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By Aman Basha
A small drop into the ocean of words and wishes surrounding the colossus that strides our age
- His Favorite Heroine
Few films can be as postcard pretty and deeply uncomfortable as Silsila. It is not very surprising why, apart from its obvious flaws, it was one of the rare flops for the box office Supremo. Much has been said and written about the Amitabh-Jaya and the Amitabh-Rekha pairs and especially the Amitabh-Jaya-Reha triangle, but I bring up Silsila not to mention any of these three but another, a most favorite Amitabh pairing of mine, that of him and Shashi Kapoor.
Amitabh’s ‘favorite heroine’ as Shashi was called, makes an important cameo and encapsulates all the chemistry and bonhomie that lit films like Suhaag and Shaan, from that delightful drunk scene to them drinking and singing “neeche paan ki dukaan, upar gori ka makaan” in the Kashmir cold. There is a well aged scene of the both bathing together, earning Silsila a place of honor in every piece discussing homosexuality in Hindi cinema.
It always seemed to me that the Shashitabh couple worked so well because of all of Amitabh’s many co stars, Shashi was the only one not trying to outshine him. Had a Vinod Khanna or Shatrughan been in Deewar, the bad blood between the brothers would have been obvious from scene-1, but it’s Shashi’s fondness for Amitabh that makes the later confrontations doubly tragic.
This leaves me to mention another favorite moment of mine, an ironic choice as it comes to be. It is the scene where Amit learns of his brother’s death from TV and breaks a TV in sudden inconsolable rage. Even in Yash Chopra’s romantic universe, the Rage of the Towering Inferno cannot be suppressed.
- Coolie Comedy
It is a commonly heard story in the pantheon of the Bachchan myth of how the Middle East and Africa fell in love with that bootlegger Anthony Gonsalves so much that they would refer to Amitabh in any film as Anthony. And why not, Anthony is one of the greatest and most iconic comic performances that has influenced and continues to exist in every masala film, particularly the Southern (Telugu) variety. The (completely improvised) mirror scene, him coming out of an egg to deliver a monologue are all well known, but there is another egg scene that the genius Manmohan Desai made Amitabh Bachchan do in a much later film.
Coolie will forever be associated with the accident, the public outpouring and prayer that seemingly brought a clinically dead star back to life, where fate decided to outdo even Manmohan Desai to such an extent that he was forced to change his ending.
But amidst all this, this delightful little scene where the coolie Iqbal mixes up an omlette broadcast and a yoga one for hilarious results is ample showcase for not only Amitabh the comedian but also Amitabh’s great physical agility that was always emphasized in Desai films. The Amitabh-Manmohan Desai combo always succeeded in making something so enjoyable that you’d start finding it believable.
- Bachchan Sings
Bachchan’s baritone has been the base of many iconic conversations, dialogues, monologues, narrations and over time, quite some songs. There are of course the two Holi staples, his drag number from Laawaris or more recently, the fantastic Piddly. The least heard of these must be the lovely elegy ‘Rozana’, from Nishabd made by a Ram Gopal Varma who hadn’t yet devolved to a second rate porn maker (so I hear). The elegant melancholy in Bachchan’s voice almost compels one to try to watch Nishabd till you realize there is always a Jhund to look forward to.“Every day I live, every day I die in Your memories…”
- Banda Yeh Badass Hai
Very few have had the comeback that Amitabh Bachchan has had. Reeling from consecutive flops, the specter of bankruptcy and a long creative decline, he completely reinvented himself, shedding any starry inhibitions for a second innings that’d put even the likes of De Niro and Pacino to shame (Not that De Niro needs any help with films like Dirty Grandpa). The 00s and 10s don’t match the peaks of the 70s but are still littered by brave attempts, lauded performances, good success and the incredible relevance that hasn’t dimmed. In all that had been written about these second innings, a film that is constantly forgotten, perhaps the most underrated of any of Amitabh Bachchan’s films is Aks.
Playing like a crazy version of Batman and the Joker, Aks is a flawed film, it struggles with its conceit and plays like a series of great moments rather than as a cohesive whole. Yet these great moments are all eye turning, tuned by debutant Rakeysh O Mehra’s craft and lifted by the jugalbandi between Manoj Bajpayee’s demented Raghavan and Amitabh’s dignified Manu Verma.
The true acting showcase begins as Raghavan’s soul possesses Manu Verma, seemingly breaking the actor exhausted and trapped in a long series of tripe and predictability into a new freedom and an eerie brilliance that, for its sheer surprise value, often compels me to use the term ‘his best performance’. There were plenty of dark moments in earlier films, Bemisaal as mentioned earlier, but he crosses new lines with the Nandita Das assault scene and could never come back. Cinema has been better off ever since.
- The One Man Industry
Few things can be as satisfying as watching and reveling in a star signature at its peak. For a star, few things can be as dangerous as time, age and fatigue. It is a truth undeniable that unlike others as Rajinikanth or Chiranjeevi, there is not much of Amitabh Bachchan the megastar anymore and that too exists only in the eyes of starstruck contestants on KBC playing out on the small screen. Yet Amitabh Bachchan’s stardom seems even today to be inevitable, the peak of his stardom can be understood and enjoyed yet not the beginnings, where all that is so iconic about him, his height, his voice, his gait were rejected.
Truly, chance and fate have their mysterious ways but with Amitabh Bachchan, they seemed to follow all the rigid contours of a masala script such that a man with a surname bearing no connotation would become universally loved across languages, faiths and continents.
A song that seems most apt to describe the love and fan following he earned is the famous John Jani Janardhan song in Naseeb, where the lyrics “Jesus, Allah, Ram hai mere” seem an understatement.
There is also a lovely little bit where Amitabh goes on to mime every major film figure cameoing there from Raj to Shammi to Rajesh to Dharam and sings about how after every film he saw, he wished to be an actor but fate had other plans for him. Indeed fate had other plans for him, he became not just an actor but a hero, a megastar, an icon, a cultural lodestar, the one man industry and so much more. In short, he now became what every audience wanted to see, every actor wanted to be, he became…….Amitabh Bachchan.
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