Mangal Pandey: The Rising has opened to packed houses the world over. It has a great release timing---the Independence Day Weekend in India. In fact it has much more. It has a star who is returning to the big screen almost after four exact years. The last time Aamir Khan was on big screen was in August 2001, DIL CHAHTA HAI. This time he returns, but not in the cool DCH mode, but rather in the pre-Independence type Lagaan mode. He is making news, he is striking aces, he’s being valued even over the nation’s most popular---SRK---right now!
Once Karan Johar said SRK was the best to him and it would be hard for him, in fact impossible to do any project without SRK. When questioned again to consider Aamir Khan too for the best spot, Karan despite retaining SRK for his choice sounded reluctant to simply write off the ace Khan for the king Khan. So he rather commented saying that Aamir might be the runner up. No doubt, after SRK, Aamir is the only one followed like crazy. But why? Because he does patriotic films? Because he behaves serious all the time? Because he shows up once in a millenium? Or because he just divorced his wife to get hold of a foreigner? One simply has no idea what way but this Khan has his own way of hitting the newspapers all the time.
Aamir is no Salman. He’s not a physically toned guy. He didn’t get voted as the World’s 7th handsome guy. He didn’t get labeled as an overactor by the critics. He didn’t go through a bad phase any time in his life like Salman did. He never got caught in major controversies like Salman. Similarly Aamir is no SRK. He isn’t a habitual award winner. He isn’t a person who does stage shows aplenty to perform, like on awards. He doesn’t have a sort of affair going on with Karan Johar...jokes...SRK is pretty close to Karan though which Aamir isn’t. Aamir, like Salman but again unlike SRK, hasn’t worked prominently with the Chopras and the Johars. Similarly, Aamir is no Saif who got labeled as a comedian and had to prove his versatility over the years. So how come Aamir Khan still in his own way rocks in Bollywood.
Well, no doubt Aamir is a decent actor. He got a solid break in the industry with QSQT. Not only was the movie a hit, but a critically acclaimed one that brought Aamir gradually into the frame of success. It wasn’t like Hrithik Roshan, an overnight case of major success. Similarly it wasn’t like Abhishek Bachchan, a talented actor who took years to rise to the top. Aamir was a balance between the two. He gradually made his mark and with his usual trick of minimal movies even at that time, he got to do all the good projects. Here he deserves a pat on the back for perfect role selection. His initial roles like Parampara (serious), Andaz Apna Apna (comedy), Raja Hindustani (romantic), Ishq (comedy), and Sarfarosh (serious/patriotic) brought him accolades from the critics and the public alike for stealing the shows. He took his time to re-appear after each of these succeses for the most part, thus his filmography isn’t as long as many of his counterparts! Now with Lagaan and DCH fetching him the best actor awards he last won for Sarfarosh and Raja Hindustani, Aamir got everpopular. What with his movie Lagaan making it to the oscars in 2001, however coming out as a loser. Aamir perhaps for unknown reasons went out of the industry on a high and returned after a long time. Everyone thought it would be a good move on his part, a one year exit. But alas it took him 4 times the wait to come back and entertain his fans. What a move, he comes back with a patriotic heavy budget movie on India’s Independence Day. Doesn’t that make him a genius?
Well but after giving him all the thumbs up for the right career moves and even after preferring him over SRK (which many members here on MS have done), I have to add my two cents on the flip side. Aamir to me is a good actor. But that is it. The fact that he turns into a hype everytime he shows up isn’t worth it. Any actor, mark these words, any sought-after A-List actor can go out of the industry for a few years and come back with a bang. That’s a known fact. Aamir, though, taking advantage of his status, has been doing it all the time, and these people make excuses for such a hiatus saying the work quality shouldn’t suffer with more and more projects. Well I say then in that regard Aamir cannot compare to someone like, let’s say the Bachchans. Abhishek just rose to success with a hatrick of hits and has always been entertaining his fans, even after his recent rise to success, with immense frequency. But an even more convincing example is that of Amitabh Bachchan.
Let us consider this. AB Sr. is a 60 plus guy who I’m sure doesn’t need money for survival at all. Yet he knows how eagerly his fans await his appearance on the big screen. So he graces the silver screen everytime he can, which is possibly 10 times a year. And almost all these performances get acclaimed and appreciated and praised and the veteran gets nominated for the best actor category quite frequently, winning a few other awards here and there too, which I’m sure the legend doesn’t really need either. So Mr. Aamir, a guy about 25 years younger than Amit Ji can simply not say that work quality suffers. I mean come on he should be having double the stamina of AB Sr, yet he is doing so much less of a work---that’s ridiculous to me to show up once in 4 years, keep the people waiting for you, get the movie opened to packed houses, and smash the efforts in mere seconds of other hard workers who’ve been putting the industry together in your absence. It’s just unbearable to realize Aamir’s strategy and still catch people praise him and take fancy to him like crazy.
Overall, still Aamir is a good actor. But the basic point here is that he’s not deserving of all that hype or attention for some above mentioned reasons. Yet, an actor recommended with some solid successes to his career!