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Ramesh Sippy’s Sholay turned 50 on August 15. A mid-century after the vengeance drama’s release, fans continue to marvel at its technical mastery, iconic characters, Sippy’s eye for both intimate moments and grand spectacle. Lines from Salim-Javed’s screenplay are still being quoted in conversation.
But as filmmaker Atul Sabharwal pointed out in his excellent essay for Scroll, Sholay was something of a paradox – a peak that its director didn’t always scale in his subsequent films; a blockbuster whose inventiveness was lost to the Hindi film industry.
Sippy’s follow-up to Sholay was the underwhelming Shaan (1980). In 1982, Sippy changed course, making a film that ignored the scale of Sholay and Shaan by turning inwards.
Shakti is a compelling character study of an upright police officer and his wayward son. Starring Dilip Kumar and Amitabh Bachchan, the film was written by Salim-Javed and loosely inspired by the Tamil movie Thangappathakkam (1974).
As a child, Vijay is kidnapped by the smugglers JK (Amrish Puri) and Narang (Kulbhushan Kharbanda). Vijay’s father Ashwini Kumar (Dilip Kumar) refuses to release one of JK’s men in exchange for Vijay. The boy learns about this. Although Vijay escapes from his abductors, his father’s perceived treachery scars him.
The grown-up Vijay’s idea of revenge is to work with Narang, which saddens Ashwini. Caught between the righteous Ashwini and the rebellious Vijay (Bachchan) is Vijay’s mother Sheetal (Raakhee).
Vijay leaves home and moves in with the singer Roma (Smita Patil). Vijay keeps crossing paths with Ashwini, this time as a criminal.
Sippy’s film is remarkable in its measured handling of the moral dilemmas faces by its principal characters. The crime aspect of the plot – JK’s later rivalry with Narang, the mission to capture JK – is a sideshow in the contest for Vijay’s soul.
Shakti is available on YouTube, ZEE5 and Prime Video. Sippy prevents Shakti from being a re-tread of Deewar (1975) and Trishul (1978), which feature Bachchan as the anti-hero Vijay who takes to crime to avenge personal slights. The Vijay of Shakti is a different animal.
This Vijay is insecure, self-centred, a bundle of resentment. Even when Vijay does declaim, it’s in a lower register. He argues with his parents, but nobody has the last word. Vijay’s rage is tempered by the knowledge that Ashwini and Sheetal are right too.
Vijay’s diffidence comes out most vividly when he meets Roma. An elaboration of the wise woman of the night played by Parveen Babi in Deewar, Roma isn’t shy about her feelings for Vijay.
They meet in a train one night. Vijay rescues Roma from a bunch of goons – a sequence that Mani Ratnam lifted for his film Agni Natchathiram (1988).
Vijay walks Roma home. His bravado has clearly disappeared. Why don’t you come in, I make good coffee, she says. Some other time, Vijay bashfully replies.
There’s no judgement about Roma, who is as much of an outlier as Vijay. She happens to live by herself and when she invites Vijay to move in, that’s that. Their ardour results in the sensuous RD Burman song Jaane Kaise Kab Kahan.
Vijay comes alive when battling Ashwini. In the bristling confrontations between the characters, the thespian sails past the younger actor in terms of dialogue delivery and emotional depth.
Shakti is a rare detour in Bachchan’s Angry Young Man phase. Sippy treats Bachchan as a character, rather than an archetype. Yet, Bachchan appears visibly unsure of how to tackle Vijay’s ambivalence.
Dilip Kumar, having already played his fair share of troubled men, has no such inhibitions. A couple of scenes are evocative of Mughal-e-Azam (1960), in which Dilip Kumar’s Salim has a showdown with his own father, the emperor Akbar (Prithviraj Kapoor) that begins with loud words and ends in tears.
Dilip Kumar is strongly complemented by Raakhee, who is terrific as his spouse. Sheetal is not a weepy bystander but a spirited woman who speaks her mind. Smita Patil too has several lovely scenes.
Compared to Sholay, Shakti is plainly filmed. There are none of the visual pyrotechnics of that Indian Western, no moments consciously designed to draw whistles.
Instead, there are searching moments of poignancy and emotional truth as a family tries to balance duty with individual goals, a commitment to righteousness with a young man’s lingering sense of betrayal.
Sippy was often faced with the question “What after Sholay?” Shakti, that’s what.
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This article first appeared on Scroll.in
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