THE SULTAN OF FATE
Amitabh Bachchan embodies stardom, but also so much more—speaking even to social and cinema history. As he turns 80, we trace the arc of his life and times in a scene-by-scene biography
It’s difficult to find a precise word to describe his slow, loping walk. Not a strut, not a swagger...nothing defiled by conceit. And yet that gait, set moving as if by some inner lode of burning coal, has traversed over half-century of Indian cinema. And, at age 80, he’s still walking. Amitabh Bachchan, the man, may be different from Amitabh Bachchan, the actor... but a ceaseless quest defines them both. Here we chart that journey in a scene-by-scene biography. From his birth during the Quit India days, his early life, a couple of mundane desk jobs, and his struggling years when auteurs willing to bet on him were rare. Then the Seventies, when he lit up Hindi cinema like dynamite from a burning beedi. His misadventures in politics and business. Then that rebirth in 2000. To now, in late 2022, in a changed world, when we look around and still see Amitabh Bachchan walking with us.