12th Fail

12th Fail is a 2023 Indian Hindi-language biographical drama film directed, produced and written by Vidhu Vinod Chopra. It is based on the 2019 eponymous non-fiction book by Anurag Pathak about Manoj Kumar Sharma, who overcame extreme poverty to become an Indian Police Service officer and Shraddha Joshi Sharma (Indian Revenue Service Officer). The film stars Vikrant Massey as Sharma, alongside Medha Shankr, Anant V Joshi, Anshumaan Pushkar and Priyanshu Chatterjee.
Released theatrically on 27 October 2023, 12th Fail received widespread critical acclaim and emerged as a sleeper hit, grossing over ₹69 crore (US$8.1 million) worldwide on a ₹20 crore (US$2.3 million) budget. At the 69th Filmfare Awards, it won five awards, including Best Film, Best Director and Best Actor (Critics) (Massey).
Born in dacoit-infested Chambal, Manoj Kumar Sharma is the son of a clerk. His father, an honest man, is suspended for hitting a corrupt officer. Manoj prepares cheat slips for his Class 12 exams, as do all his batchmates. The teachers at the local school help students cheat. However, a newly transferred police officer, DSP Dushyant Singh, stops cheating at the school. As a result, all the students, including Manoj, fail the exam.
Meanwhile, Manoj's father leaves home to challenge his suspension in the High Court. To support the family, Manoj and his brother run a traveling rickshaw. However, his brother is falsely accused of smuggling alcohol after hitting the local henchman of the MLA after he tries to have their passengers travel on a bus. Local police officers frame his brother, but Manoj bails him out with the help of DSP Dushyant. When Manoj expresses his desire to become an officer like him, Dushyant advises him to "stop cheating".
One year later, Manoj passes his exams without cheating and pursues a B.A. to become a DSP. His paternal grandmother gives him all her savings as he sets out to study in Gwalior, but he loses all his belongings on the way to a woman who steals them while he dozes off in the bus he is travelling in. He then learns that the government has decided to stop the Group I exams for MPPSC for the next three years. This destroys his dream of becoming a DSP.
Struggling without money for food, a local hotel owner near the railway station offers him free meals. There he meets Pritam Pandey, who had also come to study for the PSC exam. Pandey's father calls him and tells him to prepare for the UPSC exam in Delhi. Manoj learns about UPSC and travels with Pritam to Delhi to study and become an IPS officer. He meets Gauri Bhaiya, a fellow aspirant on his last attempt to pass, who provides Manoj with work and a place to study. Gauri Bhaiya is unable to clear his final attempt and opens a tea shop named "Restart" and also provides guidance to other UPSC aspirants.
In his first attempt, Manoj fails the preliminary examination, but with Gauri's help, he reappears and manages to clear it the following year. During a visit to a coaching centre, he meets Shraddha Joshi, a UKPSC aspirant, and falls in love with her. She assumes he is an aeronautical engineer, but he was actually a literature graduate and does not correct her. Despite hard work, Manoj fails to clear his main examinations that year due to a trivial mistake. His relationship with Shraddha also suffers when she learns the truth about his degree. Disheartened, Manoj travels to Mussoorie to apologise to Shraddha and confess his love. However, she bluntly asks him to return to Delhi.
Manoj visits his home and finds that his grandmother has passed away. He returns to Delhi, determined to pass the examination. Manoj works in a mill to earn money to send home and cover his own expenses, where he also resides. Shraddha arrives to their coaching class in Delhi and apologizes to Manoj for being rude. They reconcile and again become close. Manoj passes the preliminaries, and Shraddha expresses her love for him.
Gauri moves Manoj to his own house and tells him to give up working odd jobs and focus completely on his studies. He finally clears the main examinations, while Shraddha clears her UKPSC examinations as well to become a Deputy Collector. Meanwhile, Pritam, who failed his exams, spreads rumours to Shraddha's family that she has been sleeping with Manoj. Manoj becomes angry with Pritam but realises that Pritam really wants to be a reporter, but his father pressured him to pursue the UPSC. Manoj advises Pritam to stand up to his father.
During the interview round, Manoj answers every question honestly. He reads the letter written and given to him by Shraddha before the interview, asking him to marry her, irrespective of the outcome of the interview. Two months later, the results are declared, with Manoj qualifying for the rank of IPS officer. One year later, Manoj, now an IPS officer, meets DSP Dushyant Singh at the police station in Mandsaur to thank the DSP for encouraging him. Manoj marries Shraddha, and Pritam begins working as a news reporter.
In November 2022, filmmaker Vidhu Vinod Chopra announced the film, based on the novel Twelfth Fail, by Anurag Pathak. The film is inspired by the real life story of IPS Officer Manoj Kumar Sharma and IRS Officer Shraddha Joshi.
In November 2022, Chopra announced that actor Vikrant Massey will play the lead, marking their first collaboration. UPSC coach Vikas Divyakirti was cast to play himself on screen. Many real life UPSC aspirants were cast in various roles. According to Massey, it added "authenticity" to the film. Sharma and Joshi both made a cameo appearance in the film.
The film is shot mainly at various locations in Agra, Chambal, Delhi, Mussoorie and Mumbai. A major portion of the film was shot in the two education hubs for government job aspirants, Rajendra Nagar and Mukherjee Nagar. The filming was wrapped up in December 2022.
12th Fail's teaser was released on 10 August 2023, while its trailer was released on 3 October 2023. The film was released in theatres on 27 October 2023 in Hindi and Kannada languages. After the success in Hindi, the makers announced that the film will be dubbed in Tamil and Telugu languages and was released on 3 November 2023.
The film started streaming on Disney+ Hotstar from 29 December 2023.
The music of the film is composed by Shantanu Moitra while lyrics are written by Swanand Kirkire and Raftaar. The film's background score by Moitra, with its use of sitar and flute, was inspired by the score by Pandit Ravi Shankar in the Bengali film Pather Panchali (1955).
12th Fail received critical acclaim. Massey's performance was particularly praised. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 91% of 11 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.8/10.
Saibal Chatterjee of NDTV gave 3.5 stars out of 5 and said "Its an original depiction of an Indian Police Service (IPS) officer's life, 12th Fail is a thought-provoking and amusing film. A really sympathetic story is produced by the screenplay. It avoids any kind of extravagance in order to extract every last bit of drama from the bump and tumble of the man's journey." Mayank Shekhar of Mid-Day gave 4 stars out of 5 and reviewed the film "This is the India story!". Monika Rawal Kukreja of Hindustan Times stated in her reviews that 12th Fail is a must-watch to understand not only the hardships and emotions that UPSC students go through, but it also sheds light on the overall education in our system, something that Chopra won hearts at with 3 Idiots (2009).
Shubhra Gupta of The Indian Express gave 3 stars out of 5 and wrote that "[d]espite the background music and the occasional mood spikes, 12th Fail stays, for the most part, a film that cleaves close to ground reality. With characters that make you feel that they've wandered off the street." She adds, "[i]t's not just the main cast, but the numbers of the young who gather in the hot-spots rife with coaching centres, such as North Delhi’s Mukherjee Nagar: all these multitudes, crowding into tiny rooms, far away from their homes, cramming day and night to get through the exams in the hope of becoming something more than who they are, is such an India story." Deepa Gahlot of Rediff.com praised the performance of Vikrant Massey and said "If Vikrant Massey does not win a National Award for this film, it will be unjust to an actor who has given a performance of such unalloyed brilliance." Dhaval Roy of The Times of India gave 4 stars out of 5 and stated in his review that 12th Fail is an excellent film that is highly recommended, with nearly every scene over its 147 minutes leaving you feeling inspired and amazed. Bravo to Chopra for making sure each character in the film is given their best chance. Bhavna Agarwal of India Today gave 4 stars out of 5 and wrote "Vikrant Massey passes with flying colours on performance sheet".
Anuj Kumar of The Hindu reviewed movie and wrote "12th Fail film review: Vidhu Vinod Chopra delivers yet another hug of hope that is more earnest than magical." Sneha Bengani of CNBC TV18 reviewed the film, writing "Vikrant Massey powers through this remarkable story of perseverance". Gunjan D. Bidani of Zee News gave 4 stars out of 5, writing "Not to be hyperbolic, but 12th Fail might be just perfect. To watch 12th Fail properly requires fortitude. Goes without saying that the film at its root is a deep deprivation of human fundamentals. The arc of Vidhu Vinod Chopra-directorial is a daily barrage of study load, tricky social dynamics, menial jobs for sustenance and raw spillage of emotions." Sajesh Mohan of Onmanorama in his review wrote "The soundscape, meticulously crafted by Manav Shrotriya, amplifies the aches and joys of Manoj's journey. The way Manav uses and reuses background noise fading in and out to isolate Manoj and his emotions even in crowded scenes adds a meditative focus."
At Critics Choice Award, which was held on 12th March 2024, 12th Fail won the "Best Feature Film Award" and Vikrant Massey was awarded the Best Actor award.
In October 2024, Chopra announced at the 2024 edition of the International Film Festival of India that a film related to 12th Fail titled Zero Se Restart would be released on 13 December that year; initially reported to be a prequel, the film was later revealed to be a making-of documentary.