DUBAI, June 29 (TNF): Sholay, often called the greatest film in Bollywood history, is returning to the big screen 50 years after its debut. The fully restored, uncut version of Ramesh Sippy’s 1975 classic will premiere on Friday at Italy’s Il Cinema Ritrovato Festival in Bologna. Fans around the world are eager to see this landmark film again.
The restored edition features the original ending and scenes that were never shown before. The film will screen on the festival’s famous open-air screen in Piazza Maggiore, one of Europe’s largest squares. This setting will create a grand backdrop for the historic showing.
Salim-Javed wrote the film’s script. Sholay starred legends like Amitabh Bachchan, Dharmendra, Hema Malini, Jaya Bhaduri, Sanjeev Kumar, and Amjad Khan. Khan’s portrayal of the villain Gabbar Singh became iconic. The film drew inspiration from Westerns and samurai stories but kept its distinct Indian flavor.
Set in Ramgarh village, the 204-minute epic tells the story of Jai and Veeru, two small-time criminals hired by ex-policeman Thakur Baldev Singh. Their mission is to capture the feared bandit Gabbar Singh. The original ending showed Thakur killing Gabbar with spiked shoes. Censors made Sippy change this because they objected to a policeman acting as a vigilante, especially during the Emergency period when civil rights were under threat.
Sholay did not get great reviews at first. The box office was slow. But it soon became a phenomenon. People quoted its dialogues at weddings and political events. RD Burman’s soundtrack broke sales records. The film ran for more than five years at Mumbai’s Minerva theatre. BBC India named it “Film of the Millennium.” BFI polls called it the “greatest Indian film.”
Restoring Sholay was a tough task. The 70mm prints were gone. The surviving camera negatives were in bad shape. In 2022, Shehzad Sippy, Ramesh Sippy’s son, worked with the Film Heritage Foundation to start the restoration. They found unmarked cans in a Mumbai warehouse that held the original 35mm negatives. The team also retrieved reels stored in the UK with help from the British Film Institute. Experts completed the restoration at L’Immagine Ritrovata in Bologna.
Amitabh Bachchan said, “At the time, I had no idea this would become such a landmark in Indian cinema.” Dharmendra called the film “the eighth wonder of the world.”
The restored Sholay lets viewers see the film as Sippy first imagined it. The version includes its intense climax and unseen footage. Bachchan summed up its magic: “It’s the triumph of good over evil and poetic justice delivered in three hours—something we may not witness in a lifetime.”
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