Tirthankar Mitra
Amitabh Bachchan who is still a craze even after his 55 years journey in Hindi film industry stepped to 82 on October 11. Tall, dark and sans the conventional good looks of some of his predecessors and contemporaries hailing from the wheat fields of Punjab, he was the quintessential dark horse.
It has been a long journey for the young executive who worked and partied hard in Calcutta to be the most celebrated male star in Indian cinema whom an overseas filmmaker exasperated at not getting shooting dates dubbed as “Mr Industry”.
Bachchan had started his working life as a young executive in what was then Calcutta. He turned out to be a marathon runner. He had participated in plays in school and was a part of English language dramas which were staged regularly in Calcutta then. Young Bachchan’s histrionic abilities did not fetch him any accolades then. But the fact remains he learnt to emote. And there was no denying that the young executive possessed a baritone voice. It would fetch Bachchan his first brush with the silver screen and but not fame. .
Mrinal Sen, the director of art films , was making Bhuban Shome, an offbeat Hindi film. Penned by noted Bengali author Bonphool about a crusty railway official whose heart had untapped goodness, it was Bachchan’s voice which introduced the audience to “Shome sahab”. Sen was the first to use what would. be known as the country’s most famous voice. It would be decades thereafter when Satyajit Ray would use the then most famous voice in the country in his first Hindi film venture Shatranj ki Khiladi.
Bachchan had later regretted that he could not land a role in two films of the most famous duo who wielded a megaphone in Indian cinema. But the gawky youth overlooked the tribute paid to his voice in the first scenes of two films which made Indian cinematic history.
The lanky young man’s first film Saat Hindustani based on a storyline on liberation of Goa fetched a national award. It was a pointer to his acting skills. But worse was to follow which is every actor’s nightmare – a drought of roles. But Bachchan soldiered on. But luck was yet to smile on him.
He was fated to get a role of a voiceless man in Sunil Dutt-Waheeda Rehman starrer Reshma Aur Shera. Yet his role, a bit more than a cameo was noticed amid actors making their presence in a film based on a feud between two families not loath to spill each other’s blood.
A string of flops and unkind comments from his heroines marked this period of Bachchan’s career. But his friendship with Jaya Bhaduri, a Pune film institute graduate who had debuted in Ray’s Mahanagar, was destined. to rejuvenate his downward spiralling career and give him a life partner.
A new star had risen in the Hindi film firmament at this time. Rajesh Khanna was the darling of the crowd delivering hit after hit which added to his starry tantrums and even Bachchan had to put up with it during the making of the film Anand.
But even as Bachchan’s career seemed to be in a blind alley, Jaya’s career graph soared. Just as her beau was about to pack his bags, director Prakash Mehra sent word that he wanted Bachchan to star in his film Zanjeer. The rest is history. As a smouldering angry young man, Bachchan’s performance as an honest cop whose parents were killed by an assassin before his eyes, Zanjeer broke many a box office records.
Amitabh Bachchan has arrived and was to stay at the top for a very long time sans any starry behaviour which in so many words undid Rajesh Khanna. The angry young man image of the new film icon was in keeping with turbulent 1970’s.
Business was dull in license-permit Raj, jobs were in short supply, short cuts to prosperity beckoned even as probity was at a discount. The roles Bachchan enacted in Deewar, Trishul, Manzil, Shakti, Aakhree Raasta and Main Azad Hoon were one man protests against overwhelming odds snowballing into obstacles to fair play and justice.
The young men having conscience in the big bad world, seemed to consider the tall superstar as his role model. And according to the film script soon their screen idol was in the long arm of the law post initial material advancement.
The formula was repeated in film after film. And Amitabh with his screen name Vijay portrayed a character which despite some initial success fell before a police bullet thereby proclaiming the age old saying that crime does not pay.
Vijay’s younger sibling and a cop Ravi played with aplomb by Shashi Kapoor shot at him in Deewar. It was his father Ashwini Kumar portraying whom Dilip Kumar put up a stellar performance fired the fatal shot at his screen son Bachchan. The audience was teary eyed. But they left the cash registers jingling and the film makers and theatre owners happy.
The movie goers had a new icon and one viewing of a film starring Bachchan was not enough. His performance became a metaphor for the dormant rage, frustration, restlessness and anti- establishment disposition of a entire generation.
But romantic films were not beyond Bachchan’s acting range. Abhiman and Mili with Jaya Bhaduri, Saudagar with Nutan, Kabhie Kabhie with Waheeda Rehman and Rakhee underscored his talent for romantic acting.
A near fatal accident in the sets of the film Coolie and being diagnosed with Myasthenia Gravis put a brake to his career. Bachchan opted for politics and became a MP for Congress from his hometown of Allahabad only to realise not much later he was a misfit in the new field of career.
Looking for other peaks to conquer, the superstar opened Amitabh Bachchan Corporation Limited (ABCL) to introduce products and services to covering the entire cross section of Indian entertainment industry. But it fell on its face landing Bachchan in grave financial difficulty.
An appearance in television as a quiz master and a string of hit films like Khaki, Sarkar, Sarkar Raj, Black, Kabhie Khushi Kabhie Gham more than shored up his film career once again. It was also a mark of his versatility which passed a litmus test with flying colours. He is aptly called the Big B. Performance of younger heroes are compared to the ones he had essayed earlier. Film makers think of projects which would suit Bachchan’s age and image. The man who made his name in the early part of his career as an “action hero” has now moulded himself as a most versatile performer among the current stars of Hindi cinema.
Unknowingly Bachchan has written a part of the history of Indian cinema for the past five decades. In the process, he has reinvented his image from an angry young man to a gentler screen persona who is now more of a thinking man’s actor.
Let him pick and choose his films. Meanwhile, his tribe of fans grows and cutting across the generation gap they ask for more. (IPA)
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