in life or death. The film ends with the happy days of Barfi and Jhilmil being shown and the credits roll. Cast Ranbir Kapoor as Murphy Jungbahadur Johnson a.k.a. Barfi Priyanka Chopra as Jhilmil Durjoy Chatterjee Ileana D'Cruz as Shruti Ghosh / Shruti Ranjeet Sengupta Saurabh Shukla as Inspector Sudhanshu Dutta Ashish Vidyarthi as Durjoy Chatterjee (Jhilmil's father) Akash Khurana as Jungbahadur Johnson (Barfi's father) Jisshu Sengupta as Ranjeet Sengupta (Shruti's fiancé turned husband) Roopa Ganguly as Mrs. Ghosh (Shruti's mother) Uday Tikekar as Mr. Ghosh (Shruti's father) Sumona Chakravarti as Shruti's friend Haradhan Bandopadhyay as Daju (Jhilmil's special-care home owner) Arun Bali as Jhilmil's grandfather Kenneth Desai as Senior Inspector Rajeev Mishra as Inspector Dutta's assistant Preeti Dayal as Mrs. Durjoy Chatterjee (Jhilmil's mother) Abantika Biswas as Jhimlil's sister Oindrila Saha as Jhimlil's sister Sujata Sehgal as Ms. D'Souza (Jhilmil's special-care home caretaker) Bholaraj Sapkota as Bhola (Barfi's friend) Production Development During the production of his previous directorial venture Kites (2010), director Anurag Basu wrote a two-page short story which was later developed into the script of Barfi!. The film script that Basu wrote alternated between two time periods, and he retained the nonlinear narrative structure. He said that the script required a 30-year time span for the characters' love to grow and thus set the backdrop of the film in the 1970s. In June 2010, Anurag Basu confirmed that his film would feature three lead roles, a deaf-mute man, a mentally challenged girl, and a narrator. With former titles like Khamoshi or Silence, media reports said the story was grim or dark. However, Basu stated that on the contrary, the film was happy. According to Basu, he paid homage to Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin by adding scenes inspired by the era of silent cinema and using physical comedy in the film, involving silent portions. Casting Ranbir Kapoor was the first choice of director Anurag Basu and Katrina Kaif was the first choice for the role of the narrator. In March 2010, The Times of India reported that Ranbir Kapoor and Katrina Kaif were signed to play lead roles in the film, then titled Khamoshi and later Silence, which Basu confirmed. Basu wanted to cast a new girl from Kolkata for the autistic character. Basu's wife, Tani suggested Chopra's name for the role. However, Basu feared that audience would see "the Priyanka Chopra" and not the character due