Champion in the race

Komal Nahta

Diwali -- the one season when producers and distributors fall all over themselves trying have their films released. Box office collections are bountiful during the festive period.

Little wonder, then, that actor-producer Sujit Kumar has decided to squeeze his Champion in-between the two Chopra films this Diwali.

Earlier, Babloo Pachisia had scheduled his Sunny Deol-starrer, Farz, for Diwali release. He later admitted, though, that releasing Farz in direct opposion to a Yash Chopra flick (Mohabbatein) and a Hrithik Roshan-starrer (Mission Kashmir) would be quite suicidal, even on Diwali.

But Sunny, it would seem, is keen to have one release this Diwali.

And one release it will be. Only, it isn't the earlier scheduled Farz, but Champion (co-starring Manisha Koirala) for Diwali.

To that end, Sunny has even dubbed for the film pretty fast.

Pretty drastic stuff, that, when you consider the fact that action hero hates dubbing and producers who sign him have to contend with his back problem as much as his dubbing problem.

When asked, Sujit Kumar said, "Sunny has just one more reel to dub for just one more reel. Meanwhile, the background music recording is in progress. We're very keen to release the film this Diwali."