Unlike most normies, I already knew who Milkha Singh was. I had heard about his losing in the Rome Olympics, and the moment I began watching the biopic I felt it was just going to be a whitewash of his image. All his actions will be justified. But as the film progressed I realised this is not the case. This is one of the best biopics I have ever seen. Considering there are barely any good biopics (and also the fact that I hate biopics), there wasn't any competition anyway, but it did set a bar.

Bhaag Milkha Bhaag is a coming of age biopic. It begins at the time just before independence and carries on to the 1962 Asian Games. Milkha's entire family is murdered during the partition and he goes to join the army. From there he gets fascinated to be an athlete. He is never shown to be a good guy. He has his own share of flaws, even though his intentions are never to hurt anyone. He just ends up doing things he should not do being the naive villager that he is. Finally he grows out of that personality and becomes the Flying Sikh that he is known as.

The score, the cinematography, the acting, everything is on point. Farhan Akhtar looks very much like the young Milkha Singh. Normally when we think of the time of the independence we only think of very cultural, conservative families. We never think of some fun loving loafer that Milkha was. Milkha Singh has himself confessed that this film is mostly true, so it's not like the makers of this film are just showing all that to market their film. The only problem I have with this film is the overuse of details. I understand that this is Milkha Singh's life being depicted as a person and not as an athlete, but there were many storylines that went absolutely nowhere like a swimmer who tried to kiss him, or what finally happened of Biro.

I'd say this is undoubtedly one of the only good biopics Bollywood has ever made, the others being MS Dhoni: The Untold Story and Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai (if that counts). Normally I completely trash biopics, but not this one. This one has made me have really high expectations from all biopics.