Dadasaheb Phalke Award: Mithun Chakraborty’s multi-talented award

Mithun Chakraborty. | Photo credit: ANI

In an industry that creates a new god every Friday, Mithun Chakraborty has been a story of resilience. Announced as the recipient of the Dadasaheb Phal Award on Monday (September 30, 2024), Mithun Chakraborty has never been a prisoner of image. From arthouse to mainstream commercial cinema and even unabashed fare for frontbenchers, he has traversed genres with complete ease.

Starting with Mrinal Sen the deer In 1976, he was perhaps the only lead actor to successfully transition from arthouse cinema to commercial potboiler and back. After Naseeruddin Shah, Shabana Azmi, Om Puri and Smita Patil each carved out their niche in parallel cinema with limited success in mainstream cinema, Mithun is the only one who has had a good bite of the cherry.

In parallel cinema, he worked with the likes of Mrinal Sen, Buddhadev Dasgupta and Gautam Ghosh, winning three National Awards in the process. He moved on to mainstream fare with the likes of B Subas, KC Bokadia, Manmohan Desai and Partu Ghosh, without a hitch, gifting films to his fans. Disco Dancer, dance dance, Don’t be inclined to pay, Ganga river Saraswati, fire path And brokeretc. Director B. of fragrance Disco Dancer In addition to India, Mithun gained an international fan following as the film prospered in the Soviet Union, Japan and China. For several years in the mid-80s, he was the best-known Indian abroad. At a time when Hindi cinema was dominated by Salim-Javed’s ‘angry young man’ persona, Mithun rewrote the box office rules. Disco DancerWhereas Bappi Lahiri’s music and his dance numbers ensured repeat audiences.

For a brief period in the late 80s, he challenged Amitabh Bachchan for the top spot in Hindi cinema, prompting Desai to give him a meatier role. Ganga Yamuna SaraswatiA rarity in Hindi cinema where most heroes play second fiddle to Bachchan.

Still, Mithun’s most sustained claim to fame has to be his foray into serious cinema and his work in films About them, Old Man, Swami Vivekananda And doll still remember With his modest work in arthouse cinema, he disproved the notion that an action hero in Hindi cinema cannot pull off the fare of neorealism. About them, Kalpurusha, Swami Vivekananda And deer, Each received a National Award that gave Mithun his own place in serious cinema and ensured his popularity from first-day-first-show to the film festival circuit.

But there is another side to Mithun’s career that has been less appreciated. He is perhaps the first A-grade star to work in a film specifically made for a less discerning audience. In the mid-90s, Mithun reshaped the cinema economy by shooting the film exclusively in Ooty with a standard cast like Hemant Birje, Gautami, Deepti Bhatnagar, Kiran Kumar and Raja Murad, with music by Dilip Sen-Sameer Sen. Films made on a shoestring budget of around ₹40 lakh are completed within a month and released without fanfare in smaller centres. Like movies executioner, Chandal, grandfather, Hitler, don And Cheetah It was unheard of in the metros but in the small towns it earned the producers huge profits besides keeping Mithun’s die-hard fans happy. Interestingly, GV Iyer took 11 years to complete the research for Mithun Swami VivekanandaThis star has already completed more than 20 films!

Recently played supporting roles in films like Mithun DKashmir file And Tashkent fileWhich probably took some way to convince the three-member jury comprising former Dadasaheb awardee Asha Parekh, actor-politician Khushbu Sundar and filmmaker Vipul Amritlal Shah to select Mithun Chakraborty for Indian cinema’s highest honour.