My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
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I know I should be doing these top ten things more often. They are fun to do and somewhere deep down inside of us we all like to see top ten lists even if its about some random stuff. This time its about the characters, not main, but supporting characters who had a huge effect on the success of the movie they were in. This characters can be a Hero's buddy, his nemesis or his comic sidekick or just some dude who made the movie fun, but they had one thing in common and it was their uncommon performance. In my opinion people who made it to this list did something special which no one had done before and it changed our film industry and their career in more ways than one....
So here it is starting with number 10.....
10. Sameer in Dil Chahta Hai - Saif Ali Khan was the surprise of this first movie by Farhan Akhtar. The movie was about the romance, relationships, problems, heart breaks in the lives of affluent, trendy, young Indians and how they survived these life's curve balls while driving around in fancy American cars, vacationing in Goa and bar crawling in Mumbai. Most of the actors were playing their usual selves although in cooler hairstyles, however Saif was so earnest and goofy as Samir that he became the most lovable of all and also the life of the movie. Everytime I watch the movie I most enjoy the scenes he's in.
9. Maharani in Sadak - Sadashiv Amrapurkar was a well known villain back in the days. He had done numerous good stuff but his best was as Maharani the pimp in Sadak. He made what was usually a laughing, comic character into a scary, serious one. He was one of the reasons why people went back in the theatres to watch this movie again. Also won him an award.
8. Circuit in Munnabhai MBBS - The reason why Circuit is number 8 and not further up in the list is that even though Arshad Warsi played one of the best comic roles ever, he still didn't dominate Sanju. Circuit was awesome in both Munnabhai movies and is probably as big if not a bigger reason as Sanjay Dutt why people will watch these movies over and over again.
7. Langda Tyagi in Omkara - Brilliant, unexpected performance from Aashiq Awara. His second appearance on my list, which shows how far this man has come from his unimpressive beginnings. As Langda Tyagi he not only showed shades that no one had ever seen, but he easily dominated a stellar cast including Ajay Devgan and Konkana Sen Sharma. I think every actor needs a role for which people can remember them, Saif Ali Khan just got his with this one.
6. Bhavani Shankar in Gol Maal - Who doesn't remember this opinionated, hitleresque yet funny boss of Amol Palekar. Utpal Dutt and his numerous similar performances amused the audiences in 70s and 80s. But Bhavani Shankar is the one that has stood out over decades and is probably the biggest reason why we keep going back to this movie.
5. Govind in Damini - dhai kilo ka haath.....Sunny Deol just hammered his way to one of the best supporting actor performances ever with this movie. He was so dominant in that role that people forgot who the hero of the movie was? He was flying high after the success of Ghayal but this movie established his star value firmly on Bollywood. Certainly one of his career's best, which established him as a nostrils flaring angry Jat.
4. Babu Rao in Hera Pheri - Baburao Ganpatrao Apte is one of those strange(ly) lovable characters who I think only Paresh Rawal can play. I thought about this and put a bunch of other comics in place of Paresh and realized NAH only him. It was like the tailer made role for him. We all knew he was talented, but I guess before Hera Pheri he was a little all over the place - playing comic roles, character roles, acting as a villain etc. but with this movie he just surged so far ahead in comedy that he's closed the shops of every other comedian out there. Not to discount the performance of other goodly characters in the movie, but Baburao certainly stole the show in this one.
3. Bhiku Mhatre in Satya - Akha Mumbai ka King Kaun? Bhiku Mhatre. This role made Manoj Bajpai the talk of the town and an overnight star, although the stardom literally lasted only a few nights. But whatever happened later in his career, still doesn't over shadow the towering performance he gave as the Mumbai gangster in the movie Satya. Kudos to RGV for giving us our very own mafia poster boy and a big pat on the back for Bajpai for doing such an excellent job with that role.
2. Ranvijay in Haasil - Hum log Guerilla hain, gureilla waar kiya jaayega....gureilla-wureilla padhe ho ki nahin? Ran Vijay's character in Haasil was pure genius. Irfan Khan's performance is right up there with the likes of Samuel Jackson in Pulp Fiction. He's the kind of character you aspire to be, he is arrogant, cool, smart and way too confident. Don't get me wrong, I am not advising people to be like him, but then what man doesn't like glorified criminals - Scarface anyone?
1. Gabbar Singh in Sholay - Kitne Aadmi the? Sarkar kitne bhi aadmi hon, Gabbar to sirf ek hi hai....The only reason I have Gabbar Singh ahead of Ranvijay is....well actually there are two reasons....first when was the last time a debutant dominated a movie full of heavy weight stars, probably never and second he's Gabbar Singh, he's lasted 3 decades, he'll last several more. Even Amjad Khan himself couldn't give a repeat performance. Solid gold!!
So that ends my list of top ten supporting roles in Bollywood. Before I end, I must say that a character is a combined effort of the writer, director and ofcourse the actor. Here I have recognized the actors, but by no means the contribution of the writer director is any less. Raju Hirani, Tigmanshu Dhulia, Ramesh Sippy, Ram Gopal Verma, Salim-Javed, Vishal Bhardwaj, Hrishikesh Mukherjee and several other talented people were involved in creation of these classic characters. Thanks for keeping the creativity in Bollywood alive. On another note, there were others who almost made it, but weren't quite good enough. I would love to see your top ten lists so post em as comments below!!
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Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
This looks interesting. Must say u have come out with a good list. Can't think of anyone of these not featuring here. But I do have some more which could give them tough fight...let's see
Sher Khan (Pran) in Zanjeer
Shatrughan Sinha in Kala Patthar
Dr Dang (Anupam Kher) in Karma
i'll get back with more... Nice thread Sunil!
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
I would add Ashutosh Rana for Dushman and Sangharsh
Sanjeev Kumar for Silsila
Sadashiv Amrapurkar for Ardh Satya
Om Puri for Maachis
Nana Patekar for Parinda
Amitabh Bachchan in Namak Haraam
but good list nonetheless....I would have had Ranvijay as number one....some of the lines Irfan says in that movie are just awesome
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
Good list but dun u think there is something missing here - no female characters???
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
Sorry LA Gal no offense to female characters but I wanted to keep it to male characters.....maybe you can do a list of female characters.....the one problem you'll face is to find a supporting actress that stood out in a movie.......
even if you take negative performances like that of Kajol in Gupt and Priyanka Chopra in a recent movie....they were quite unimpressive in my opinion.....I don't think Bollywood creates very many strong female roles.....
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
Do send in your blog for this section on Sify Movies:
http://sify.com/movies/bollywood/fullstory.php?id=14401130
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
i do agre wid u but dont u think tht jaya bachchans act in fiza or hazar chaurasi ki maan deserved a mention in this list
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
"Only BigB" mentioned Amitabh Bachchan in Namak Haram, but I think his most interesting supporting role was in Anand, the Babu mohshay character, Amitabh played the role of a honest, intellectual doctor to the perfection. The desperation of a doctor when he realizes his inability to cure a particular disease is very well portrayed by Amitabh with lot of intensity.
Then I remember the role of a jealous lover played by Monish Behl in Maine Pyar Kiya and Shola aur Shabnam. Jealousy is one emotion where Monish Behl is the king, he gives the perfect expressions.
Gokulchand - Manohar Singh in Main Azaad Hoon. Ambition to become a prime minister.
Sashi Kapoor's Nihal singh in Vijeta directed by Govind Nihlani. As a father of Angad - Kunal Kapoor, he is very protective, and does not want Angad to join the Army, but eventually agrees. Rekha also plays a good supporting role as a mother of Angad, The film shows the conflict of a growing young man with his parents very well.
There may be others I dont remember and left out.
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
This list is a big pile of cow dung. When you look at the list, it gives an impression that all good movies that ever came out of bollywood(Lame nick name) have been in the past 10 years or so. In fact half of those have been in last 2 years. Specifically, all the movies with good supporting characters have been a recent phenomenon. This shows your pathetic lack of depth, more so, it gives a very good idea to guess what your age might be.
I wonder why did you even mention Golmaal and Sholay. Throwing those names is just putting lipstick on a pig and is utterly obvious that you are attempting to somehow legitimize your list and camouflage your lack of knowledge about Hindi movies. Others in the thread have already mentioned some good ones. When you mentioned Amzad Khan for Sholay, why did Amitabh not occur to you? Or Sanjeev Kumar? or Jaya Badhuri?
A suggestion. Please stop watching junk for movies and start renting some classics or older movies. You'll find 10 other lists that beat the crap out of this. Finally, your list tells me that you are very young and naturally have a bad taste in movies or you don't have a very good memory.
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
I wish you had atleast used your real name when responding to the post....
you're basically saying that any movie that is older is a classic? and all the movies that came out in the last 10 years are junk.....that is very informative coming from a no-name expert on movies.....Guess that speaks a lot about your age.....
let's talk about Gabbar singh again....if you read my post you'll realize the reason why I mentioned Gabbar Singh and not Jaya Bhaduri who had what four lines in the movie? He was an unknown actor and going against legends of Indian film industry and to this day when people talk about Sholay they talk about him and not Jaya Bhaduri or Amitabh or Sanjeev Kumar.....if you walk out of Sholay and say boy that Jaya Bhaduri was awesome.....then you seriously need to stop watching movies because you have a film IQ of a retard....
one more thing....please lighten up....all these lists that you see on the web are not created for an academic purpose they are there for fun so stop being so fuckin uptight.....I agree there has to be numerous other performances that were great.....but I didn't think they were good enough to be on the list.....if you feel otherwise post them here and we'll talk about them and have a healthy discussion.....let's see if you have the balls to do that....and try using your real name this time because there are too many anonymous people on this website it's hard to keep track
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
That was a good reply :) and the list was a pretty good one too (though i've not seen all the movies in the list). but i've a small opinion about this "... and not Jaya Bhaduri who had what four lines in the movie". One line of dialog or may be just one small scene without dialog is more than enough to make an impression. i can give instances from hollywood and mallu and tamil movies... but not bollywood coz i dont follow hindi movies ardently.
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
Thanks Shaan.....I was trying to keep calm....but got carried away and that's why the Jaya Bhaduri remark.....I agree people can have a huge impact in a very small role as well.....and I think she had a great role in Sholay much like everyone else.....however it wasn't substantial enough to beat that of Gabbar Singh's.....
Re: My Top 10 "Supporting" Roles in Bollywood
I'll add one common thing about these supporting roles mentioned by Sunil. All these characters rose above the demands of the script and surprised the audience out of blue. They had what you say "shocking" value. No one expected Sameer in DCH, Gabbar Singh in Sholay, Maharani in Sadak, Bhiku Mhatre in Satya, Ranvijay Singh in Haasil or others listed above to come out of the shadow of the lead protagonists with such high flying colors. And moreover, these movies have repeat value because of these characters. You watch Golmaal for Bhavani Shankar, not for Amol Palekar. You watch Damini for Govind's towering court scenes, not for Rishi Kapoor. You watch Hera Pheri for Baburao and not for Akshay-Suniel.
It's tough to come out with this kind of list with only 10 entries. And that's a good sign for Bollywood, because I, too, feel we have many other supporting roles which can challenge these and give them a run for their money.
Amitabh Bachchan in Anand, Namak Haram
Shatrughan Sinha in Kala Patthar
Abhishek Bachchan in Yuva
Viveik Oberoi in Company
Pran in Zanjeer
Jackie Shroff in 1942 A Love Story
and some more...
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