Remember the good old days of Bollywood? Where we used to get a two-three hero film regularly, some of the examples being Sholay, Amar Akbar Anthony, Loha, Naseeb, The Burning Train etc. People today reminiscence about those days and wonder where did it all go?
While in the 90s the ensemble culture prevailed and garnered huge praise from the cinema lovers. Such was the impact of these films that they are hailed as cult classics to this date. Some of the films featuring an ensemble starcast includes Hum Aapke Hain Koun, Dilwale Dulhaiya Le Jaayenge, which recently completed it’s 25 golden years, Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, Hum Saath Saath Hain and many others. One film that comes into our mind whenever we say ensemble is undoubtedly Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham! The level of Starcast Karan Johar managed to pull off in his epic family drama is still unmatched to this date.
But since the past few years we have witnessed a dip in the frequency ensemble movies releasing . With the actors being cautious about their image and fan following and wanting more screen space than their co actors, this had created a space where very less amount of two hero films used to arrive and barring young actors no lead actor tried doing these films despite the public demand.
Only the comedy genre films held the ensemble culture for a long time and without a doubt a lot of it’s credit goes to Priyadarshan who has made several films like Hulchul, Malamaal Weekly, De Dana Dan which boasted a bulk load of stars each getting a meaty role. With Akshay Kumar doing films like Welcome and Housefull, comedy was the only genre in 2000s which continuously produced these films.
After a slack period in earlier 2010s the trend for multistarrer films seemingly started to make a comeback with films like Happy New Year, Dilwale and Dishoom. And taking cue from South Indian cinemas, Bollywood too started back the two hero trend latest example of it being Tanhaji.
And seeing the coming lineup of the movies we are all set to witness several of the stars coming together. The upcoming drama Taish which is directed by Bejoy Nambiar stars Pulkit Samrat, Harshvardhan Rane, Kriti Kharbanda and Jim Sarbh.
Netflix‘s Ludo features several of the established actors including Abhishek Bachchan, Rajkummar Rao, Pankaj Tripathi, Aditya Roy Kapoor, Sanya Malhotra, Fatima Sana Shaikh and others.
Upcoming biggies like Sooryavanshi will be featuring Akshay Kumar, Katrina Kaif along with Ajay Devgn, and Ranveer Singh.
Ranveer Singh’s 83 also features an ensemble cast of more than 15+ actors including Ammy Virk, Jatin Sarna, Tahir Raj Bhasin, Hardy Sandhu and more.
While South Indian films have upped the stakes with several of multistarrer film arriving in the future. The top most talks of the town are undoubtedly SS. Rajamouli’s magnum opus titled RRR which features Jr. NTR, Ram Charan, Alia Bhatt, Ajay Devgn, Shriya Saran, Ray Stevenson and others.
While Prabhas’ Adipurush stars Himself and Saif Ali Khan as the parallel lead actors. Adipurush is all set to be mounted on a huge scale featuring two of the best actors of their respective industries.
Ayan Mukherjee’s epic Brahmastra features Ranbir Kapoor, Alia Bhatt, Amitabh Bachchan, Dimple Kapadia, Mouni Roy, Akkineni Nagarjuna and others.
It seems that actors have sensed the mood of the audience and thus are not doing the same single hero film where hero beats the villain and the story ends. The filmmakers are taking their chances to assemble a good and packed starcast. And casting actors from all over the country which will garner the attention of the audience all over India.
Aamir Khan will be seeing working with Vijay Sethupathi in the upcoming Laal Singh Chaddha.
It’s good to see that the old culture of ensemble films coming back so that we can witness the chemistry of our favorite actors together and hopefully soon in the big screens.