Fading Star

Let’s start with the Actor of the last Century (according to a BBC worldwide poll in 1999), Amitabh Bachchan. That he is an icon is an understatement. God! I know there were several people like me who worshipped him once. And several more who still do. But here’s the reason why I think that he’s a fallen idol. First up, some of his old movies when I saw them again, really sucked. It’s taken me years to accept that these movies sucked. Ok, some of the others now actually seem better than they were before. And his acting in those good movies is still superlative. Ok then, that reason for calling him a fallen idol isn’t justified, and my problem is not with his past. It’s with his current.

Bachchan says all the time that he hates the label “Bollywood” used to denote commercial Hindi cinema and anything that’s connected to it. According to him, this implies that commercial Hindi cinema is inferior or is in some way subordinate to Hollywood. He takes offense to that implication. He believes that commercial Hindi cinema is more prolific than Hollywood and has an identity of its own. And several other senior Indian cinema artistes feel that way too.

But then, let’s look at some of the more recent movies of Mr. Bachchan; like Kaante, Sarkar, Family, Ek Ajnabee, etc. In most cases, these movies have been either directly lifted (copied) or are largely adapted from Hollywood movies. If he continues to agree to act in cinema that’s largely “inspired” from foreign cinema, especially Hollywood, then how the hell does he think that commercial Indian cinema is going to ever shake off that “ollywood” tag? Beats me!

And if he isn’t starring in remakes or copies, he’s acting in crap pseudo cinema of the Chopra’s and Johar’s (Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham, Mohobattein, etc.) Occasionally he gets to prove his acting chops in less commercial movies with original themes such as Virrudh, etc. But then these are so few and far between. If he’s doing so many “inspired” roles, what are the lesser actors and actresses to do? When’re you going to start to practice as you preach?

Let’s put it this way Mr. Bachchan. You sure must be getting a lot of scripts and must be sitting on a good pile of money to be able to effect a change. I agree that people are writing scripts for you that they’ve never ever done for an aging stalwart in Indian commercial cinema, and that’s a big change from the past. But you’ve got to put your foot down when it comes to remakes. An occasional “Aks” or “Viruddh” do not wash away the plethora of remakes and copies that you have starred in. The glory days of Don, Sholay, Deewar, Trishul, Agneepath, etc. may not necessarily be over.