Rocket Singh: Salesman of the Year (2009)

Director: Shimit Amin
Story: Jaideep Sahni
Cast: Ranbir Kapoor, Naveen Kaushik, Manish Chaudhary
Music: Salim-Sulaiman
Time: 156 minutes
Bottom-line: Different type of film, but well worth a watch

Troubled of salesmen always calling on your mobile or knocking at your door? Well, then you must see Rocket Singh: Salesman of the Year, the 2009 Bollywood film, focusing on how a normal sales executive enters and experiences the world of sales and marketing. Not audience favouring, for it has no fistfights, no duets etc. but just a clean story, with very little deviations. The film stars Ranbir Kapoor in the lead, with D. Santosh, Naveen Kaushik, Manish Chaudhary and Gauhar Khan in the supporting roles.

Harpreet Singh Bedi (Kapoor) is a graduate with very low marks, who goes for a job interview with AYS Computers, a big computer sales and servicing firm. Harpreet is an honest and straightforward salesman, but within a few days, he realizes that honesty has no place in the sales business. His good attitude only brings him humiliation. Yes, he is sure that someday, honesty will succeed. So, he illegally begins his own corruption-free firm: Rocket Sales Corporation, while still working at AYS. How he recruits members for his company, whether or not he makes business and the other ups and downs of his company are shown in the rest of the film.

Ranbir Kapoor as Harpreet

The story is basically about what a salesman has to go through to become a pro. But of course, in today’s world, most of the salesmen and the companies are corrupt, using some method of trickery or the other. So, in that aspect, the film shows what an ideal salesman should be like. In many places (in the scenes or dialogues) it is shown that a company can profit only through trickery. We also see how big companies often ignore talent and concentrate only on money-making.

Manish Chaudhary as Sunil Puri

But that apart, the story also has plenty of subtle humour and few good dialogues as well. The romance between Harpreet and Sherena (one of his customers) is perhaps the only thing that is deviating. Yet, some scenes are interesting. The scene where Nithin, Harpreet’s boss (Kaushik) asks him to advertise and sell a pencil (somewhat similar to a scene in The Wolf of Wall Street), the scene where Harpreet meets a parts supplier and understands the truth of how companies make money, and the scenes where Harpreet recruits members are excellent. Of course, whether or not someone can really open a film in this illegal manner without getting caught is a question mark, that can very be well ignored here.

Kaushik as Nithin (top left), Santosh as Giri (top
right), Gauhar Khan as Koena (bottom left)
and Ranbir Kapoor

The acting is superb, but more importantly, the characters are what I liked. Ranbir’s acting is splendid, and he displays various emotions: innocence when a client asks for a bribe, determination when he starts the company, cheekiness when Puri (the M.D of AYS computers) calls him to ask about the company, and many more. The dialogues were good, but my pick is this one, when Harpreet says, “You saw the clients as numbers, while I saw them as people.” D. Santosh, who plays Giri (a mechanic), gives us lots of humour in his acting. Others like Manish Chaudhary have also done well.

To conclude, Shimit Amin’s Rocket Singh: Salesman of the Year is a welcome break from the masala Hindi films, but is well worth a watch. Ranbir Kapoor’s fantastic acting (this might be his best acting performance yet), the brilliant dialogues, fast and thought-provoking (in a way) story are few of the plus points. Any person interested in making a business should watch the film.

My Rating: 4/5