Popularity - equal to any other actor in the town. Reviews - rave more often. Box Office - initials guaranteed. And its all without any big names backing up regularly. AKSHAY KUMAR is an epitome of self-dependence and determination. a career that took off signing films galore has reached such a stage where he is considered a competition to the top league.
In the first phase of AKSHAY’s career, all he could claim was a MOHRA and a string of KHILADI flicks, which worked despite being highly mediocre, for their equally high pot-boiler quotient. By 1999, AKSHAY’s career was on a downfall. his maar-dhaad flicks had become monotonous by now, And he was no longer a hot property. but then came JAANWAR, and everything changed for AKSHAY. call it AKSHAY’s lucky stars or his improved choice of scripts, his films were bigger and better now.
The mean guy in AJNABEE, the oh-so-perfect hubby in DHADKAN, or the intellectaul criminal in SANGHARSH, he was giving performances now. the last 3-4 years have brought a great amount of maturity in AKSHAY’s performances. KHAKEE, MUJHSE SHAADI KAROGI and GARAM MASALA were truly great yet natural performances. he is the first choice for romantic comedies now. carrying JEETENDRA and GOVINDA’s tradition, AKSHAY doesn’t mind doing mediocrity on screen as long it brings in the audience and adds zeroes to his cheque amounts.
Okay, so he doesn’t have the equal intensity as the other top stars have, but he is surely a consistent deliverer at the BOX-OFFICE. Although he doesn’t have SANJAY LEELA BHANSALI and KARAN JOHAR to direct him, or YASH CHOPRA and RAM GOPAL VARAM to produce his films, he is a draw of his own among the audience. As much as I am sure NAMASTEY LONDON will be yet another tacky romantic comedy, I am even more sure that it will sail through at the ticket counters as it has the deadly combo of AKSHAY KUMAR and HIMESH RESHMIYYA [ another draw among the masses ] thats the power AKSHAY KUMAR holds currently. cheersharsh