Sanjay Dutt

LIFE BEGINS AT FORTY!

1999 was just what the doctor ordered for Sanjay Dutt, who, for all

practical purposes, was tottering on the brink of oblivion. They’d just about begun to call him names — none-too-flattering ones, such as spent force, for instance. Or also-ran. Or Mr Two-Left-Feet. Distributors, even those with a famous soft corner for Dutt Jr, had begun to fight shy of touching his films, Even with a bargepole.

Then it happened. Close on the heels of one another, not two, not three, but four releases of his, that were expected to crash with a resounding thud, took wing. Haseena Maan Jayegi, Daag - The Fire, Kartoos and Vaastav did flattering business, considering the hero was an ageing 40-plus man. It was just the sort of second wind Sanjay Dutt needed. And hey, presto! He was quickly being touted as the new flavour of the season. Even the Khans were passe.

All in the space of a calendar year, the Dutt boy went from being a fading, over-the-hill actor with only a few nondescript roles to show for his status, to one of three most saleable heroes.

He made all but a fleeting, blink-and-you-could-miss-it appearance in Raj Kanwar’s Daag - The Fire, but even that sufficed to make people sit up and take notice of the fact that he was a vastly improved actor.
Producer Smita Thackeray said she selected Sanjay for the role in Haseena Maan Jayegi simply for “his physique and screen presence,” which wasn’t saying much for him as an actor. But Dutt did find a surprise forte in comedy, with his antics in the comic caper raising a few laughs. Which only goes to show he’d come a long way from the Thanedaar days, when his comic routine only managed to raise groans and yawns. Dutt, indeed, had evolved as a performer. Before our very eyes.

He followed it up with the spine-chiller act as the menacing underworld don in Mahesh Manjrekar’s Vaastav. Not surprisingly, he had not only the front-benchers applauding his performance, even the hard-to-please balcony crowd joined in.

What made the difference to the new Sanjay Dutt? Dutt himself may have dismissed it off with a shrug and a “Perhaps, I didn’t try hard enough earlier. Or may be I’ve matured as an actor,” But the fact remained that he no longer was being considered for the merely-action-oriented roles as in the past. Or for roles the Khan troika had rejected. He’d also jumped from being a fading, B-grade hero to a top banner star. Indeed, some come-uppance, that!

The muscle-bound toughie with the vulnerable looks — that turned out to be an irresistible draw at theatres in 1999. The distributors would vouch for that.

Then came the icing on the cake that was 1999. Best actor awards for his performance in Vaastav including the SCREEN-Videocon. And Y2K was ready to roll for Sanjay Dutt. Or so it seemed.

The awards were a pleasant surprise to Dutt himself. “I’m too thrilled for words,” Dutt had admitted after walking away with the SCREEN statuette. “But don’t forget I’ve always been doing varied roles, it’s just that no one noticed it prior to 1999,” he added.

For an actor who’d all but thrown in the towel thinking his career was finished, the awards just the morale booster he needed. They were proof enough that even his critics had begun to applaud his growth as an actor. That he was good enough to rival the best.

Yet, 2000 hasn’t been the windfall year it promised to be at the outset. Dutt earned good reviews in the comedy, Khoobsurat, but the film was a wash-out at theatres. As was Khauff, the Sanjay Gupta movie — it probably paid the price of taking too long in the making.

And so too, was Jung, the controversial film that Dutt believed ought not to have been released at all. Following a tiff between the producer and director, the former released the film without the director. Dutt’s own scenes were not completed, and what’s worse, somebody else had dubbed for him.

Three false starts in the year hardly augur well. But lest you begin to pen his requiems already, be warned. the year’s not over yet. And Dutt has several strong releases coming up. In the wake of one another.
First off the block will be Nitin Manmohan’s Chal Mere Bhai, where he has his old Sajan teammate, Salman Khan, playing his brother, and Karisma Kapoor their romantic interest. A cliched triangular romance, did you think? “Well wait till you’ve seen the film,” chuckles producer Nitin Manmohan (see interview below).

Among other forthcoming Dutt fare are Vidhu Vinod Chopra’s Mission Kashmir, Mahesh Manjrekar’s Kurukshetra and Pitah, Anees Bazmi’s Deewangee, David Dhawan’s Jodi No 1, Ketan Desai’s Yeh Hai Jalwa and Sanjay Gupta’s Kaante, which pits Dutt against Amitabh Bachchan. And these are by no means all, for there are more under negotiations. These films should keep Dutt in circulation for well over a couple of years. And should one of them do well, more offers are bound to come his way.

Surely, the Sanjay Dutt jalopy isn’t about to come to a grinding halt just yet. He’s in it for the long haul.

Shaju George Alex