Damini – Lightning

Damini
DVD cover
Directed by	Rajkumar Santoshi
Produced by	Aly Morani Karim Morani Bunty Soorma
Written by	Rajkumar Santoshi Sutanu Gupta(Story)
Starring	Meenakshi Sheshadri Rishi Kapoor Sunny Deol Vijayendra Ghatge Rohini Hattangadi Kulbhushan Kharbanda Amrish Puri Paresh Rawal Tinu Anand
Music by	Nadeem-Shravan Sameer (Lyrics)
Cinematography	Ishwar Bidri
Editing by	V. N. Mayekar[1]
Release dates	30 April 1993
Running time	176 minutes
Country	India
Language	Hindi
Box office	117.5 million (US$1.9 million)[2]

Damini – Lightning is a 1993 Hindi film directed by Rajkumar Santoshi starring Meenakshi Sheshadri in the title role alongside Rishi Kapoor, Sunny Deol, Amrish Puri, Tinu Anand and Paresh Rawal in pivotal roles. The story is of how a woman fights against society for justice. The film is considered to be the best woman centric film ever made in Bollywood along with Mother India.

Besides being critically acclaimed, the film became the sixth highest grossing of the year and was declared a 'hit' at the Indian box office.^[2] Damini – Lightning is mostly remembered for Meenakshi Sheshadri's career best performance, the role that became her identity and it is also memorable for Sunny Deol's role as an advocate and gained him a Filmfare as well as National Film Award for Best Supporting Actor for 1993. It strengthened his Bollywood he-man image. The film was a milestone in the careers of Meenakshi Sheshadri, Sunny Deol and Amrish Puri who gave some great hits like Ghayal and Ghatak: Lethal together. Aamir Khan acted in a very special appearance in the stage show dance song. Damini – Lightning was remade into Oriya as Nari Nuhne Tu Narayani starring Sidharth and Rachana. It was remade into Tamil as Priyanka starring Revathi as the titular character. Box Office India declared the film Hit.

Synopsis

Shekhar Gupta (Rishi Kapoor), a rich businessman, falls in love at first sight with Damini (Meenakshi Sheshadri). They get married and Damini moves into his palatial bungalow. One day, she witnesses Shekhar's younger brother, Rakesh, raping the maid-servant and rushes to tell Shekhar. Shekhar rushes over to prevent the sexual assault but is too late. The Gupta family conspire to cover up this shameful incident. But Damini decides to inform the police. The matter is taken up in court, and Damini is asked to testify. Damini is portrayed as a mentally unstable person and confined in a mental institution for two weeks by a judicial order. Unable to bear the mental torture in the institution, she escapes and runs into a down-and-out alcoholic lawyer, Govind (Sunny Deol), who has the rape case re-opened. The maid-servant dies in hospital, and the police write her death off as a suicide. But Govind is able to prove otherwise. It is up to Damini, Govind and Shekhar to provide justice to the victimised girl.

Cast

• Meenakshi Sheshadri – Damini Gupta
• Rishi Kapoor – Shekhar Gupta
• Sunny Deol – Govind
• Amrish Puri – Barrister Indrajit Chaddha
• Anjan Srivastav – Chandrakant (Damini's dad)
• Paresh Rawal – Tolu Bajaj
• Kulbhushan Kharbanda – Mr. Gupta
• Rohini Hattangadi – Mrs. Gupta
• Vishwajeet Pradhan – Police Commissioner
• Ashwin Kaushal.... Shekhar Brother
• Vijayendra Ghatge – Inspector Kadam
• K.K. Raina – Shekhar's friend
• Suhas Bhalekar – Guest Appearance as Urmi's Grandfather
• Prajakta – Urmi
• Sulabha Arya ... Mami Tinu Anand's wife
• Tinnu Anand – Shekhar's uncle^[3]

Remakes

Soundtrack

Awards

• National Film Award for Best Supporting Actor – Sunny Deol
• Filmfare Award
  • Best Director: Rajkumar Santoshi
  • Best Supporting Actor : Sunny Deol^[4]
  • Best Actress (Nominated):Meenakshi Seshadri

References

External links

• Damini – Lightning at the Internet Movie Database