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The big chill
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Amitabh Bachchan, the one-man entertainment industry, talks to PREMA MANMADHAN in the cool climes of Munnar
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CHANGING FRAMES Amitabh Bachchan: `I am happy working with the new generation: full of energy, very creative, very aggressive, and with tremendous attitude' PHOTO: MAHESH HARILAL
Cool Munnar, ever popular with the holiday crowds, has a big reason to celebrate this season: Big B has landed there and that too for a whole month, shooting for Ram Gopal Varma's Nishabd. Tea County's lobby is packed with fans waiting to have a glimpse of the star, however fleeting. The actor zips in and out, shooting in a bungalow 10 km away.
"The subject of Nishabd is bold and a departure from Ram Gopal Varma's other movies like Gangster or Sarkar. It's a short film and has no songs in it," he said, in a chat with The Hindu MetroPlus and Businessline, after a hard day's shoot.
The charismatic actor was graciousness personified, going into minute details of every question, right from his company AB Corp — which happily has started making profits — to the changing face of Indian cinema and audience tastes.
Arguably, no other superstar has had such a spectacular second innings as Amitabh who seamlessly shifted from the angry young man image of the '70s and '80s. I tried to get him to name his fav role but he neatly sidestepped, preferring instead to dwell on his eventful career.
"I've always tried to demarcate certain time spans within which prominent works were done, certain prominent associations were created and my very long, creative, committed association with Hrishikesh Mukherji. It's a pity that that kind of cinema is non-existent now. The largest number of films I did was with him. Whether it was Abhiman or Mili, Chupke Chupke or Namak Haram, they were all very important films. Then came the days with Salim-Javed and Prakash Mehra, Manmohan Desai, Ramesh Sippy Yash Chopra. I did some wonderful work... Deewar, Amar Akbar Antony, Sholay. The generation after that was people like Mukul Anand and Tinnu Anand who did films like Agneepath, Shahenshah and fortunately, (working with) the generation after that, like Karan Johar, Aditya Chopra was good and now, I am happy working with the new generation: full of energy, very creative, very aggressive, and with tremendous attitude. The average age on the sets today is not more than 21."
And one major change, he added, was women managing crucial departments of filmmaking.
Parallel cinema was never a part of his 120-film oeuvre. Why?
"Nobody asked me."
But, said this Bollywood phenomenon — probably defensively — the West was coming round to viewing the song-and-dance routine as worthwhile entertainment. "I have always thought that that was our USP. Even when it was ridiculed and (viewed) too pedestrian for Western tastes. I have always believed that when a country does well economically, everything about it looks good. Its food tastes good, dress is appreciated..."
Page 3, Black and a few other movies, which would have been bracketed within parallel cinema five years ago, have done well, and that shows the change audience tastes.
Considering he was right now God's Own Country, I asked him about Mohanlal who is starring in Sholay's remake. "He is one of the greatest actors of the country; it's a pity that the rest of India does not get to see him much because of the language problem."
The bitter memories of ABCL, the company he floated and which ran into problems from the word go, still haunt him, but it was "not a flawed vision. It was because we could not manage it right. I would like to believe that the Miss World pageant was the best that was staged. Priyadarshan, who directed the show, took the concept of civilisations developing along riverbanks the world over. It was truly Indian, the whole event. But a lot of people missed the point and hence a lot of controversy around it... "
When it went into the red, many businessmen friends advised him to declare bankruptcy, as it was the sanest thing to do. "But it was a company which bore my father's name. I needed to protect it and I was not comfortable facing people I owed money to. Happily, we have paid everything back. ABC is a small company and yes, it has started making profits. Content is king. And that content is mostly from films. It also forms 85 per cent of the content on TV. So we are making only films now... We are contemplating going public later."
What about all those brand endorsements? Switch on the TV and you see Big B promoting all kinds of products from chocolates, pens, soap powder to posh living spaces. Wasn't it an overdose?
No way, apparently. He was bound by a contract with ABC. When is Kaun Banega Crorepati, off the air following his recent illness, coming back? "Ask Star channel," he smiled.
Making light of descriptions such as "Brand Amitabh", he said: "That is manufactured by the corporate world. In fact, the whole communication system has become abbreviated: yeah, okay, no, fine, cool, chill. These words now encapsulate what we would have conveyed in three or four sentences 10 years ago."
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