Bollywood Across India

Every year, Bollywood churns out countless movies, some of which are so superlative that it keeps the audiences on the edge of their seats. Such movies deserve to be proliferated into other languages. Bollywood has its fair share of such breathtaking movies that has inspired remakes in other film industries across the country. The plots are so alluring that even some of the remakes, like Ram Robert Rahim (1980) and Priyanka (1994), have managed to gain a lot of popularity just like their original counterparts. The flexible storylines are molded to adapt the diverse culture that is found in each state, making them even more gratifying. We, at BollyCurry, have picked out five entertaining movies that influenced filmmakers of multiple languages across generations.

Majboor (1974), starring Amitabh Bachchan and Parveen Babi, is a crime-thriller of the early 1970s that took many viewers on a nail-biting roller-coaster. The plot is set around Bachchan's character, who got interlaced in a murder he never attempted and set out to find the real criminal. The story, as well as the pairing, was a crowd pleaser. This Ravi Tandon hit was remade in Tamil - Naan Vazhavaippen (1979), directed by Dasari Yoganand, starring Sivaji Ganesan and K.R.Vijaya. Another remake was in Gujarati -Naseeb No Khel (1982) with Ashish Kuki and Geeta Behl playing the lead roles. The story surely had the right essence of thrill that led to its popularity!

Directed by Manmohan Desai, the movie made quite a splash at the box office and was the talk of the town. Starring three truly talented actors, Amitabh Bachchan, Rishi Kapoor and Vinod Khanna, this movie broke many stereotypes by bonding three protagonists of three different religions. Even today, we can hear people using references from the movie. Being such a blockbuster of its time, this movie gave way to three remakes in South India. The Tamil remake was directed by P. Madhavan and called Shankar Salim Simon (1978), starring the trio of Jai Ganesh, Rajinikanth and Vijaya Kumar. The Telugu version was named Ram Robert Rahim (1980) and the Malayalam rendition, John Jaffer Janardhanan (1982) also managed to rope in big names from its industry - Ratheesh, Ravindran and Mammootty, so as to match the brilliance marked by the original movie.

Aaina (1993) is a story of two sisters who were polar opposites, and managed to intrigue much of the general populous. The drama that ensued when both the sisters fell for the same man (Jackie Shroff) caught the audience's interest and held it till the very end. The movie was directed by Deepak Sareen and is a Yash Chopra production. Amrita Singh, who played one of the sisters, won the Filmfare Best Supporting Actress award and this movie also strengthened the career of Juhi Chawla, who played the other sister. All this buzz influenced three remakes - the Telugu Aayanaki Iddaru (1995), the Tamil Kalyana Vaibhogam (1997), and in Kannada as Yare Nee Abhimani (2000).

Considered as one of the best woman-centric movie of all times, Damini (1993) is a crime drama that depicts the fight of justice for a rape victim. This movie was not only a huge hit, but also a milestone for many of the cast including Meenakshi Sheshadri, Sunny Deol and Amrish Puri. Rajkumar Santoshi made an astounding film with a controversial story that touched many Indians' hearts. This movie was remade into Tamil, Telugu, and Oriya. The Tamil version Priyanka (1994), starring Revathi, was embellished with Ilaiyaraaja's music making the movie a huge success in Kollywood. Urmila (1997) in Telugu and Nari Nuhen Tu Narayani (2007) in Oriya also received great reviews from the audience.

There are many love stories delineated in Bollywood but Jab We Met had a spice that made other film industries commend it, so much so that they decided to remake it. The story of Aditya and Geet clearly spoke to them on many levels. The adaptation in Tamil, named Kanden Kadhalai (2009) has a charm of its own and so does Priya Priyathama (2011) in Telugu, but neither could live up to the sizzling performances and chemistry of Kareena Kapoor Khan and Shahid Kapoor. The word on the rumor mill is that this movie is going to be remade in Kannada and Malayalam as well, which would make it one of the few movies that has managed to inspired the entirety of South India's film industry.

Writer: Lekha V.

Editors: Sanika S. and Gunia K.

Graphics: Ayesha S.