Swami Vivekananda

Swami Vivekananda is a 1998 Indian biographical film directed by G. V. Iyer and produced by T. Subbarami Reddy. It took Iyer 11 years to finish the research work required for the film and to write the screenplay. The film starred Sarvadaman D. Banerjee as Swami Vivekananda, the 19th-century Hindu monk, and Mithun Chakraborty as Ramakrishna, his guru. Even though the film was completed, ready to release in 1994 and was considered for 1995 national awards, the film got released on 12 June 1998. The film was premiered on India's public service broadcaster Doordarshan on 15 August 1998, the country's Independence Day. The film received mainly negative reviews from critics. Mithun Chakraborty's acting in this film was widely appreciated, and he won his third National Film Award. Plot The film mainly captures the events of Vivekananda's life from his birth to 1897, when he returned to India from the West. The film begins with the birth of Narendranath Datta (pre-monastic name of Swami Vivekananda) and shows the neighbours and relatives of Datta family celebrating the event. It immediately moves to the scene where Narendranath sees his father Vishwanath Datta is donating money, clothes, food to poor and distressed people. Seeing this, young Narendranath asks his father to give him something too, and his father tells him to go and look in a mirror and find what he had already given him. Following his father's suggestion, Narendranath goes to the room, sees his image in the mirror.