There was a time Amitabh Bachchan ruled the silver screen. Then came the downslide and the man gave way to his successors, and made himself a firm niche on the small screen instead. Today, with a slew of sensible films in his kitty, Big B is looking forward to rule the marquee once more.
In the offing is Suneel Darshan’s family drama “Ek Rishta” in which he is paired with Rakhee after a long time. In the film Big B plays a stern patriarch, a man of high principles and a demanding father (to Akshay Kumar). There is talk in the trade circles that this film, if it clicks at the box-office, will mark the beginning Big B’s journey back to numero uno position.
But even if “Ek Rishta” fizzles out at the turnstiles Big B has little to worry. His home production “Aks”, a Rakesh Mehra-directed psychological thriller in which he is paired with Nandita Das, is ready for release, and it’s promos are already on the air. Then there are other in-the-making films like Vipul Shah’s “All the best” and Sanjay Gupta’s “Kaante” ( he plays a bank robber in both these films), which promise to immortalize his image as truly the “superstar of the millennium”.
But the most promising of the lot are a number of films in which he will be seen in the roles he hasn’t played hitherto. He will play king Dashratha in Sanjay Khan’s “Maryadapurshottam” (which is based on the epic Ramayana), and Lord Indra in Arjun Sajnani’s “Agni Varsha”( based on “Mahabharata”).
The doyen of reigning actors in the Bollywood Amitabh has never had much of role commensurable to his age in the second half of his acting career. There have been films in which he has been paired with the third grade actresses like Shilpa Shirodkar and Rambha. Only lately have the directors like Aditya Chopra (in “Mohabbatein”) or Karan Johar ( in forthcoming “Kabhie Khushi Kabhie Gam” showed some creative imagination and wrote the roles exclusively for the man. Now it remains to be seen if he can be the Shahenshah of the big screen one more time.
There was a time Amitabh Bachchan ruled the silver screen. Then came the downslide and the man gave way to his successors, and made himself a firm niche on the small screen instead. Today, with a slew of sensible films in his kitty, Big B is looking forward to rule the marquee once more.