Zanjeer (1973)

Directed by: Prakash Mehra
Music: Kalyanji Anandji
Starring: Amitabh Bachchan, Pran, Ajit, 
Jaya Bhaduri, Om Prakash, Bindu, Iftekhar

1973 saw the release of another Bachchan movie - one that was completely different from Saudagar as chalk from cheese. It was a film that would turn his fortunes, and set the industry on its head. It was a film that would usher in a new type of hero, one who, deeply troubled himself, did not think twice before dealing with issues on his own - with, or without the help of the law.

On a Diwali night when the city of Bombay is celebrating, a small boy, playing hide-and-seek with his father watches from his hiding place in horror as his parents are murdered. Stunned with shock, all he can see from the gap between the cupboard doors is a man in a tan suit, a white horse dangling from a gold charm bracelet on the killer’s wrist, as he shoots. His world explodes much as the fireworks outside.

Twenty years later, having been adopted by the inspector (Satyen Kapoo) who investigated the double murder, the boy grows up to be  Inspector Vijay Khanna (Amitabh Bachchan) with as many transfers, as there are black marks on his record. His inability to see any crime other than through a red haze of anger makes him take action in ways that are not very acceptable to his superiors.

It doesn’t help that he is traumatised by continuing nightmares of an uncontrollable white horse that brings back to mind the brutal murder of his parents. His methods fall just inside the rule of the law, but his barely sheathed anger means that he is transferred at the end of every successful case. 

And so, unsurprisingly, he is transferred once more. This time, as he views the files of a neglected little police station, he learns that almost 90% of the unsolved crimes committed in the area could be laid at Sher Khan’s footsteps. 

A large, jovial Pathan, Sher Singh (Pran) who is sent for, comes to welcome the new inspector.Vijay gives Sher Khan short shrift. Sher Khan is angry, but still calm. “Let’s see how you do in my area, and without a police uniform,” he says.

 

Vijay is not one to refuse a challenge.  

A well-fought battle ensues between two worthy opponents. At the end of it, Sher Khan is happy to have found a ‘real man’, and proffers his friendship. Vijay refuses. He will be no friend to a criminal. “Is that so?” retorts the Pathan. “As of today, as of now, I’ll stop all my illegal activities.” And so he does.

  

Vijay doesn't know it yet, but he has made a strong ally.

Meanwhile, Vijay gets a tip from a man who refuses to identify himself, and hangs up as soon as the information is given. Unlike the officers preceding him, Vijay acts on the information given and confiscates the suspect truck. The news is brought to Teja but he is unfazed. He decides to take the war to the enemy and invites Vijay home.

Teja’s girlfriend Mona is entrusted with the task of sweetening the recalcitrant inspector. Which, she tries valiantly, to do. (The colours in this scene are eye-popping! While Vijay is sartorially elegant in a crimson suit, Mona darling is wearing what looks like a yellow feather duster or a brood of new-born chickens in her hair. Check this out.)

The anonymous tips continue. This time, however, the truck breaks the police barricades. In the chase that follows, the truck runs over several school children. The itinerant knife sharpener Mala (Jaya Bhaduri) is in a position to have seen the driver. As she makes her way home, she is visited by a couple of goons who pay her to feign ignorance.

For the money they offer her, she is ready to stay mute for the rest of her life. When the police constable takes her to Inspector Vijay, she pretends not to have seen anything, much to Inspector Vijay’s disgust. 

Furious at her seeming callousness, he drags her off to the police morgue and shows her the children’s corpses. Shaken to the core, Mala caves and identifies the truck driver from the police line-up. 

But her actions have consequences - as she is returning home, some goons chase her. Fleeing for her life, she comes back to Vijay’s house. It is the start of a quiet understated relationship between two people who are otherwise alone.

Mala’s evidence is just one more link in the chain that leads to a very respectable industrialist, Dharmadas Teja (Ajit) who is leading a double life as a very successful criminal. Vijay pays him a short visit and leaves with his suspicions grounded, but with no real evidence. Vijay’s activities with regard to crime causes Teja to lose business. Knowing that bribery is not an option, Teja tries another tack – when murder fails, he uses a local drunkard to frame Vijay on charges of bribery.

Found guilty, Vijay is suspended from the force and the only man who can give evidence for him is killed. Vijay is jailed for six months. 

When Vijay is released, he goes to meet the man whom he knows is responsible. 

 

The result? Teja’s goons arrive to beat him up. He thrashes them soundly but Mala is grieved, and fearful for Vijay’s life; she prevails upon him to give up his quest for revenge. Why can’t they just lead a normal life? Seeing her distress, he agrees, and forges an uneasy peace with Teja.

As he battles depression and frustrated anger at his own helplessness, D’Silva (Om Prakash) comes to meet him. D’Silva is the informer who comes out of the shadows of anonymity when he learns that the only man on the force who helped him can no longer do so. He excoriates Vijay for stopping short of his goal, and narrates the reason why he is taking part in a very dangerous game.

 

Vijay feels trapped between his promise to Mala and his obligation to help D’Silva in achieving their common goal. He falls into a deep depression that even Mala cannot dissipate. His quest for that long-ago murderer, and his passion to fight crime was what kept him going. With that taken away, he is a lost man. 

Mala begins to be afraid that Vijay’s anger will feed on him from the inside until it destroys him. 

 

Will Vijay ever be free of his past? And what about D'Silva who is still searching for justice? Will Vijay ever be able to settle scores with Teja?

The sweetly romantic era of Rajesh Khanna was coming to an end, though the last nail in its coffin was yet to be hammered in. No one had any idea that a juggernaut by name of Amitabh Bachchan was set to take over, not even Rajesh Khanna who had worked with the much junior actor three years earlier.

Ironically, Amitabh Bachchan wasn't even the first choice for the role of Inspector Vijay Khanna. This film had been signed by Dharmendra, and when he opted out, had been offered to Dev Anand, Raaj Kumar, and even Rajesh Khanna. Every single one of them turned it down. Writers Salim-Javed, who were also to become famous after this film released, had seen Amitabh Bachchan in Bombay to Goa and had been impressed by him. They recommended him to Prakash Mehra, who, with nothing to lose, agreed to sign him on.

Then began the hunt for a heroine. None of the established actresses agreed to sign on opposite the promising-but-still-unknown hero. "Sign a film with that camel?" is what the  top actress already signed on to act opposite Dharmendra is supposed to have said, when Amitabh was signed on in his stead. That must have hurt. It was Jaya Bhaduri, then Amitabh's steady girlfriend and already a well-known star, who saved the day by agreeing to sign on the dotted line. 

After Upkar, where producer-director Manoj Kumar had given Pran a new role as a do-gooder, Zanjeer was to cleave a new path for the versatile actor. Amitabh himself credits actor Om Prakash for recommending him to producers after Parwana, and Pran for being his strongest supporter during the Zanjeer days. As Sher Khan, the hennaed Pathan who is willing to give up his illegal activities for a friendship, Pran brought a certain je ne sais quoi to an otherwise-typical character. He is the man who is brought to a friendship with a man who is, or should be, his arch enemy; and later, is responsible in helping that friend in  his quest for justice. 

Both Jaya and Om Prakash had small but crucial roles in the film. Jaya is Mala, a knife-sharpener, who is also very quick to wield the tools of her trade. 

 

She is quiet, supportive and definitely not a doormat. Even though the wildcat is tamed by love, she is nevertheless outspoken when it comes to Vijay's trauma and its effect on their lives. Om Prakash is a police informer who uses information gleaned from bars to get revenge for the death of his sons. His is the sole emotional character in the movie. 

Ajit, long-time secondary hero, stepped into the villain Teja's white shoes with élan. Attired in stylish suits (his own) Ajit's Teja was to bring back a dashing, dapper, suave villain onscreen.  He had class, did Teja, and that was to reflect in his low-pitched performance. After Zanjeer, Ajit moved on to being a major player on the villainous front.

Vijay was a total anti-hero, the first on screen. While heroes had played totally negative characters onscreen before, or ones with grey shades, never had there been a hero like Amitabh's Vijay. He did not laugh, he did not cry, he did not sing songs, he did not romance his heroine. He seethed, with an anger that was turned inward. He worked within the parameters of the law, but used its long arm as a catharsis for his own inner demons. He was a simmering ball of anger that was just waiting to explode, and explode it does in the last reel of the film.

Any review of this film would be incomplete without mention of its script-writers Salim-Javed. This was their fifth film as a team, and the one that would catapult them into fame in their own right. Loosely based on ‘Death Rides A Horse’, and on the life of Teja, an underworld Don, they adapted Zanjeer to an Indian milieu with a tight script and to-the-point dialogues. They wrote a hero who reflected the times, with the same pent-up anger of the common man who did not want to wait for a messiah.

For both Mehra and Amitabh, this was a do-or-die endeavour. And it must have been a nail-biting wait to see if the film would become a hit or go bust. Calcutta embraced the new hero with open arms; Bombay took its time, but when it did, it did so in a way that set a phenomenon called Amitabh Bachchan on his way to stardom. Almost overnight, a man who had been rejected both for his voice and his unconventional looks, became a star. The king had arrived to stake his rightful claim to the throne, and he would rule unchallenged over his fiefdom for the next decade and half.