Day is turning out to be a much bigger film than what must have been envisaged before it went on floors. If the pre-release hype was anyways gaining good momentum during last few weeks, the recently announced National Awards have given the film an altogether different dimension. At last count, the spy thriller cum action drama would boast of, hold your breath, as many as five National Award winners associated with it.

"These are Rishi Kapoor, Arjun Rampal, Irrfan Khan, Shankar Mahadevan and Nikhil Advani", states an observer.

While Arjun Rampal had won a National Award for Best Supporting Actor ( Rock On ), Rishi Kapoor had brought home one with his very first screen outing, Mera Naam Joker . Incidentally that was for being the Best Child Artist. On the other hand, Shankar Mahadevan is a multiple National Award winner though his latest one for the song 'Bolo Na' ( Chittagong) has brought one more to his shelf for Best Male Playback Singer.

"The biggest gain to the film though has been Irrfan Khan's win as a Best Actor for Paan Singh Tomar ", a prominent filmmaker adds, "It is one of the best deserved awards for a long time. Even though Irrfan has been around for over two decades and has won many awards, a National Award was eluding him. Now with the tag of a National Award winner against his name, Irrfan would be adding a lot more weight to D-Day ." Not to mention the man at the driving seat, Nikhil Advani himself, whose Delhi Safari has also brought him a National Award for being the Best Animation Film.

"Though his D-Day is hardly a film in that genre and is predominantly an adults affair due to its theme, what matters is the vision", a close associate of the director adds, "With as many as five National Award winners in his film and other talent like Huma Qureshi and Chandan Roy Sanyal, expectations from D-Day would be manifold." Though the world of social media is already going gaga over the slick narrative of the film after watching its rushes, we would rather wait to see how the award winners have indeed contributed to D-Day which is exactly four months away.