The Lunchbox
A lonely Mumbai housewife desperate for connection begins exchanging heartfelt letters with a widowed office worker via a misdelivered lunchbox, but as their imagined romance deepens, the fragile bond threatens to unravel both of their ordinary lives.
“Can you fall in love with someone you have never met?”
Synopsis
A mistaken delivery in Mumbai's famously efficient lunchbox delivery system (Mumbai's Dabbawallahs) links a young housewife with a stranger in the final years of his life. The two begin to build a shared fantasy world through notes passed via the lunchbox. Over time, this imagined world begins to encroach on and threaten their real lives.
Credits
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How many hands made this film
The scale of the collaboration
A crew of 159+ credited
Why a floor?
This is a minimum, not a total. We only count the credits we’ve captured so far, and coverage is uneven — a blockbuster might show a few hundred names while another of the same size shows a couple dozen. The real crews all ran into the thousands. The number here only grows as full credits are enriched — so we frame it as a floor, never a headcount.
Craft leads on file
Edited by John F LyonsShot by Michael SimmondsScored by Max RichterDesigned by Shruti GupteSound by Ramesh BirajdarCostumes by Tasneem KhanVFX by Vinay Singh Chuphal
Box Office
2013 · Box office
💰 Box-office hit — grossed 5.1× its budget
Why 2.5×?
Cinemas keep roughly half of every ticket sold, and a wide release’s marketing often costs about as much again as the film — so a movie needs to gross around 2.5× its production budget just to break even theatrically. It’s a rule of thumb, not the studio’s ledger (home video and streaming come later).
Worldwide gross
$17.2M
Re-release box office
- 2014165 theaters
- $7.2M($10.1M today)
Domestic gross earned in theatrical re-release, by year · adjusted for inflation
Also known as
- Lunchboxde
- The Lunchboxen
- (English)The Lunchbox
- (Bulgarian)Кутия за храна
Release dates around the world3 countries · showhide
- FranceMay 19, 2013
- CzechiaJul 4, 2013
- PolandJul 25, 2013
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Cast & Crew
159 unique people credited
Top billed cast
Irrfan Khan
as Saajan Fernandes
Nimrat Kaur
as Ila
Nawazuddin Siddiqui
as Shaikh
Lillete Dubey
as Ila's Mother
Nakul Vaid
as Rajeev
Bharti Achrekar
as Auntie
Yashvi Puneet Nagar
as Yashvi
Denzil Smith
as Mr. Shroff
Shruti Bapna
as Mehrunnisa
Nasir Khan
as Ila's Father
Lokesh Raj
as Duke's Owner
Sadashiv Kondaji Pokarkar
as Dabbawallah at Ila's House
Supporting cast
29Aarti Rathod
as Saajan's Neighbor
Krishna Bai
as Toothless Woman
Raj Rishi More
as Ila's Brother
Santosh Kumar Chaurasiya
as Autorickshaw Driver
Avijit Khanwilkar
as Young Man in Train
Aakash Sinha
as Autorickshaw 2
Xavier Hodges
as Very Old Couple
Rosemary Hodges
as Very Old Couple
Hubart Vossoaker
as Neighbor's Family
Rosemary Vossoaker
as Neighbor's Family
Flory Vossoaker
as Neighbor's Family
Sebastian Vossoaker
as Neighbor's Family
Quitira Vossoaker
as Neighbor's Family
Baaburao Sankpal
as Dabbawallah at Saajan's Office
Chandrakantha Rajani
as Saajan's Office Staff 1
Kancha Karki
as Saajan's Office Staff
Rajendra Dubey
as Saajan's Office Staff
Narendra Arora
as Saajan's Office Staff
Ashwin Desai
as Saajan's Office Staff
Mahesh Mahadev Salavkar
as Office Peon
Krishna Mandal
as Office Peon
Calvin Desilva
as Cricket Kid
Craig Narona
as Cricket Kid
Kyeron Kandoria
as Cricket Kid
Shubh Jadav
as Cricket Kid
Andrew Belfield
as John
Md Anan Islam
Rita Sonal Panjatan
Swapnil Shrirao
as Duke's Waiter
Directors
1Writers
3Producers
29Abhishek Goel
senior di producer: Filmlab
Achin Jain
co-producer, executive producer: akfpl
Anurag Kashyap
Producer, Producers
Arun Rangachari
Producer, Producers
Benny Drechsel
co-producer
Cedomir Kolar
co-producer
Danis Tanovic
co-producer
Gitika Aggarwal
associate producer
Guneet Monga Kapoor
Producer, Producers, producer (as Guneet Monga)
Irrfan Khan
executive producer
John F Lyons
associate producer
Karan Johar
co-producer
Karsten Stoter
co-producer
Lydia Dean Pilcher
executive producer
Marc Baschet
co-producer
Meraj Shaikh
line producer
Nina Lath Gupta
co-producer
Nitin Keni
co-producer (as Nittin Keni)
Ritesh Batra
executive producer
Ronnie Screwvala
co-producer
Sahab Narain
associate producer
Shaan Vyas
associate producer: AKFPL
Shahnaab Alam
co-producer
Shivani Saran
supervising producer
Siddharth Roy Kapur
co-producer
Smriti Jain
line producer
Sunil John
co-producer
Vikramjit Roy
executive producer
Vivek Rangachari
co-producer
Other crew
92Siddharth Diwan
additional cinematographer
Aravind Vijayakumar
adr engineer
Niharika Bhasin
as Niharika Khan
Tasneem Khan
assistant costume designer
Neema Sharma
assistant director
Sangram S
assistant director
Raj Rishi More
assistant post production manager, assistant director, research and development
Dilip Gupta
assistant production manager
Raut Shweta
assistant production manager
Michael Nagel
assistant sound editor
Raju Gadam
best boy
Sudesh Siddhu
boom operator (as Sudesh Sidhu)
Parents Guide
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