Pad Man (film)

Pad Man is a 2018 Indian biographical comedy-drama film written and directed by R. Balki, featuring Akshay Kumar, Sonam Kapoor, and Radhika Apte in lead roles. It is based on the short story The Sanitary Man of Sacred Land in Twinkle Khanna's book The Legend of Lakshmi Prasad, which is inspired by the life of Arunachalam Muruganantham, a social activist from Tamil Nadu who introduced low-cost sanitary pads.^[5] The film was released theatrically on 9 February 2018.

Contents

• 1Plot                                                                                                                       
  
• 2Cast
• 3Production
  • 3.1Development
  • 3.2Casting
  • 3.3Filming
• 4Release
  • 4.1Marketing
  • 4.2Controversy
• 5Reception
  • 5.1Box office
  • 5.2Critical reception
• 6Soundtrack
• 7See also
• 8References
• 9External links
  

  Plot

  Padman revolves around the story of Arunachalam who invented low-cost sanitary pads.

  Cast

  • Akshay Kumar as Lakshmikant Chauhan
  • Sonam Kapoor as Pari Walia
  • Radhika Apte as Gayatri Chauhan
  • Maya Alagh
  • Amitabh Bachchan as Himself in a cameo appearance

  Production

  The film will be based on "The Sanitary Man of Sacred Land", a short story from Twinkle Khanna's book, The Legend of Lakshmi Prasad,^[7] which is inspired from the life of Arunachalam Muruganantham, a Tamil Nadu-based social activist who revolutionized the concept of menstrual hygiene in rural India by creating a low-cost sanitary napkin machine.Pad Man was envisioned to be an awareness film without focusing on commercial aspects. The producers' main agenda was to reach out to a wide audience to create awareness and eradicate prevalent superstitions in India surrounding sanitary pads. As with Kumar's previous film, Toilet: Ek Prem Katha, he hoped to educate the masses, both women and men, about menstrual hygiene and to stop labelling it as stigma or taboo in society.

  

  Furthermore, it was a plea towards politicians to drive their attention towards sanitary pads and making it mandatory across institutions The idea to adapt Murugan's life began in 2015 when Twinkle Khanna came across his story while doing a research for a column in The Times of India. Inspired and moved by his persistence and determination, she wrote about him in her book, The Legend of Lakshmi Prasad (2016).Later, she planned to adapt his life to the big screen in order to reach out to more audiences, saying "our world is filled with viewers, not readers. Khanna, who also serves as a producer on the film, said she was drawn to the project due to its relevant yet underrated subject about menstruation and Muruganantham's determination
  R. Balki was Khanna's first choice to direct the film. She had previously seen Balki's work and appreciated his sensitivity in filmmaking.
  In November 2017, Sony Pictures became the global distributor for the film

  Casting

  Akshay Kumar plays Arunachalam Muruganantham, also known as "India's Menstrual Man" Kumar was not the first choice to play the role.Khanna thought of a few actors but she eventually handed it to Kumar after Murugan's insistenceand because she thought it would be a game-changing event if Kumar, who the Indian public idolises and men look up to, wore sanitary pad.

  Filming

  

  Pad Man is the only second Bollywood film to be granted access to shoot the film inside the headquarters of the United Nations in New York Cityafter Half Girlfriend in 2016.
  Pre-production began in March 2017,and principal photography commenced on March 14.Filming moved to Delhi in April. Murugan worked closely with Kumar and Khanna on set in India, making sure every detail was accurate from the way he built his machine, to how to operate it, even his own posture. 
  After filming ended in India, the team travelled to New York City where pivotal scenes were filmmed in Brooklyn Bridge, Times Square and Jazz at Lincoln Center, as well as the United Nations headquarter. It is the second Bollywood film to be shot at the site following Half Girlfriend while Hollywood film The Interpreter was the first

  Release

  The film was initially planned to be released on 13 April 2018,but was later moved to 26 January However, on 19 January, it was announced that the film has been postponed to 9 February 2018 to avoid clash with Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Padmaavat.^[1] Regarding the possible box office clash with Aiyaary which releases on the same day, Kumar denounced the tension saying that it was unlikely since both films have different subjects and themes.^[23]
  Pad Man is scheduled to be released across 3350 screens worldwide; 2750 screens in India and 600 screens overseas.^[24] Being a social issue based film, the producer's are planning to show the film in various schools in smaller towns and cities with the aid of various ministries and the government.^[11]

  Marketing

  The first trailer was released on 15 December 2017.^[25] Soon after, the trailer began trending on Twitter with the hashtag #PadManTrailer. Scenes showing Kumar casually trying to wear a sanitary napkin and the other handing them to his sister became a trending topic.^[26] A second poster was released on 25 December which shows Kumar holding cotton in his hand with words like "Fighter, Genius, Innovation, Unreal Man, No Shame, Real Problem and Passion" written all around. The Times of India called it a "unique poster".

  Controversy

  Despite of being one of the widely released Indian film at the same day, it was banned in Pakistan due to its subject revolving around taboo. Central Board of Film Censors denied to give the No-Objection Certificate to the film and said, "we cannot allow a film whose name, subject and story are not acceptable yet in our society." They disallowed the Pakistani film distributors IMGC and HKC to purchase the film rights and stated that they were "ruining Islamic traditions, history and culture." Film posters were also removed from the local cinemas.^[

  Reception

  Box office

  Pad Man earned a modest ₹10.26 crore (US$1.6 million) on its opening day. Buoyed by good word of mouth, the film witnessed gradual momemtum on its second and third day earning ₹16.11 crore (US$2.5 million) and ₹16.11 crore(US$2.5 million) respectively. In total, it earned ₹40.05 crore (US$6.2 million) nett (US$7.9 million gross) over its opening weekend.
  Outside India, the film debuted day-and-date in 5 international markets which generated around an estimated US$1 million for a worldwide opening of US$8.9 million.
  In the United States and Canada, Pad Man grossed US$760,000 at an average of US$5,000 per screen from 152 screens. Sony noted that the film debuted above the opening of Kumar's Toilet: Ek Prem Katha, which debuted with US$678,000 from 176 theaters (US$3,852 per theater average).

  Critical reception

  On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 100% based on 10 reviews, and an average rating of 6.8/10.

  Soundtrack