Here’s one of the biggest conundrums for all ye schmucks.
Why is it in Hindu majority India it’s the Muslim heroes in Bollywood who walk away with all the glory, a lot of the moolah and most of the box office successes while the Hindu heroes increasingly turn into zeroes.
Movie after movie featuring Hindu heroes sink without a trace while films starring Muslims often tend to do spectacularly well.
As all but the dimwitted know, the three biggest Hindi film stars in India today are Shahrukh Khan, Salman Khan and Aamir Khan. All of them Muslims. Two of them (Salman and Aamir) came from within the industry while Shahrukh was an outsider.
The three Khans are responsible for three of the biggest hits in the last couple of years – My Name is Khan, Dabbang and 3 Idiots respectively.
Now take the Hindu stars of Bollywood – Akshay Kumar, Hrithik Roshan, Abhishek Bachchan, Ajay Devgan and Ranbhir Kapoor (we exclude Sanjay Dutt and Shahid Kapoor because of their mixed parentage). With the exception of Akshay, the others have deep roots in the film industry like Salman and Aamir.
Of the five Hindu stars, Abhishek Bachchan is a cartoon and Ajay Devgan appeals only to a small section of loyalists. Ranbhir Kapoor has potential and could yet break the current Hindu jinx but he’s not in the big league yet.
That leaves only Akshay Kumar and Hrithik Roshan as the current contenders and challengers to the Khan hegemony over Bollywood.
In our analysis, Akshay Kumar’s raison d’etre is to inflict the maximum pain on moviegoers with stolen shit like Tees Maar Khan or unwatchable trash like Action Replayy, Patiala House, De Dana Dan, Blue, Kambakkht Ishq et al.
Housefull, Akshay’s sole saving grace in recent years, was directed by Sajid Khan, a Muslim.
Hrithik Roshan’s Kites with its Mexican heroine was not in sync with the Indian moviegoers’ ethos while his Guzaarish didn’t find favor with the audience either.
Of course, you dumkopfs would be right in saying that the Khans’ movies are no great works of art either.
To be sure, we didn’t like My Name is Khan, 3 Idiots or for that matter Dabanng even one bit.
So if the movies of the Muslim heroes are also no great shakes, what then accounts for success and superstar status of Muslim stars in Bollywood while Hindu heroes increasingly draw a blank?
Since there are no definitive research studies on the subject, here are a few hypotheses why Hindu heroes are increasingly finding themselves emasculated in Bollywood:
* Muslims turn up to watch the films of Muslim actors in large numbers but give the cold shoulder to movies featuring Hindu stars. This is a highly plausible explanation considering Muslims have a higher identification with their religion than Hindus have to their religion.
* Muslim stars do a better job of marketing themselves to their fans through various gimmickry, be it through accidents that kill sleeping footpath dwellers, throwing a tantrum at the airport entry-points or shaving their head. Continue reading »
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