Beyond All Boundaries
One of the most popular and acclaimed Indian faces in Hollywood, the TV show Big Bang Theory star Kunal Nayyar who plays scientist Rajesh Koothrapalli in the award winning show, has voiced and produced a prolific documentary on Cricket. The documentary is presented by Enlighten Films directed by Sushrat Jain and tells the stories of three ordinary Indians, a penniless superfan, a boy superstar and a girl cricketer, for each of whom cricket is a lifeline.
The film had its World Premiere at the Dallas International Film Festival in April 2013. It subsequently screened at the Arclight theaters in Hollywood as an official selection at the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA), the premiere festival of Indian cinema in the world. At IFFLA, Beyond All Boundaries won both the Audience and Jury Awards for Best Documentary Feature. And after all the acclaim, the Documentary is finally hitting Indian theatres!!
As India, host of the 2011 World Cup of Cricket, begins its campaign to win the Cup after a 28-year drought, three ordinary Indians - a penniless super fan who cycles across India to cheer the team, a 12-year old cricket prodigy, and a girl cricketer from Mumbai’s slums - seek their salvation/escape from a difficult life through their passion for cricket.
It is the spring of 2011 and the World Cup of Cricket is being held in India. On every street corner and in every village, children play cricket. The country’s obsession with the sport is unparalleled and it is the only thing that transcends India’s deep divisions of language, religion, region, class, and caste. For almost half a year, the makers followed three Indians, for each of whom the sport of cricket is a lifeline. In the struggle and triumph that make up their journeys, we get glimpses of the hope and despair that characterize life in modern India.
Sudhir Kumar - a 30 year-old superfan who for the past ten years has attended every Indian home game - makes it to matches often by cycling a thousand kilometers. He has one dream - for India to win the World Cup after a 28-year drought. Prithvi Shaw - a twelve-year old boy from a humble background - is breaking several long-standing Mumbai school records in batting. Coaches, players, and even local politicians speak about him in hushed tones, convinced he is the next Indian cricket superstar. His mother died when he was three, and his unemployed father has great ambitions for him. In a world dominated by boys and men, a group of girls dressed in cricket whites practice hard every day in one corner of Mumbai’s famous Shivaji Park. A standout among them, Akshaya Surve, bowls with the fierceness of a professional cricketer. She shares a small room in a Mumbai slum with her mother. We follow her as she prepares for and takes part in the selections/try-outs - her last chance of breaking in to cricket and having a future beyond the slum.
After many festival laurels, it is finally releasing in theaters here on 10th October.