Tribute to Non-Actors
To me, everything about cinema is fascinating and most fascinating are the people who work in it. This is a post, about the people, more than the cinema. Specifically, this is a post about people we see on screen. It’s amazing to see and hear those people in normal life, and realize how they get transformed on screen. I used to be amazed to see how Sridevi used to come across as this shy, almost quite woman, in film awards and stuff and how she used to completely transform herself when on screen. I remember seeing Amitabh Bachchan in some of his early films, as this lanky, extra tall and lean but shy and introverted individual, who was too conscious of himself, yet went on to be the most natural versatile actor who would excel in everything including loud comedy. So, what happened, were they always born with the gift or somewhere along the line, the process of filmmaking transformed them. Were they still shy and introverted in their regular life, after the success and fame?
But then, this post is not about stars and superstars or gifted individuals. This is about non-actors, people who were born without any of these gifts and still for some reason or other ended up in films and on screen. This is not to lampoon them, but instead pay a tribute to the personas behind these faces; after all, they are most like us, the common people, stuck in a job they were not designed for. Unlike, rest of their peers, they do not have any of the gifts they can rely on, and I don’t just mean acting skills here. For example, some people may argue that Jeetu bhai was the biggest non-actor we ever had, but then he was blessed with, perhaps one of the most beautiful male face on screen and could rely on his charm, film after film. Plus he proved some of his acting credentials with Parichay and Khusboo. So Jeetu bhai is out, so are actors like Akshay Kumar, who was termed a non-actor when he first came on. But he was a great exhibitionist, who enjoyed being in front of the camera and over time with enough hard work he developed enough acting quotient.
In search of true non-actors, we need to go a bit further back. Remember Sujit Kumar? To me, he represents the earliest generation of non-actors. At one time, he used to be a regular in Rajesh Khanna and/or Shakti Samant films. Every time I see SK on screen, I wonder, how someone like him, the most normal individual, devoid of any acting skills whatsoever, ended up in such a visual medium like films. He never displayed any capability ever to act, not comedy, not hero type charisma, not even adequate skill to be a supporting friend, slightest bit of variation from straightforward dialog and SK would start hamming. Yet, SK’s filmography reads 155 films, quite amazing!
The other name that comes to mind, Deepak Parashar, remember him, the first model to appear in films. Blessed with height and model looks, you can spot Deepak from a distance and tell that he is not meant for acting. Deepak didn’t have anything going for him, had a frozen face that gave only single expression, had a voice that didn’t modulate at all and had none of the charisma. On top of that Deepak carried moustaches, a big no-no for Hindi film heroes. Deepak appeared in 29 films, as per IMDB and some of them were BR Chopra superhits like Nikah and Insaaaf Ka Taraju. Off late, I have spotted Deepak in some of the Ekta Kapoor serials and he still looks the same, even the greyness in side burns seems fake, it seems he hasn’t aged at all.
From those days, and even before that, there were few other names, Anil Dhawan, Deb Mukherjee (Joy Mukherjee’s brother, appeared in Kaminey in a bit role recently), Kanwaljeet, and even Vishwajit. Anil Dhawan even appeared against Jaya Bhaduri and got a decent run before being ruled out, appearing in TV serials now. Deb Mukherjee, I remember him singing some hit Kishore Kumar songs in a film that was made for him with Tanuja as heroine, I think the film was – Ek Bar Muskura Do. Some people may argue that Vishajit doesn’t belong in this category because of his series of hit films and he was probably as good an actor or star as were Joy Mukherjee, and Rajendra Kumar.
In 80’s and 90’s we saw a number of non-actors entering the film industry. Anyone remember Sumeet Sehgal, a Govinda look alike, only taller. His was probably the most wooden face I ever saw. There were several others that came and went- Avinash Badhawan, Hemnat Birje, Ronit Roy (Mihir of Kyonki Saas Bhi kabhi bahu thi) and many others. I am not counting the ones who were supposed to have potential and blew it like Vivek Mushran, Chandrachur Singh (we’ll count Vivek Oberoy in the list soon) and others, but the ones that didn’t have any business being in films in first place. Avinash Badhawan was an MBA and seemed like a smart guy, but was totally unfit for films, and definitely a bad idea to rome around wearing snake charmer’s costume singing sad Nagin songs, my only memory of him.
But to me, the superstar of non-actors, the man to whom I dedicate this post would always remain Sanjay Kapoor. Surinder Kapoor, the film producer and father of the Kapoor brothers was speaking of his three sons in an interview. According to him, Sanjay was the smartest of the three and was the most educated. Whenever I have seen Sanjay Kapoor in TV interviews, he comes across as a very smart and articulate guy with good sense of humor. But, when on film screen, he was a complete disaster. The signs of his superstardom in non-acting became very clear in his very first film – Prem and the very first song “Aati Nahee”, probably one of the most ridiculed debut songs, which became an anthem for constipation. According to the lore, Prem took 5 years in making and deprived us 5 years of Tabu in her peak. The film was made as a launch vehicle for Sanjay but made us sigh only if Tabu had come in 5 years younger. But the song would remain a classic and was unmatched until recently when we had two back to back classics – Saaaawariya in Saawariya by Rohan Kapoor and Robot Act ( I meant the dance only, not his acting in the film) by Harman Baweja in LS2050. Oh, the Robot Act, need to watch it again!!
But Sanjay Kapoor was a class apart. He followed the text book of acting a bit too much. If he had to look careless and casual, Sanjay’s shirt would be half tucked. But the shirt would be so neatly half tucked, that you could only smile at it. He probably got this trait from his brother, shirt neatly half tucked, hair perfect, but while Anil’s acting didn’t allow us to focus on such flaws in perfection, Sanjay’s would be hard not to notice. And his acting, it always reminded me of my elementary school dramas, where we were supposed to cross our hands around our chest to act out word Pyaar or love. If you don’t believe me, go watch “Aati Nahi” and see how he uses his index finger to say “Nahee”.
Sanjay Kapoor did everything he could, got decent banners and starred even opposite Madhuri in a hit film, yet he couldn’t transform himself and audience found no connection with him on screen, whatsoever. Sanjay also tried an understated style in “Sirf Tum’, not a bad film actually, but didn’t make much headway.
Who took SK’s place, Abhishek Bachchan probably came the closest, but then ABJ in a class of his own. I remember AB Jr. from his very first film. He appeared as a very fine individual, well brought up, with mild manners and respectful to elders, kind of like achcha bachcha. In any other profession that required academic skills, ABJ would have probably done great, but the fate brought him into films, that too in a year where he had to debut against two people meant for screen – Hritik Roshan and Kareena Kapoor. ABJ was always awkward on screen, even though tall and handsome; somehow he couldn’t hide his shyness and awkwardness in front of screen. If I were Oracle and he had come to me, I would have told him, “You, my son, are not meant to be The One”. After first 4-5 films, it became quite clear, but what made him continue. I think two things – one, his father was similarly awkward when he started out and took time to find his feet and two – the nametag and sycophants around the family who kept offering him films after films, instead of being truthful to him. It was sad to see him copy his father’s dance steps or mannerism, you could almost smell the director behind the scene telling a young ABJ, “AmitJi ke jaise karo”… what a pity. After a while ABJ did transform himself, first with that song “One Love” and later with films like Dus and B&B, but somehow you could always sense that this coolness, this ultra-confidence was fake, that was not real ABJ, the person. The real person was this suave, almost business tycoon like, mild mannered mamma’s boy. It was sad to see him dance as if he is at his brother’s wedding in his recent family awards (IIFA) and go on and on in an acceptance speech (that probably he had long time to prepare talking about his childhood days and his dad), for a tuchcha “Best Comedian” award that he didn’t deserve to win.
How can we forget Tushar Kapoor? Tushar didn’t have any acting genes, that was pretty clear, but unlike his dad, he didn’t have the looks, the screen presence or the charm to carry him through. I saw one film (can’t remember the name), where he was opposite Ayesha Takia, (for some reason , the film was based in a foreign country and I couldn’t find out till the very end, which country), and there were two side kicks for him. It seems they must have had hard time finding actors for those roles, because they were so bad and annoying. I guess, anyone slightly better would have overshadowed our hero Tusharji, probably the hero with the worst screen presence ever. Tushar comes across a very nice guy, and even talks with the same sincerity about his roles in umpteen number of films he keeps appearing in. His sincerity and drive amazes and even makes me feel better about my job.
I am making a bold prediction, Rohan Kapoor has the potential to beat all non-actors and reach the heights that nobody has ever reached. Not because Rohan is a particularly bad actor, because everybody in the industry keeps sticking super stardom on him, which means he’ll never get the opportunity to grind it and learn by working hard under a good director. Even though only few films old, RK has demonstrated enough traits in films like Saawariya and BAH to show that he may have many talents, acting is not one of them. But he has got big banners and big producers like Karan Johar probably see in him what ordinary audience members like me don’t. Wake up Sid! I doubt he ever will, but we’ll see. In the worst case, Rohan will end up like Akshaye Khanna, born superstar who never achieved what he was born to achieve, according to film pundits.
Harman Baweja also shows lot of promise. There are lot of parallels between him and our original superstar Sanjay Kapoor. Harman convinced his dad to make one of the costliest films of all time, Prem was exactly that, a very expensive Boney Kapoor film. When SK came, he looked like a clone of Anil Kapoor, albeit without moustache ( a secret that Anil revealed in Lamhe, SK should blame Lamhe for his failure). Any guesses who Harman resembles and in fact went out of his way to imitate? Why would he do that? Why would he think that acting like a Hritik clone would be path to stardom, I guess we would never know.
No, I m not forgetting female actors. But in a male actor dominated industry where female actors have always been used as props, it’s hard to single out few as non-actors. For example, we would never know if Raveena Tandon was really a bad actor or she acted during bad times for a Hindi film heroine. But even in this crowd of beauty props, we call heroines; there are few that call out loud for attention, as complete non-starters. The best was probably Kimi Katkar. I never understood how Kimi became an actress, she wasn’t even particularly beautiful, like the Miss Worlds who get in on the basis of their beauty. But Kimi was exceptionally bad actress but her filmography reads 46 films. And, we call it male dominated industry..huh!
Only other name on the list – Lara Dutta. Lara is one of the sexiest stars in the industry in our times. I find her extremely sexy. But she is clearly not meant to be in films. She hasn’t grown a single whisker of acting in all these years. And she probably never intended to either, just happy playing glamorous props in film after film. But then they offer her roles like the one in Billu Barber. What a tragedy! Lara was probably the second biggest factor that killed the film, first one being SRK’s forced item songs allowing SRK to display his superstardom and his feminine side at the same time. In a role, where a Konkana or Tabu could have done magic, Lara was a complete disaster. Watch the film again to realize, what I mean! I dare you!
But, I would like to pay my tributes to all these names. They made others around them look better, made us realize that even film stars and star sons are also human beings, they also face the same career choices and insecurities that we face. They also make bad decisions, decisions that they probably regret just like we do, doing jobs that they can’t get up for in the morning. And, just like us, they too probably wonder – “What am I doing here?”
Tags: Acting, akshay kumar, Amitabh Bachchan, Medium, Movies
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
not nitpicking, but i think u meant “ranbir” kapoor when u talk of “rohan” kapoor. the reason i singled this out is because there is indeed one “rohan kapoor” (son of the legendary singer mahendra kapoor) who debuted in Love 86, with Govinda & Neelam as the the other stars of the film. and i think he wud also qualify to be in this list of yours. he had also been the host of one of the talent-hunt shows on DD about 8-10 years back. fortunately, he found his calling elsewhere, probably where he actually belonged.
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your post reminds me of the FLOPIYA list that some of us at PFC had come out with during one of the discussion threads about a year back. anyone from that discussion-group, raise your hands please. (im missing Steve a lot these days…)
Jha- are hum bhi to hain flopiya list discussion group ke
A.Singh- I’m not completely convinced about AB jr ( of course his early movies like Shararat,
Dhai Akshar Prem Ke etc were making him head in Sanjay Kapoor’s territory
A lot of names that also can be included like Hemant Birje,Zayed Khan,Prithvi ( the guy who was hero in movies like Dil Ka Kya Kasoor ),Dino Morea etc.Will add more names shortly.
Sethu, ABJ is actually the prime example of what I meant, a complete misfit. Unlike this crazy, wild side of his father that comes out on screen, ABJ is more straightforward guy. He is sober and well mannered in real life, like his father, but clearly not meant for screen. I have even seen him dancing on stage in awards and man he is completely a non-showman.
FLOPIYA ka discussion aur Is Me hum Nahin Hai, Bahut Naa Insafi Hai.
bhai, aapko aur sethu-ji ko bilkul nahin bhoola, in fact, aapka contribution zaroor aayega pata thha, issiliye steve bhaiya ki yaad aa gayi. aajkal na jane kahan gum ho gaye hain…
Jha- the Rohan Kapoor you mentioned is actually the son of Mahendra Kapoor ( the singer ) – sadly he couldnt survive as an actor.Not that we are shedding any tears though
arre, i did mention rohan to be the son of legendary singer mahendra kapoor in my comment. i used to watch tht stupid singing-talent-hunt on DD just for his sake, he was so howlarious…
Yes, and my apology for that. Actually, I don’t dislike that much. Not sure, why i got the name wrong. Man, i am getting old.
I meant, I don’t dislike Ranbir that much.
I agree with the most of your picks in your article but I feel that you got carried away by the end of it.
ABJ is certainly not a non-actor. Yes he is not supposed to do a certain kind of roles but he was good in GURU and YUVA.
I think the biggest non-actor of all time would be Salman khan. This guys does not know acting, no emotion but somehow he survived and became a superstar. I guess his case is very close to JEETU bhai… Some more names which occured to me are Kamal Sadana, Arjbaz Khan, Fardeen Khan, Zayad Khan, Dino Morea… there could be lot more names but certainly not ABJ
Dude…a very nice write up. Though may not be 100% true for all the names mentioned in the post (it’s an individual opinion)…but you captured most of the names. I really liked the post. Well thought and researched post. Hope you have seen the disastrous movies which you mentioned in the post.
Some missing names are – Kunal Goswami (Manoj Kumar’s son), Karan Kapoor (Shashi Kapoor’s Son), Mimoh (Mithun da), Aryan Babbar (Raj Babbar), Suniel Anand (Dev saab), Sikandar Kher (anupam Kher), Zyad Khan (Sanjay Khan), Adhyyan Suman (Shekhar Suman), Ashmit Patel (Amisha), Siddharth Koirala (manisha),…and last but not the least UDAY CHOPRA (Kya mummy) …and the list is really long.
I keep Fardeen in the same list (though he got the sensational debut filmfare award) still all his hits are multistarer.
And same with the actress list. To add to this we have Twinkle Khanna, Esha Deol, Rinki Khanna, Simple Kapadia (yups, u r right…she is dimple’s sister), etc etc.
Considering the stardom of the parents, i feel these kids dont have to struggle for their debut (father producing the film, links, relations, no auditions…and top of all a best debut award – no matter they deserve it or not).
Have recently read somewhere that ABJr was rejected by 30 big directors and producers…it was when JP saab had decided to launch him. Post that, he has given over 10 flops in a row…but he really grew as an actor and now among the coolest dude in the industry. Same goes with Saif and Ajay Devgan.
On the other hand Shahid Kapoor whose parents are TV stars (Pankaj and Neelima)…had made it on the big screen and is a top contender for next superstar.
Every Actor has its friday…there are starsons who have got chance again and again cos of the stardom their father or mother had enjoyed…and there are some real good actors who were not able to make it a big on the box office, just because they are not from a filmy background.
Let me put a disclaimer that its my opinion…you may or may not agree to it. But i feel pity when a starson goes wrong…and feel more bad when a good actor who is not from a filmy background thrown out cos the director wanna launch his son / daughter / nephew, etc.
~Ashu Bhai MAPRM Wale.
Man, you seem to have PhD on the subject. Thanks for reminding me of Mimoh (enjoyed seeing him dance on the other day..fun..fun) and Rinke Khanna. But I think Aryan Babbr has promise and i actually like (individual opinion) Uday Chopra. He comes across happy go lucky guy. He was good in Charas (Tigmanshu Dhulia follow up to Haasil).
I am not claiming to be Oracle, but I always thought Saif was natural and had promise. I liked Ajay Devgan too as an action star. But I have been wrong too, hated the sight of Akshay in his initial movies but am a big fan post Hera Pheri.
Hello Ashu Bhai,
Fine reading but I don’t agree with you about Simple Kapadia being a non-actor. I think she was pretty talented & in the movies I watched her in, “Anurodh”, “Jeevan Dhara” , “Shaaka”, “Pyar Ke do Pal”, she performed remarkably well. I only think she was not lucky because she came on the scene after Dimple and very unfair comparison followed. All through her acting career she suffered public flogging from self-proclaimed film critics and was shockingly labelled ‘ugly”.So, despite everything, she was unable to make it contrary to other actresses not as beautiful & talented as her (here I can name Aruna Irani, Bindu, Padmini Kolhapure among others) who didn’t have to suffer the burden of an elder successful sister.So, you mentioning her in the same breath as someone like Rinki Khanna who acted in only a couple of movies, is very very unfair.
gosh A Singh.. similar to a lot pf people, you ve forgotten the ‘other superstar” Imran Khan … unless otherwise totally managed by aamir, who know whats Imran’s best profile, what mannerisms are can be shown as his strengths, how to make sure he talks in hinglish and thats the mood of the movie, how to use his raw acting into a light mode of the movie, Imran Khan is a pakka next Suniel Shetty in making… very soon, he will be playing a part in 6 hero movies (beginning with LUCK) and would be to White Feather films, what Ranbir is going to be for YRF KJ camp…
Imran Khan is overrated, gosh his “Mean Guy” act in Kidnap made me,
You know, you may be right. Imran was likable in JTYJN, haven’t seen his other films, did’s dare.
Imran Khan should ALWAYS be “Aamir Khan presents Imraan Khan, if he wants to be successful”
dont even need to watch movies… watch trailers of Kidnap and Luck, then see some cover pages of his on magazines, read a few articles, then see Filmfare awards hosting, and the vote india campaign, and you’d see that here is an actor is one of the most half baked actors, who has a huge struggle in front of him, but already has slipped into complaceny of being treated as a Star.. hos only appearance with Aamir in dus ka dum was possibly the only one that was good as well cause between Aamir and Salman he looked like he was in his place…
And thats where actors go wrong, when you are being seen by so many … then prove yorself as an upcoming actor in every sense than “I am a HIT AND FUTURE” .. this is what is stopping Imran, ABJ, Ranbir and gang to already be sterotyped to a limited success, the complacency shows, while a lesser famous dad’s son Hrithik, still tries to keep it low, off media, appears humble and media shy, thankful, and his PR shoots UP all the way …
And I don’t know how many others feel this, but I so much wanted to see My Name is Anthony Gonzales, for a much more realistci and simpler yet a high dreamer kinds Nikhil Dwidedi (reminds me of a wierd combo of SRK and Mithun during their real ugly days) than Sawariya, Love Story 2050, Jimmy, Kal Kisne Dekha…. and I am strictly referring to only the Hero’s image pull, and not the production values of the movie, or the locales, camerawork, marketing et al…
Couldn’t agree more man. That’s certainly the case with star sons. Hritik also got carried away initially and then had 5 flops in a row. After that he knuckled down, did less work and results are great. But you have to agree that Hritik was born with lot of advantages – great chiseled face, looks great on screen, is tall and could reasonably act. He had to just build on it.
I haven’t seen Anthony Gonzales, is it any good?
I wouldn’t agree about Hrithik’s advantages right away … I still remember when the first trailer for KNPH came out, there were a soundbytes, that here comes one more of Fardeen Khans (for the first few 20 secs, ‘ae mere dil tu’ trailer did look like ‘jab jab tujhe dekhu, jale yeh dil jale badan’ trailer from Premaggan) .. another flop actor ka flop beta … and even a little before KHPN released HR was still being seen by certain sections as “not so conventional, middle east ka band more than india ka” looks.. those days nobody bothered about his greek god body and woah he fights acts dances all at one go and still looks amazing thing… I think for an entire year they were so conscious that they didnt show his sixth finger, indicating that they were skeptical about his acceptance themselves…
Talking about Imran and gang again, what these guys are not realising is, in India, there is a dearth of consistent achievers, what we have show up once in a while… nlike say australia having gold medalists almost every month, somebody breaking records everyday … so we look at these actors as proper heros… and at a time when these new people should be working hard we see complaceny and “mai kaun hoon jaanta hai na” attitude that they lose it…
Ultimately Shahrukh Khan is not #1 actor in the industry because he just acts… most of his fans remain people who are still in awe of the way he struggled and made it to the leagues that zillions including myslf can only dream… and again dearth of many such people in the country … so people tend to mix personal and professional life to be fans.. THATS the reason he never fades out…not KANK and MHN and OSO and all the other crap “blockbusters” he churns …maybe the day Ranbir and Imran and even ABJ stop making the “mai superstar, and that director is a nice chap, woody allen” kind of big statements like they pass the judgement kinds, and stop even remotely showing, mere baap ka business hai toh I am gonna stay boss attitude… will be someday their flms will be accepted hugely…
Arjun rampal is the new Deepak parashar. This guy cant act for nuts. He is as wooden face as sumeet sehgal. Did he win best actor in a negative role for OSO. I wonder why he even got nominated for that role. but again its filmfare. Sab maaf hai!!!
But wasn’t he just awesome in Rock On ?
i Dont think he was awesome.. that really is too too far fetched. he was just less irrtitating in that. it was very much one dimensional role
Lara at least has the killer looks, and for me she was the only tolerable aspect in that “Bore Barabar Bore”. But yeah she did not suit the role in Billu.
Esha Deol- Na looks hai, na acting hai, na charisma hai,kuch nahin. Making her play Smita Patil’s role in that Arth redux, was nothing short of blasphemy.
Amisha Patel- She looks good, as long as she does not open her mouth,and post Gaddar, has often confused Wheezing for Acting.
Raveena Tandon was not a bad actress IMO. I liked her performance in Satta, and also to some extent in Shool.
From the current ones, Deepika Padukone would win the numero uno award hands down!!
Completely agree on Esha Deol, I actually see a lot of parallel with ABJ, sky high expectations, great pedigree and background and wrong profession.ABJ got a longer run because of their standing in the industry and because he is male actor. Esha was only doing it with Hema’s contacts and Deols didn’t support her ( not sure if that’s a good thing or bad thing).
and if by any chance you want to see the guild of extra ordinary non actors (okay half actors who are good at times, Sunny deol after all gave us ghayal damini gadar border and arjun) watch the movie called JAANI DUSHMAN – EK DHOKHA… the movie has a complete list of brilliant non actors or actors in bad patches… brilliantly overshadowed by Sonu Nigam by outpacing everybody in the department of bad acting.. it was sad to see the singing gentleman (sa re ga ma made my mom sure that this guy is soooo obidient) blaming his debut failure in acting to 10 other actors and a snake (oh yeah he did on a awards stage… ) .. of course the movie had other superstars like Siddarth Salaria, Sharad Kapoor, Armaan Kohli, a bad bad day Arshad Warsi and Akshay Kumar, a fan deprived still up and running Suniel Shetty, Aftab .. gosh … this was a competetion between each one of them to perform the worst… n yeah, despite Manisha koirala’s best effort to give the worst performance, raveena tandon’s cousin (what her name yaar) …… KIRAN KIRAN.. of course, took the cak away along with others…
PS don’t insult JAANI DUSHMAN_EK ANOKHI TORTURE, its my favorite “Kalti Classic”, i have seen it 20 times to date, he, he.
Come on not too often u get to such an ensemble casting of Siddarth, Rajat Bedi, Armaan Kohli and then Aditya Pancholi, Suneil Shetty as students. And if not for nothing, at least to see Sonu Nigam saying “Bhaiyya”, priceless, you don’t get such sights often on screen.
Damn, you got Rajat Bedi before me… 2 points to you :( +2 for catching “Ek Anokhi….” as well :(
My favourite remains sonu nigam getting “REAL SCARED” when the sofa goes up in air… i havent laughed more even on a Mehmood Kishore Kumar JOhny Level Paresh Rawal classics… :D
Looks like we have a club here.. Even Raj babbar was kickass as i dont principle or father.. btw atul agnihotri had a cameo in the movie..
my doomsday, you caught Atul Agnihotri before i did :( +2 to you as well … Can I get like a bonus point just for pointing Kiran Rathod?
U sure do. Boss iss movie pe kam se kam ek mega article to banata hai. anyone volunteering?? btw i remember upasana singh, rambha, kiran rathod n manisha as whatever u know. there were more. Arshad warsi’s dying performance is one of the best that i’ve seen in ages.
Torture movies are more pleasant in the long run than classics.
Hence proven |
PS & Myalterego, you’re going to thank me for this! Here- enjoy to your hearts content. There are pictures even which will make the reading more enjoyable!!
http://www.teleport-city.com/movies/dvdjournal/labels/Stars:%20Manisha%20Koirala.html
By the way, looking at your passion for such movies, there is a group on facebook ‘I love trashy hindi movies’. It’s great fun at times!!
@ PS & My Alter Ego
JAANI DUSHMAN-EK ANOKHI TORTURE is the second most discussed movie on the Web after GUNDA, in the “Kalti Classics” category. There have been fan sites for this movie, and currently its a favorite with movie lovers.
I meant an article here on PFC which is home to all movie lovers like u me n hum
Ok I take the responsibility for the same – give me some time to work on this classic movie- meanwhile let me speak to Javed Bhai and come- lekin wo to so rele hai
And between you me my alter ego and Ratnakara sir, .. Jaani Dushman has successfuly beaten Kaminey as the most discussed topic within 2 hours… I only wish all the people involved in this movie come to know of this… they would have been so proud… Maybe Soniu Nigam would ve given hugs to all 4 of us.. Bhaiiiyyaaaa :D
N kiran rathod would be filled with tears after knowing that duniya mein sab khudgarz nahi.. hum jaise log bhi hain!!!
You are rite PS- its certainly a great feeling to write and discuss on this mahaan movie.I am hoping Rajkumar Kohli or someone connected to him makes a sequel to this classic- it can be called Jaani Dushman Ek Sansani Kahani
no need to take away college angle- earlier the actors were doing their UG course, now they are doing their PG course.
imagine Sunny paaji sayin- ” main bhi is college ka PG student tha ”
we can add people like Zayed Khan,Dino Morea etc too in the sequel
maybe a prequel or yeah sequel.. zayed khan as rambha’s brother, dino morea being Raj babbar’s son… what they didnt show in the first flick, amrish puri said the snake lives as the “love child” of aftab and Kiran and now seeks revenge on the professor/fathers family
I’m all game to contribute to the prequel/sequel for JAANI Dushamn.. Jaani dushman aur ek anokhi kahani.. or JD-Return of the king cobra. my first actor for the movie is going to be sonu nigam hands down…
whatta a movie.. Manisha really got into the skin of the character(or snake?). She put on tonnes of weight after knowing that she has to break the gufa with her dance steps.. the actress u r talking abt is kiran rathod. she was fab.. remember her khudgarz dialogue
my only disappointment is that i dont rememeber the other actresses’ names… who weren’t exactly sure if they were leading ladies with all the “heros” or if they were dancing extras for “11 baje ya 12 baje” …. that song definately would ve made it into the same league as “Aati nahi”… nature conspired against it!
Jaani Dushman- Ek Anokhi Kahani pe discussion ho aur hum na ho- aisa nahin ho sakta- saw it in theatre and freaked out.keep watching it often.It also had Rambha,Aman Verma,Atul Agnihotri etc.Gosh Sonu Nigam and Aditya Pancholi- both vying for Kiran Rathod’s attention
Sharad Kapoor trying to appear serious, Siddharth and Rajat Bedi desperate to rape Manisha Koirala 
and the climax a clear inspiration from Terminator-2 Judgement Day- in short a modern classic.
it was aftab and aditya pancholi trying to woo kiran rathod i thought.
@ Sethu, how can you ridicule Aditya Panscholi and Aftab (I know you meant him, but damn sonu nigam doesnt go off our heads) affection for Kiran Rathod’s attention … even after My Alter ego reminded you of the Khudgarz dialogue????
oh damn.. i’d forgotten Aman Varma was there in the movie as well +2 to you too!!!! something is completely wrong with me, somebody take sonu nigam off my head…
He he.. btw love that scene when sharad kapoor says ‘kyon padi na’ or something of that sort to Dinesh hingoo when he daydreams about taking sharad kapoor’s gf on his lap..classic!!!
My bad, Aftab and not Sonu Nigam.
hilarious is an understatement and yes
Sample this song of Sonu- “javed bahi so rele,acha khase so rele”
myalterego- that Sharad Kapoor dialogue was
the other song I remember-
” gyarah baje ki barah baje”- another gem.Rajkumar Kohli needs to be given a special award by the Govt.of India for promoting entertainment through multistar cast films
Come on Jaani Dushman -II was such as gem. Manish Koirala was superb. She just didn’t act bad, she looked fat too. But Armaan towered above them all. It’s sad, doen’t anybody tell them, you are not made for screen.
Btw did u know suniel anand directed and acted in a movie called Master. I think it’s in the blood. It keeps coming on 9x along with most of Dev saab’s movies. Mebbe he owns it
Also the biggest non actress Ms.Katrina Kaif, been in movies for long, and she can’t act to save her life.
Celina Jaitley- At best an average looker, and her acting is way below average.
And Singh Sr, u have overlooked the Baap of all Non Actors, Kishen Kumar, Gulshan Kumar’s brother. I think the only reason he ever even acted in movies was because of his Bade Bhaiyya.
Ab Ratnakara sir, what can Singh saab do, at any given point of writing we can only think of a few names na, after we are done with the post hajaar naam aur aa jaate hai dimaag mei … my third response
Singh saab … you ve opened a whole pandora’s box :D …
Karan Nath, Karan Sharma, Amar Upadhyay, Vijay Arora, Tareeq, Sahil Khan, Sheeba, Vindu Singh, Monica Bedi, Aditya Panscholi… let me post this… will get more :D
Kishen Kumar, what a name! I used to love his songs on the screen – there was thing song with a long boat chase, i think with Shilpa Shirodkar. But I appreciate his audacity to even think that he could be an actor. I salute him for that.
@A Singh,
Few actors may have limited range and may not look appropriate in some roles but few among the actors listed in your post have given good performances in some films during their film or TV career.
>Sujit Kumar - Aradhna, Ittefaq, Amar Prem, small role in Aan Milo Sajna etc but his best came in a comedy role in Anubhav.
> you write – “…moustaches, a big no-no for Hindi film heroes”
but this is not true. Chandramohan, Raj Kapoor, Pradeep Kumar, Raaj Kumar, Shatrughan Sinha etc enjoyed a good stardom in their respective acting careers. Kishore Kumar can be included in this list. Nana Patekar kept even beard also. Kamal Hasan and Rajnikant, two biggest south stars, both worked in hindi films and they had moustaches on their faces. Anil Kapur, Jack Shroff both have been haing moustaches.
> Kanwaljeet- If you have missed his good performances, please watch Shankar Hussain, Shart, two TV serials (Buniyad and Farman), 15 Park Avenue and his best was saved for Maachis, where he was nowhere less competent than Om Puri, Tabu and C Singh. and he tried light comedy also in Kuch Meetha ho jaye and he was successful in his attempt. Many things depend on the factor of “chances at right time” but Kanwaljeet will never come in a non actors category. If he also gets right opportunities at this age of his life, he may do quite good In character actors category.
> could not get clearly your opinion about Akshay Khanna but it seems he comes in your list of non actors or those actors who are in wrong profession. He is a good actor and has proved his worth many times.
> One can not predict so negatively about Ranbir Kapoor so early. Once he gets a role which challenges his acting capabilities, then you may try to put him on stake. at present it’s not justified to declare him as a non actor.
The kind of films (most of the time rom-com) such new comers get dont help their growth as an actor.
But history of cinema suggests that if one has capability to learn and vulnerability to explore further then transition happens. Saif’s case is a live example.
> Abhishek has shown on occasions that he can act well. Sarkar, Naach, Yuva, Guru, his record is good in sensitive roles. In many films he could be termed as average but Non actor? This is though true that films like JBJ, Dostana etc may not put him on the next level of growth which an actor always needs.
your opinion looks quite harsh on him.
> Lara was good in JBJ and maybe she fits well in such comedy roles.
In short, many actors can be termed as Non-actors only when they dont perform well under the guidance of good directors.
If actors are also getting directors who themselves improving their craft of direction and have not attained a good developed level then actors can not be judged independently.
To call someone non actor his/her each and every film has to be scanned.
May I add here, Kanwaljit has done some good work in recent Punjabi movies…..he is not a bad actor by any measure. And he was quite good in the TV Serial Saans.
I think I gave credit to Sujit Kumar for doing so many films. His was one of the most ordinary face to grace the screen, despite that he did quite a few films. But i don’t think he distinguished himself in any of the roles you mention.
Kanwaljeet – haven’t seen much of him outside the TV serials. He was good in Buniyaad and Saans, but then so were so many other actors. TV serials is a completely different medium.
Ranbir may be talented beyond what I see. But i hope the industry spares him the hype, for his own good. He is heading down Akshaye Khanna path, if not Sanjay Kapoor way.
If a you and I were given as many chances as ABJ got, we would also have few films that could be claimed as our good work. ABJ was not meant for screen, not just acting. He should not be in performing arts, that’s not what he is born for, is the point i am making. Of course, he will continue to act as long as he gets chances and some of them will be good too.
@ A Singh,
Are you able to see the direction in which contradictions present in your post and comments, produced by you later, are carrying you?
(leaving apart fun factor which few commentators might have got from such a topic)
No, RK the genius. Why don’t you educate me? Not sure what’s your problem? Are you concerned that people are having fun?
This is also a platform of constructive criticism of the things related to cinema. Sir is doing just that.
@A Singh,
things are making you irritated,
discussion can not be done.
Please carry on your fun voyage.
@my alter ego….. bosss… you just knocked the whole round out…. where and how did you remember all those women????? I am so ashamed my my proud feeling of watching the 502 pataka kind of movies and knowing them….. you just made me feel self consious…. WE do need a post on this one…
barso ki tapsya… i do make it point to remember all peepal’s names who are extra-ordinary actors. I was so amazed by kiran rathod’s acting i remember searching for her on the net for next one week. she did act in few south indian movies too!!
I go with Rk, Kanwaljeet is a pretty good actor, he did very well mostly in TV serials Buniyaad, Saans, and i liked his performance in Maachis too. I don’t think he really got good chances in movies.
BTW the best ensemble of Non Actors was in a movie called FIGHT CLUB- Ashish Choudhury, Dino Morea, Zayed Khan, Suneil Shetty, Amrita Arora, Rahul Dev, take that if u can.
The holy difference between Fight Club and Jaani Dushman was that Fight club, from the day they even named the movie, never looked like the makers wanted to look like geniusees, it looked more like quick money, ek hafte mei jo aayega, pocket money haisa chal jayega.. Jaani Dushman was re launch of Armaan Kohli as Munish Kohli, top actors (Akshay and Sunny) charging half their fee for the respect of director, MI2, Matrix, Terminator ka EK Anokha Mix…
and YESSS +2 for me time, you missed Yash Tonk… as much as I enjoy him breeezing though the screen, he is a severe no actor…
You know, a book should be written on making of JD-II and RGV’s AAG. It would be very interesting to know what went through the minds’ of so many big stars and the director to waste time and money like that.
hahahahahahahahahhaahhahahahahahahahahah
Amrita Arora- With her squeaky voice, even worse acting skills, and average looks, she was yucky all the way. Her sister, was not a great actress either, but at least she had looks and could dance well.
Moon Moon Sen, Riya Sen- Both Ma and Beti, are bad, Period. Raima Sen is somewhat better, she was good in Manorama, Honeymoon Travels.
Munmun Sen, Riya sen are probably all time best along with Poonam Dhillon. Not sure, why i missed them.
who is rohan kapoor???
@ MyAlterEgo… M honestly laughing out aloud at the scene you mentioned… :D:D:D:D .. HILARIOUS!!!! This movie definately an all time classic… and all due respects to Sonu Nigam, because of his acting in this movie, I actually saw Love in Nepal … and trust me.. enjoyed that one … again HILARIOUS one…
@PS- we have some catching up to do dude. i too loved Love in Nepal.. Sonu played this Casanova to the hilt.. After watching him in that movie i dropped my ideas of entering ad world as I’m no where close to what Sony Nigam was in that movie.. Genius is an understatement I’d say!
absolutely… he was definately the acting star who never got his due… his “seduced look” after katra katra … “I am so Shocked” look after there is a dead body in his bed.. this guy was a brilliant actor… rady made for Ramanand Sagar serials… and of course his way of saying “MAAUL” (maal) almost beat the “BHAIYYYA!!!” off Jaani Dushman…
@MyAlterEgo, just curious, did you also watch the sonu nigam flick with raj babbar’s daughter… I didnt dare to … maybe I might have if they d ever released it in even VCR shops… did you get to see that one too???
Unfortunately i Could not see that.. Kash aap humare hote.. N i really feel its going to be as killer as others.. I hope they will show it sometime on TV. ab to bas bhagwan hi maalik hai!
by god dude… +20 to you, to just remember the name of the movie.. let me try if I can find this movie… they may show the movie on Sab TV.. they air rippler comedies all day …
I really feel like watchin Love in Nepal again. I only watched it 4 times.. so injustice for a movie of that caliber!!! Raj Zutsi played perfect foil to brilliant Sonu!!!
pretty honestly, I actually liked this flick .. for all the stupidities and insanity, it was a fun watch .. and the songs were pretty good…
One more priceless scene from JAANI DUSHMAN-EK ANOKHI TORTURE. Manisha is furious with Siddarth and Rajat Bedi after they attempt to rape her, all her other “College” friends ask her to forgive them.
Manisha( To Sunil Shetty): Kya agar who Preeti ke saath, aisa karenga, phir bhi tum unko maaf Karenge.
Sunil Shetty: Tukde, Tukde karonga unhein, phir bhi kehta hai unko maaf karo.
:D:D:D …how can the “AAJA .. AAJA” music be forgotten as the background score when “Muhnish” Kohli re enters “Manish”a koirala… and Amrish Puri being hit by a stone a bleeding away … any other movie this would ve been normal … in this movie… everything was HILARIOUS!!!
Mr A. Singh is going to be thoroughly pissed off with u me PS n other JAANI DUSHMAN fans i guess. But what the heck, I’m gonna write one more scene. Raj babbar calling manisha’s aatma and Mr Akshay-genius-kapoor shooting at was one of the best scenes in my opinion..
:D speechless.. i swear words cant express the laugh that I am having… this post has definately been one of the most cherished movie talks ve had.. !!!
“uss se pehle I will kill you , I WILL KILL YOU”
Kiran Kumar transforms into Manisha Koirala, “mai tumhare bhai komaar daalunga, Sunny Deol ends up grabbing the real KK’s neck in the police station .. the who,e set up is feaking crazy … :D
this movie was a marvel for its sci-fi actions too. the way the goggles appear on armaan was slower than AK hangal running.. then the car running into akshay kumar n splitting.. technical brilliance at its best!
MyAlterEgo – I am holding you completely responsible to write a post in Jaani Dushman! None can do better! Please be kind to us, or you have found a Jaani Dushman in me. ;) :D
Being the humblest fan of JAANI Dushman, I can only comply. But I’ve my shortcomings..MUjhe yakin main itna behak jaaunga likhte likte ki the article may never get finished n it may never come out..but i’ll surely try!!
“bhaiyyaa”
P.S. – thats my signature quote btw
Whenever you do, please ensure that you list out Upasna Singh and Rambha.. man .. how did you ever remember those guys ???
No man, please count me in. I love JD-II, the classic.I think it desrves a whole book on the making, so does RGV’s AAG.
@ sethu, Javed Bhai Jagrele got you on splits??? then you have to go through the movie dialogues again …. “aaj se sau saal baad, jis aadmi mei pralaynakri shaktiyan hongi, jo ishwar ka bheja hua insaan hoga, usi se tumhara nash hoga” …. :D then there are the jokes that Arshad Warsi cracks, you as audience I did laugh my head out at them.. at the apathy of them … boy .. this film is a wonder!!!!
@PS- remember the way Manisha n armaan bang their heads.. I banged mine too after watching their performance.. but i couldn’t bleed a drop.. wonder how they did it?
PS- mere bhai Javed Bhai was an example of how brilliant the movie is.dialougues and scenes were all fabulous and Munish/Armaan Kohli tried his best to come across as Keanu Reeves in Matrix.Sunny Deol saying ” main bhi is college ka purana student hoon”
@ sethu, was just trying to elaborate on the apathy of the dialogues.. completely agree there can be no better song than Javed Bhai Jagrele… shucks as much as I like Sonu the singer… I remember him coming on to a podium and saying, akshay kumar told him this would be the biggest hit song of the year… and this might be one of his best ever, since he knew that the song would be a restounding success even before he sang it…
College ka purana student hoon … somehow sharad kapoor rajat bedi aditya pancholi never graduated out of that college ….
“Sunny mai aa gaya hoon” .. IIIIINSPECTOR SAAAAAAB, YAHI HAI… YAAAHIII HAIII JISNE MUJH PE HAMLA KIYA…. ” yeh tu kya keh rahaa hai … mai tere pe kyu hamla karunga… MAINE KOI KHOON NAHI KIYAAAAAAA
Jaanam Jaane jahaan .. Jaanam jaane jahaan
How did you forget me ?
Yours sincerely
Rahul Roy
Here’s a bonus – dug out the lyrics for all you lovers of Jaani Dushman
Arz Kiya Hai Javed Bhai So Rele Hai
Javed Bhai So Rele Hai Achche Khaase So Rele Hai
Mohalle Wale Jagrele,Mohalle Wale Jagrele
Jab Javed Bhai So Rele Hai ,Javed Bhai So Rele So Rele
Javed Bhai So Rele Hai Achche Khaase So Rele Hai
Mohalle Wale Jagrele,Jab Javed Bhai So Rele Hai
Javed Bhai So Rele Hai Achche Khaase So Rele Hai
Mohalle Wale Jagrele ,Jab Javed Bhai So Rele Hai
Javed Bhai So Rele Saasein Wasse Rele
Javed Bhai So Rele
Pattli Gali Se Nikal Lere
Javed Bhai Brave Bhai
Javed Bhai Brave Bhai
Javed Bhai So Rele Hai Achche Khaase So Rele Hai
Mohalle Wale Jagrele
Jab Javed Bhai So Rele Hai
Jab Javed Bhai So Rele Mumbai Mein Pange Ho Rele
Woh To Sapne Dehkrele Par Yahan To Dange Ho Rele
Javed Javed Javed Bhai Javed Bhai
Jab Javed Bhai So Rele Mumbai Mein Pange Ho Rele
Woh To Sapne Dehkrele Par Yahan To Dange Ho Rele
Pange Hore Dange Hore Pange Dange
Pange Hore Dange Hore
Patli Gali Se Nikal Lere
Javed Bhai So Rele Hai Achche Khaase So Rele Hai
Mohalle Wale Jagrele
Jab Javed Bhai So Rele Hai
Din Bhar Bottle Pilere Kharraate Raat Ko Lerele
Mohalle Wale Poochlere Kab Allah Ko Pyaare Ho Lere
Din Bhar Bottle Pilere Kharraate Raat Ko Lerele
Mohalle Wale Poochlere Kab Allah Ko Pyaare Ho Lere
Ho Rele Kab Allah Ko Pyaare Ho Rele
Ho Rele Kab Allah Ko Pyaare Ho Rele
Javed Bhai Jaag Rele Achcha Khaassa Lag Rele
Javed Bhai Jaag Rele Achcha Khaassa Lag Rele
Mohalle Wale Bhaag Rele
Javed Bhai Lag Ree Achcha Khasa Lag Rele
Mohalle Wale Darrre Le
Patli Gali Se Nikal Pehle
Javed Bhai Javed Bhai
Javed Bhai Jag Rele Achcha Khasa Lag Rele
Bhaag Ne Waale Bhaag Rele
How did the national awards folks miss this one out???
Even i consider salman khan is a bad actor..After many years in the film industry,still he can’t do emotional scenes..
The Butt corporation (Mahesh, Mukesh & co) did introduce some very lousy non-actors. Their only selling point was music.
When Nadeem Sharavan were at their peak, people took courage and launched many a new faces. Ronit Roy, Ayub Khan, Kamal Sadanah, Prithvi etc
Mention about Pururaj (son of Raaj Kumar)also.He made his debut in a film called Baal Brahmachari opposite the super-successful Karisma Kapoor, directed by Prakash Mehra and with no apparent help from his dad. Which means, Raaj Kumar cannot be blamed for the devastation of several distributors brought about by the film.
He followed it up with a villainous act in the film called Hamara Dil Aapke Paas Hain, where he raped Aishwarya Rai only to be beaten to a pulp by Anil Kapoor – not for the rape, but for offering to marry Ash to atone for the rape! (Yes, that’s the plot. And Happy Women’s Day).
Actually, the flop star son with the maximum number of launches is Uday Chopra. He has completely failed to get any film outside the Yashraj banner. Remember, the only cast & crew member firmed up for Dhoom III is him!
@ yayaver- Uday Chopra has done movies outside the YRF banner- Supari and Charas.I liked Charas- it was by Tigmanshu Dhulia- somehow the movie didnt get noticed.
Of course by saying this I dont state that Uday is a good actor- no ways
Sorry stastical mistake..Still Timanshu Dhulia and Padam Kumar really have balls of steel for casting Uday chopra
Recently read a very “Aanso Bhari Hain” interview from Uday Chopra, where he said he felt he was so depressed that the audiences did not accept him, and thankfully he had a self realization, that he had a long way to go.
One more in example: Suneil Anand acted in a film directed by his father Dev. It was called Anand Hi Anand.His acting skills matched Kungfu style in a film named ‘Master’. The movie had he movie had the hallmark dialogues of martial arts films – “Kiyaah Choo Mash-tah Sinchuang Kung Pao Mash-tah Honourable Mash-tah”!
Just a few comments….
1. However entertaining everyone’s comments on Jaani Dushman might be, let’s just stop it for the time being… There is a place and time for everything, and we can have an even more entertaining discussion on the cult classic somewhere else…
2. Regarding the post by A, I am a little disappointed…. I am OK with minor errors like calling ranbir, rohan… I am also OK if the list of “non-actors” includes some names I find debatable… I just feel that the article was not as well put across as it started out to do in the first 2 paragraphs and ended up being – “a list of my least favourite actors”
Jaani Dushman is one of the gems, it had everything, any body who wants to be a film maker should watch it, so that he can learn what not to do while making movie.
But makers of JD also made QAHAR,loosely inspired from Dalpati.
Shiney,Arjun,Zayed,Fardeen,Esha can be added to list.
Last but not the least how can one forgot KRK-Deshdrohi
Living by what “Sucker” said, we should have this conversation somewhere else… or it changes the face of the post… but QAHAR… OH MAN, was trying to remember the name… it was a classic again …. this was absolute movie of hams… kickass!!!
how can one forget Mohit from James?
My List: ADD ON:—-
Parikshit Sahni
Taariq
Kumar Gaurav
Suniel Anand
Rohan Kapoor
Hemant Birje
Rajeev Kapoor
Mandakini
Kimi Katkar,
Chunkey Pandey,
Mohnish Behl,
Salma Agha,
Sangeeta Bijlani,
Anita Raaj,
Kunal Goswami
Sanjay Kapoor
Kamal Sadanah
Atul Agnihotri
Zayed Khan
Dino Morea
Amrita Arora,
Rahul Dev,
Ashish Choudhary
Rahul Roy
Fardeen Khan
Celina Jaitley
Riya Sen
Aftab Shivdasani
Gracy Singh
Bobby Deol
Karan Nath
Sohail Khan
Arbaaz Khan
Diana Hayden
Yukhta Mookhey
Faizal Khan
Sumeet Saigal
Taariq Shah
Moon Moon Sen
Rupa Ganguly
Pooja Bedi
Dia Mirza
Amisha Patel
Mamta Kulkarni
Apurva Agnihotri
Avinash Wadhwan
Ritu Shivpuri
Anjali Jathar
Somy Ali,
Sonica Gill
Zeba Bakhtiyar
Pritivi,
Ronit Roy
Krishna (Govinda’a nephew)
Ravi Behl
Jugal Hansraj
Uday Chopra
Sheeba,
Varsha Usgaonkar
Shika Swarup
Siddharth (Vansh-fame),
Sudesh Berry,
Sanober Kabir
Nisha Kothari,
Antara Mali,
Monica Bedi
Sandep Patil (Kabhi Ajnabi Thhey)
Syed Kirmani (Kabhi Ajnabi Thhey)
Mohsin Khan (Batwara, Saathi, Fateh, Pratikaar)
Vinod Kambli (Anarth)
Ajay Jadeja (Khel)
Gosh man, thats like a Who’s Who list of Non actors. Not sure if i wud place Parikshat Sahni in that list, he was not a bad actor, and for most part had to live in his father’s shadow.
Also Kumar Gaurav did do well in Naam, Janam and even Kaante, so don’t think he will make that list.
parikshit sahni’s name cropped up in my mind inreference to the main article. i always felt he was carrying the burden of truth that he was balraj sahni’s son, so he had to be an actor. i felt he was good in some movies, average in many, and plain atrocious in others.
.
kumar gaurav acted really well in some movies like naam, janam, kaante, and also a lesser known film called GANG. but otherwise, he was an absolute gone case, espcially in films like Star and others that followed his love stroy.
abe satyendra…. ab bacha kaun industry mein? kaminey!
bahut mehnat se naam yaad kiye hain bhai. maine ek post bhi draft kiya tha – FLOPIYA LIST. baad mein publish nahin kiya, bahut “attacking’ ho raha tha.
@Jha – did u forget Arjun Rampal or do u seriously think he can act!!!
yaar, maine usse sirf Rock On ki wajah se maaf kar diya hai…
vaada dekh lo! he will be back in ur list
Parikshit Sahni…can’t beleive this!!…he is a very good actor..
And how abt John Abraham…he is a worst actor of all time!!….expressionless!!
Is it just me who feels that Rahul Bose is one of the most overrated actors of all. Every movie i see him giving the same old blank dumb expression, and he was irritating to the core in Shaurya. I think he gets away with it, because he stars in “meaningful, New Wave” cinema kind and not the regular mainstream stuff.
i concur with you. i liked him in english, august, and the few others immediately afterwards, mainly coz we had not been exposed to those “meaningful” cinema earlier, post 90’s. however, lately, i find him to be quite irritating.
.
watched two bengali films of his, anuranan and kaalpurush, where h really irritated me with his “pseude-intellectual-egoistical” portrayal of “today’s man”.
Agree with you sir. I too feel the same.
Agree with you Ratnakar….I have had numerous arguments about the same…..It’s just the choice of his movies that makes people think he is a good actor.
Rahul Bose is one of the over rated actor.
if we look closely most of star kids and star sons are non-actors.
Guys….I think we are forgetting one of the biggest non-actors of all time (considering his standing in the industry)…Emraan Hashmi. Just like Zayed Khan he is still doing quite a few movies every year. And in females…Kim Sharma who has only two assets and both are physical !!
Kim Sharma with her pout and “squeaky as a mouse” voice, should have been doing some VO’s for Mickey Mouse or Tom & Jerry cartoons, instead of acting in movies.
Minnisha Lamba- Her so called Bikini Act in Kidnap was so cold, and in Shaurya, she along with Rahul Bose were the worst part of it.
The only movie of Minnisha in which she hasn’t irritated me is Yahan.
in fact yahan was a good debut for minissha…I thought she would become a good actress…!!
Emraan would have figured in the list but he redeemed himself a bit with films like Aawarapan. Zayed Khan was pretty likeable in MHN, but yes painful to bear in all other films.
Kim Sharma is a golden addition to the list.
I was wondering what you fellas think about Neil Nitin Mukesh…granted he was a part of that mindblowing “Johnny Gaddar”….but then how would rate him as an actor ? Specially when I remember that scene where he was confessing to Dharmendra, it makes me cringe….
NNM was bad in both Aa Dekhein Zara and even New York.
I actually like NNM a lot. He has a great screen presence and shows potential. I liked him in NY too, in addition to Johny Gaddar. I find him different.
Anybody else thinks that Aishwarya too belongs in this category. She may not be a total non-actor but is no better than an average just like her husband.
Definitely… haven’t been able to figure out WHAT makes her tick even with people like Mani Ratnam.
Ash is a curious case. Obviously she got in simply because of her looks and how beautiful she is in real life (all heroes wanted to work with her, won’t you if you had a choice?). But she comes across as a very hard working person and with lot of hard work, she did produce some good work – Josh, Taal, Devdas, Raincoat and Jodha-Akbar. Even after all these years, she can still be wooden. But she is special man, there is no one like her.
Ok, I am going to drop a K bomb here, actually two K-bombs!
Karisma Kapoor and Kareena Kapoor? Barring JWM, and may be Dev Kareena has been a hamster all the way.
And Karisma Kapoor’s success was never her. It was Govinda and David Dhawan all the way.
Looks like this post is gonna score a 200.
Posting on topic like these is fun because it makes us nostalgic and also acts as vent for all our resentment.
Posting on topic like these is fun because it makes us nostalgic and also acts as vent for all our resentments.
Karisma for sure!! Man she got on my nerves in that movie shakti.. I came across so many people who praised her in that movie? Is it just me who thot she was awful?
But I disagree with u on Kareena.. She was good in Omkara too!!
Kareena does well if the director is good, Govind Nihalani( Dev), VB( Omkara), Imitiaz ali(JWM). Otherwise she is just intolerable in movies like Khushi, MPKDH, Talaash.
Am willing to give Karishma, benefit of doubt for DTPH, liked her performance in it much more than her “overhyped” performance in Raja Hindustani.
@Ratnakar- Ok let me remind u of a scene.. ‘Main buri hoon, main buri hoon’. Do you still think she was good in DTPH. actually i think she said that dialog after self-realization
That’s right. lol
Kareena is very glamorous and looks made for screen. She has delivered whenever she got a good role. Karisma, yes was completely not meant for screen, but she was a great dancer and extremely hard working person. It’s amazing what a long run she had despite all her limitations. I don’t find her particularly beautiful either, unlike Kareena who is gorgeous.
Actually most of the actresses working now-a-days are non-actors.
Problem is most of the actresses really don’t get the roles that have depth, in that regard i admire Madhur Bhandarkar. Whatever his films might be, he does come out with strong female characters.
Sirjee, do the actresses really require in-depth role to show their caliber? Indian movies have always lacked strong female characters. A good actress will shine in all her movies no matter how much crappy they are. Take the example of Madhuri Dixit.
Jahan, the thing with heroines like Madhuri,Sri Devi, Hema Malini, Rekha was that they could carry real crap movies on their shoulders. None of the current bunch of heroines have that ability, most of them do well if the director is good or the role is good, but on their own they can’t pull a movie. I guess Madhuri for now seems to be the last of those actresses.
Kajol would be the last one on this list according to me… the few time when Madhuri was carrying movies on her shoulders life not a many people still have music videos and 24 hour TV channels, so a chunk population did see beta and raja and kinds for the “Madhuri Dixit hogi toh achi hi hogi” faith, and that was the only place …. Kajol did try to push pathetic movies, and boy, during the days when people had started having options, “Kuch Khatti Kuch Meethi” “Hote Hote Pyar Ho Gayaa” still had viewers, at least even on MTV and other channels, some dared to venture into cinema halls… though I’d still give a 100 credit for “hum aapke dil mei rehte hain” success to Madhuri Dixit… and if there is someone who has seen this movie, please please do let me know, if you watched this one cuz a 40 year old Anil Kapoor with all his youthfl looks was wearing an orange jacket and go “yeeeeeh meri life hai … yeh yeh yeh yeh yeh yeh yehyehyehe meri life hai …. “
@PS, Hum Aapke Whatever Whatever had Kajol not Madhuri. But it was much more tolerable than the other one Hamara Dil Aapke Paas, with Anil and Aish.
oops sorry, got too excited… but yeah I meant Kajol, and the movie was a success because of Kajol … and it re started the trend for Satish Kaushik to make scene to scene remakes of Telugu flicks..
@PS
Kajol could have been that actress after Madhuri if she had stayed in the industry longer. Most of her successful movies are with the big Khans and big banners. So it’s not entirely dependent on her.
Again, I’d say, KKHH was the only movie which was the complete package of cinema.. locations.. feel good.. family …supersta hero … with DDLJ she became a STAR along with SRK, SRK included became a STAR only then… and Kajol made whole new position to the existing Sridevi-Madhuri-Juhi Chawla list… Apart from KKHH, every movie she did was along with a fellow upcoming actor than a STAR, the way Rani, Priyanka and folks are doing, and she always held herself at par if not better yaar.. Yeh Dillagi, she was followed as much as Akshay was (boss there was a huge following for Akshay always) Karan Arjun, DDLJ, Baazigar, holds at par with SRK, Dushman, outperforms SD, she played the perfect victim which made Ashutosh Rana look even better… Hamesha, otperformed saif and the all time great aditya panscholi, Gupt… it was her all the way …
To be honest a lot of flicks are in minds only cuz she was there in those movies… even a Bekhudi and Udhar ki JIndagi, you d remember cause it was Kajol…
The question of Big banners doesnt apply to her much because with her in the cards some banners actually made it big… pre DDLJ, YRF was possibly the biggest production house, post that, they became monopolistic, KKHH and KJ, could not have made it big at all if not for Kajol playing that role (which now can be real pain in the arse, but then it was HUGE)
I agree. Completely.
I agree. That’s why i am a bit sympathetic to actresses. They only get limited opportunities and in most cases they get a film based on other factors, even though that may be true for male stars also in this day and age.. I think most of the leading male stars choose their heroines. That’s just an outsider view.
Lot of bashing on failed non actors. Is it really there fault ? Salman Khan didn’t act and has huge superstar image with him. He will give aspiration to future genration that good looks only could win you laurels of indian jantaa !!!. Its fight of star and actors or brain with hearts or substance with show off. And our anger is coming in form of the comments..
A star is a person who continues to be interesting even when he is not doing anything. An actor is a person who has to act (but of course!) to be interesting. The actors will live on in the textbooks of cinema, in the corridors of National School of Drama.
The stars will live on in the Saturday evenings of Zee Cinema. Today, it is Shanivaar Ke Raat, Amitabh Ke Saath. Tomorrow, it will probably be Shah Rukh.
Very occasionally, a star will encroach into the actor’s territory. An Amitabh Bachchan will do a Black and cause National Awards to stall because venerable critics will not be able to digest a frivolous star upstaging more conventional thespians. A Shah Rukh Khan will do a Swades and it will flop because the audience cannot find Raj Malhotra in it.
Sometimes star persona helps an actor in getting the awards. Take the example of Amitabh only. He got National Award for Agneepath in 1991 while Pankaj Kapur was no less deserving candidate than him for Ek Doctor ki Maut.
This year Aishwarya and Akshaya both got the Padmasree award. Both of them haven’t done anything exceptional in the movies and they will qualify this list of non-actors to some extent but still got them. There are definitely better candidates who deserve these awards.
Jahanpanah,
Awards ki kahani to puraa ek mega article maangti hai..
well if Salman Khan can get the Best Supporting Actor over Manoj Bajpayee, anything is possible.
it again comes back to not just the persona but how things are marketed, you have to agree Swades was a poorly marketed movie… it showed NASA, a village, a few songs, and apart from that a SOBER SRK.. that was all that was given to a layman, who doesnt read reviews or anything… but just walks into a movie for the hype.. a SOBER SRK alone… no takers.. a SOBER SRK, with great background title, dadi, and a few works and CDI got YRF back to profits…
Thats the key for a lot of Aamir movies as well.. when he realised 1947 was poorly publicised… and so be it for all his previous releases to them … including JJWT and AHAT, which were pretty good movies….
Agneepath … boss as much credit you give to AB, you have to give the same to director Tinnu Anand, for all those screenplays, kickass background music (so what if borrowed), the right editing, and making Danny Archana Mithun equally potent but still as people around AB .. the package was brilliant… warna the movie could ve been a stale story …
Wasn’ Agneepath directed by Mukul S. Anand?
I left out Salman Khan, because this post is not about stars who are non-actors, it’s about people who were complete misfit. Salman on the other hand had great great screen presence, and star qualities that made him likable on screen, even with limited acting talent.
Top 10 Non-Actors of all time
1)John Abrahan
2)Uday Chopra
3)Sanjay Kapoor
4)Arbaaz Khan
5)Ishmit Patel
6)Mahima chaudhary
7)Puru RajKumar
8)Lara Dutta
9)Tushar Kapoor
10)Amrita Arora
u r the first one to remember Ashmit patel
No one even remembers him. But i dont think he should be there in that list. I think one of the criteria should be atleast acted in some x movies. I’m sure he has not acted more than 5-6 movies.But if you are gonna abt all time then there are orhers like Rajendra kumar, Rajkumar, sanjay khan, Jeetedra (except parichay i cant think of any other good movie of his), pradeep kumar n so many more
well, i cud remember two other good movies of jeetu off-hand: khushboo and kinara (both gulzar fims, btw). in fact he was very good in Gehri Chaal (AB is the side hero of tht film) as well.
thats 4 movies of very good performances. Mebbe we can take him off that list then
Jeetu did well in the Gulzar movies, and some earlier flicks also. I doubt if we can ever take his son, Tushar off the list though. Even in a “negative” role in Shootout at Lokhandwala he was as dangerous as a rabbit.
he he. Well said. 5 years of more non-acting and he wud be in the same league as bobby is now..
Tushar is special. He is the complete misfit. There was this movie with Ayesha Takiya and Ajay Devgan (man, one Socha Na tha made me watch so many crappy films of Ayesha), i think the film was called Sunday and they made Tushar do an item number. Yes, our dear Tushar. I was having hard time locating him the crowd full of extras. What a gem he is! Long live Tushar!
Jeetu was not a bad actor at all… his selection of movies were appalling… but check his older flicks apart from gulzar ones… Farz, geet gayaa pathron ne, caravan, even gehri chaal… and there are quite a lot, with Mehmood and kinds, which were real old, and that guy was an out and out hero who did real well… it was the era when Jayaprada Sridevi took over and dancing competetions and who makes a more ideal bahu fight between them started which left Jeetu saab standing next to pots and beaches…
But here is my bet… I can be so dastardly wrong… But John Abraham, purely by the virtue of movies he is ready to select, would learn acting soon (the practice makes man perfect kinds, John is still on an on the job training :D ) …
The biggest plus with John is, even if he selects a very very mediocre or a low budget movie, with his overall persona, even that movie starts looking like A class movie.. (the lowest levels in A, but still looks like this movie still falls in the category of the big ones… maybe the smallest amongst them)
If he does end up learning how to act… and he continues to play all the characters that he is being doing lately… he ll turn into our Brad Pitt (no comparison in acting…, but John finally might be the only guy who ll take up the different roles, and yet be JA, the hunk who wouldn’t taken too seriosly, but still be an A Lister)
John is here only bcoz of his looks, style and female fan following…and i hope he may learn some acting one day but comparision with Brad Pitt is too much and i think that the right person to be compared with Brad Pitt is Hritik Roshan..
John Abraham is male counterpart of Katrina Kaif.
Thats cause you are talking of talent… I am talking about pure persona making a small insignificant movie or a character into something that people will at least rememeber… Hrithik can blow a lot of top actors away in departments of acting, and I include Hollywood as well… though for some reason, I can never see him do a breezy role with conviction … (apart from mayb a LBC)
. Lara Dutta a non actor
. she is not a non-actor . She is a decent actress . I dont think that Billu didnt work because of her . She was fine in it .She was pretty good in the dismal Jhoom Barabar Jhoom ,infact the only thing good about it was her . she was credible in No Entry as well . I think u havent included a lot of non actors who deserved to be on the list . You seem to have chosen the easy targets of failed actors boss . I dont think Chandrachur was bad actor , he just didnt have any success
agree… lara was very good in no entry and her comic timing is quite good…
I disagree. Any other actress would have done magic with the NO Entry role. But i agree, she is fantastic as a glamorous prop, like in JBJ.
Please read carefully, I didn’t include Chandrachur in this list. His name was in the list of those who had potential but blew it or didn’t quite get their due, like Vivek Oberoi.
nice post. all the names are definitely non actors. but they were also flop. we have some hit non actors.what about Rajendra Kumar? I don’t Know Why his films were silver jubilee. I guess just because of the songs and the heroines.another name is Pradeep Kumar.today we have Aftab Sivdasani. why he gets films is a mystery to me.
I agree Rajendra Kumar and Pradeep Kumar should be in the list. I had a close relative who liked RK a lot :-), so didn’t want to hurt his feelings. PK, he was a historical specialist and actually wasn’t bad as a king.
Aftab, i liked him in LKLKBK. I thought he had promise but couldn’t compete well enough with star sons.
As an individual I’m willing to forgive Rahul Bose as he’s genuinely done some good films.But people like Kim Sharma,Aftab ( nowadays check out- he has just 2 expressions- one a silly idiotic smile and the other- a pained,constipated look
),Bobby Deol,Amrita Arora,Dino Morea ( aur kitne mauke chahiye bhai? ) etc are terrible.
Jha- you’ve made it difficult for all of us by making such a comprehensive list.
I’d Always believe Rahul Bose can speak well… thats it… he can orate in english really well, that we like to hear, but thats about it… never could see him as a great actor…
I am not sure if these can be classifies as non actors, cause I dont know if they are actors at all, but a lot of White Feather and RGV camp are non actors (leads only, they do get great other chracters, who build up the movie..) Kumar Gaurav, Bikram Saluja, Rohit Roy, ….
RB is on the top of the list my wife would make. She hates the sight of him. But i think he is in good in specific types of role-urbanized, westernized, English speaking, kind of what he did in English August and Mr. amd Mrs. Iyer.
Dino Morea ( aur kitne mauke chahiye bhai? )…
In terms of chances no body can beat Bobby deol (1995-2009), he is the man who is hurting us for last 14 years (14 saal qaide ba mushakat)
Agreed Akash Bobby Deol hamein saalon se sata raha hai.As a solo hero apart from an odd Barsaat,Gupt,Soldier and maybe Kareeb he has done nothing.the other decent movies of his like Apne,Ajanbee,Humraaz etc are not solo hero projects.14 saal mein bas itna hi teer maara hai
The only decent Bobby Deol performance i have seen in this decade to date is Tango Charlie, about the rest, less said the better.
I thought Bobby was good, the only dancing Deol. He was good in Gupt and Soldier. After that, I think he listened to Sunny bhai too much. Deols are not that bad, but have PR problems and it took a while for Bobby to realize that and get into YR camp, by then it was too late.
by the way what about katrina kaif, who only knows how to smile.. she is unbearable, the moment she opens her mouth…
Ms.Kaif has been in the industry for close to 4 years i guess, and still can’t pitch in a decent performance.
Lara was much better than Ms.Kaif in Partner, and in Maine Pyaar Kyun Kiya it was Sush all the way.
Ture said. Katrina is lucky girl. She is working with venerable indian directors like Rajkumar Santoshi and Prakadh Jha. Looks like these directors have succumb to the saleability rather than craft. I dont know where hindi cinema is heading.
Looks can be deceptive…
Well thats what happens when you have Salman Khan around… you get the biggest of banners, nobody dares to call you a wooden actor, you will be picked up at least as a prop and then also tounted all the way while promoting the movie, finally audience accepts you … for some reason Salman Khan does this to almost every “top” and “most upcoming” non film personality, gets them the stage, and finally when they make their position, they demand their space… and then we know what happens… nonetheless.. Salman Khan family and Sanjay Dutt family seem to bring forth the most number non actors… cause they are all “brothers” and “good friends”
You are right sir ji…Salman Khan has given true real gem like bad actors… sohail and arbaaz..
the butterfly effects are Amrita Arora, Ashish Chaudhary Yash Tonk Vatsal seth sameera reddy (and the entire cast of Maine Dil Tujhko Diya) Dino Morea Bikram Saluja Rohit ROy …
Katrina is not bad. She is pretty and decent actress. She was first rate in Namaste London. I admit again, I am partial to actresses. I don’t think they get ample opportunities to show their acting talent.
As I have stated earlier, actresses can still give decent performance in whatever role they are offered. It’s not about what the role is. True actors are not dependent on the strength of the role.
As far as i am concerned Ranbir is a star of tomorrow….no 2 opinions about it….he has a potential and will be among the top stars of next decade along with HRITHIK and SHAHID….Same was said for ajay,akshay and saif in nineties but see what these guys have achieved….No one can predict anything…I still remember kunal kohli tearing apart saif’s performance in HAMESHA…Even going on to say that he should retire from the industry,but guess what he himself roped him for HUM TUM…Similarly while reviewing DIL TOPAGAL HAI he said whenever akshay comes on screen people use to leave audi to go to toilet or get some snacks…But last heard he is desperately trying to get him on board for his next movie…..So never bite more than you can chew……And yes this is not a tribute but mockery of all the above mentioned names….First see how much success you have received in your life before commenting on others.
Good for you, mate. Ranbir can do some more fans like you. But you are not alone, other successful people like you, from the industry like him as well. So, he would get a run for at least next 5-7 years.
But i agree and have already made a concession that people may grow and learn over time. Akshay is a prime example. So i wish the same luck to Ranbir for you. But he may not get the required kick in the back because of this pre-declared superstar tag on him, by people like you. Same thing happened to Askhaye Khanna.
How many of us say akshaye khanna is a non actor today….gandhi my father,race,hulchul,dil chahta hai….he has proved that he can act….and if he decides that he want to do few film in a year then its his choice….but he is not out of work….
Anjala Zhaveri- Try watching her “Act”. She managed to hit it off for a while in Telugu movies, with a string of hits, but then another string of flops put an end to her career.
Meghna Kothari- The female in Prem Aggan, she actually manages to make Fardeen look good, no mean achievement.
Meghna kothari was too dumb.. do you remember the scene where she seduces fardeen and after that scene her dialouge.. main tumhara imtihan le rahi thi..something..
Not to mention her fetish of jumping off from waterfalls, Gosh i wud crazy with a GF like that. Dunno whats with the Kothari surname, Neelam, Meghna and now Nisha.
in terms of bad acting, i think prem agan will top the list all were very bad.. the boy with whom anupam kher wants to get marry nisha.. he was…oh my God what to say… even great Anupam kher was unbearable in premagan and what to say about fardeen ji.. kutte aaj mein tujhe maar daalunga… premagan was so bad that still some time i watch certain scenes of this movie to get to know the height of badness…
Anjala should have been on the list. Kya ada kya jalwa tere Paro. Remember that gem!
Oh! Meghna Kothari is a true gem
another gem would be Anjali Jatahar – for those who dont remember she did movies like Shastra with Sunil Shetty and was paired with SRK in Trimurti.
I guess we should definitely add Ritu Shivpuri and Kamal Sidhu to this list for sure.
Yeah, remember Ms.Sidhu’s “Tum Jhute Ho, MAA CAR ho” dialogue in that Jackie Shroff starrer Aar Ya Paar directed by Ketan Mehta.
Sheeba Sheeba Sheeba …. Miss 420 …
Ah! That Baba Sehgal’s debut movie.
The songs are still catchy …I even remember Ameen Sayani’s voice, ‘dekhiye “Miss 420″ ankhon se choo, saanso se choo, nazron se choo hoton se choo … ‘ some AIR trailers are unforgettable…
I only remember ‘kala chehra gora til’
oops, its gora chehra kala til
Miss 420-” Aaja meri gaadi main bait jaa,o aaja meri gaadi main bait jaa.
long drive jaayenge,full speed jaayenge
kahin rukenge na hum,gaana bajana,khana
peena gaadi mein hoga sanam”
My bad sirjee, how did I forget such a gem. It was quite popular song those days.
@ Jahapanah… you did?? U remembered gora chehra kala til and not .. aaaja meri gaadi mei baith ja? You surely would ve ripped the heart of one my childhood friends, to whom Idolising was all about Baba Sehgal, and Akshay Kumar… man … I can see his face cringe!!! :D:D:D
What about the Mallika Sherawat and her 90s counterpart like Mamta Kulkarni and Sheeba. There was Pratibha Sinha too daughter of Mala Sinha.
Oh u mean Mamta “Khol ke Dikha” karni, dunno what Raj Kumar Santoshi saw in her though, pyaar kabhi andha kar deta hai.
Mamta “Khol ke Dikha” karni.:rofl:
There was a whole crop of the actresses in 90 who tried to achieve success by exposing themselves and Mamta was the queen of all.
Rajkumar Santoshi was in love with Mamta? He was fascinated with Meenakshi Sheshadri though.
way below the belt.
way below the belt
I agree, below the belt. I actually liked Mamta. She wasn’t bad, just made some bad decisions and wanted success too soon. Plus, if you make public what a director or hero did to you, you are gone, finished. That’s what happened to her, after China Gate. If she had kept mum about Santoshi incident, she would still be around.
Pratibha Sinha…aweful actress with the “twins”.Last seen in a Mithunda film called Military Raj having music of Bappi Lahiri. The song “balle balle” of that film was sort of an anthem in my college for the well, bouncy dancing in it.
one more culprit is nisha kothari even though in RGV films only but still she is giving pains.. watch her in Shiva.. so bad unable to describe…
RGV seems to have a fascination for pouts, first it was Ms.Matondkar and now Ms.Kothari. Ms.Matondkar though did give some good performances, though of late dunno why she is acting in real B grade stuff. As for Ms.Kothari, she confuses pouting with acting.
RGV sir makes film for her heroines only.. to expose them to the audience pleasure
Nisha (now Priyanka) is special, I agree. I am not sure why i have left her out. May be I haven’t seen enough of her, couldn’t sit through any of her films beyond 15 min.
another one is Urvashi Sharma (plastic Sharma) of naqaab… i still remember that night in Delhi when i watch naqaab at Rivoli theatre and it was full house and after ending, i am telling you one thing that if anybody from naqaab may be actor or director had come there.. khuda hi janta hai public unka kya haal karti… all were very angry.. the tag line was the most shocking thriller of the year… and public was really in shock…
I dunno why but Urvashi Sharma looked like Udita Goswami (a non-actor again) to me.
agreed initially i thought that Udita has gone through with some plastic surgery or something..but i think Urvashi is more bad then udita..
Hey.. where is Somi Ali…what was she
She was Sallu Mian’s first GF, had a break up, but her exposing in Anth was hot. Interesting thing was i saw Hard Target the previous day, and next day caught Anth on Cable, the bike scenes, were a frame to frame copy.
Talking about John Woo’s Hard Target with Jean Claude Van Damme (another non-actor)?
The climax of the Hard Target was copied there in Suniel Shetty’s movie Rakshak too.
Yaar most of Van Damme’s movies were a big bore, i only liked Hard Target, that too coz of John Woo’s stylish action shots.
Well sirjee, my tryst with Hollywood started with the movies of Alrnold and Van Damme whose pirated hindi dubbed cds were available in abundance in my small town. :D
Hard Target is my favourite JCVD movie too. John Woo is master of Gun battles (someone may consider Micheal Mann here too) and stylish action scenes.
Ratnakar- correction, she was Sallu’s 2nd GF- 1st being Sangeeta Bijlani.Anyways Somy Ali is in the U.S- apparently runs a clothing line and a non profit organisation.
And yes Rajkumar Santoshi was in love with Meenakshi and even proposed to her.It was a big gossip item those days.Though I was a kid then, such news would always find its way through to all
Santoshi saab and Mamta Kulkarni actually had a spat while filming China Gate and thats why he brought in Urmila for Chamma Chamma.
In those days sunday edition of Punjab Kesri was full with stories of Santoshi with Meenakshi and later with Mamta.. and there was also a discussion that Santoshi Saab was having something with alphabet “M”
hmmm .. Recently Jackie Shroff, whil trying to stand by his wife’s supposed affair with Sahil Khan mention that she forgave him when he was doing his rounds with Dimple, Madhuri and Meenakshi … and the skeletons were off the closet..
No body talked about real gem of Kapoor Khandan..aah ha ha.. kya actor hua karta tha.. Rajiv Kapoor
bamde mein baat thi.. bus sahi johri nahi mila hire ko tarashne ke liye..
Another one is Yukta Mukhi..in an interview she said… “actully i am very tall so no Indian hero fits with me and that is the reason my acting carrer is not picking up and you see everybody has praised me in pyasa..”
Add another Ms India Shruti Sharma to the list, mostly remember her acting in some skin/sleaze flicks.
Also Zulfi Syed, teak wood at its best, was terrible as Shah Jahan in that Sanjay Khan flick.
Ratnakar ji if i am not wrong it was Akbar khan flick tajmahal..and yes its good you talk about Sanjay khan from where we come to his son Zayed.. who i think is the real wood actor..oops sorry to call him actor…just watch 20 minutes of his misperformance in rocky…. i wont say any thing more..you know what i am talking about..
Yaar Zayed ke naam mat lo, muh se gaali nikaltha hain.
all the ‘vishwa sundaris’ are non-actors who got an easy break in movies.
By the way where is great mandakini these days.. there was some news that she is with “D”
Another great non actor is Ashish Chaudhary..Kya kahen inke baare mein… bus naam hi kaafi hai..
Yep remember him doing Nicholas Cage role in the desi version of Rock, Qayamat( itself a terrible movie), and then Arbaaz Khan- Sanjay Kapoor as bad guys, Riya Sen as one of the heroines, aaargh.
and in the end riya sen says to Ashish after watching Ajay Devgan smiling…”He smiles…he smiles”…uuff that scene is still in my mind like a scar…
yes kaushik infact the entire Khan family can be called non actors right from FEroze to Sanjay To Akbar to Fradeen to Zayed bad sting is , as the industrywallas would say , in their genes .
Proneet Bhai.. Feroz Khan Saab was different… he was good actor and no body can come across his style and in case of rest of the khans i am 100% agree with you that bad acting is in thier genes i dont know why.. why.. they are doing this with us…
I enjoyed watching The Sword of Tipu Sultan in my childhood. I think Sanjay Khan was good in it.
Agreed he was quite good in that and if i am not wrong you must also remember the back ground score of tipu sultan..that was good.. some old memories..
I agree. Feroz Khan had his own style. Sanjay Khan was a heartthrob for ladies, but no actings kills.
sorry i meant acting not sting
i would like to add one more surprise inclusion in your article of non-actors besides Lara which is Ranbir . Now anybody who calls Ranbir a bad actor has either written the article in sleep / under alchol/drugs (the fact that you misspelt Ranir as Rohan proves this) or he is completely ignorant about what good acting is . Ranbir is a terrific natural actor & He is a delight to watch on screen even in bad movies like Sawaariya .
My apologies for getting the name of you idol wrong. But you and I see different things and that’s ok. I have nothing against Ranbir, he might develop and grow over time, if allowed by people around him who seem to treat him like a superstar already. I would be happy to be wrong few years down the line.
@Proneet
Good choice. Thank God you hv found your superstar. Saawariya must be your all time favourite movie,IMO.
Terrific natural actor!! do you understand these words LOL!!
good to meet your kindda log !! :P
Kishen Kumar anyone ? Of the bushy eyebrows and the movie ( I forget the name ), that had 22 songs, I guess it was the first movie that had a double cassette pack for the soundtrack.
Was it Bweafa Sanam?
the movie was Aaja meri jaan..naam mat lo uska.. it was too much of promotion on zee tv in those days..
Oh! his first movie, second was Kasam Teri Kasam which also got a lot of promotion but his only successful movie was Bewafa Sanam.
Oh man, don’t remind me of Kishen Kumar, I used to love that guy and hi audacity for trying to be an actor. Quite brave really!Kind of like Rakhi Savant brave.
Wait till one day he thinks of appearing in Bigg Boss… the new den for all these non actors and similar people who were never cut out for the jobs they wanted to get into…
Nothing beats Papa the Great… the only other act of his which was better than Papa the Great was his supposed illness and admittance to hospital when was slapped with match fixing charges, the face that he made while denying it all, still on th stretcher… on live TV cameras :D …. last heard oscars did not nominate this act, as the news clip overed only 7 seconds and the minimum criteria in any category was 15 seconds…
@PS – I can always count on you to get beautiful names on the forum.. I love that movie.. oh mere papa the great!
I was a regular with these flicks… serious cinema can always arouse debates… know these ones, and all you expect is a crackling time with your friends… I call them the 502 pataka movies…
this was another classic one, where the house is on fire and nagma wants to see aamir khan, and eventually one day kishen kumar makes a wife realise her ‘duties’ as a wife and how she has never lived up to it, by indulging in looking at aamir khan … HILARIOUS!!!!!!!
Kishan Kumar the great has also shown his singing talent also and an album was realeased and there was some song in it starting with ladkiyan.. ladkiyan..
:D:D:D Kickass!!!! I remember that one.. it came alongside aadesh srivastav’s pashchim ki laila ko purab ke chaila ka .. namaste… and there this wierd guy .. god not getting his name… try uttering these lines in the wierdest posssible tune and you may get who I am talking about … .
Nazarein milaake pere paas aake looot liya, Nazarein milaake pere paas aake looot liya, Nazar bhatke ke ke Nazar bhatke ke ke, Nazar bhatke ke ke Dil chura ke chal diye…
PS- it is purab ki laila paschim ki chaila
Kishan Kumar is a specimen indeed.Aaja Meri Jaan and Bewafa Sanam had good music, BS even was a hit.But then thats it.” O Mere Papa the great” uff too much!!!
Hey Sethu, isnt papa the great a remake of some bhagyaraj cinema? was it ever accepted in tamil?
PS- yes Papa the Great is a remake of Bhagyaraj’s Vettiya Madichu Kattu.It was an average grosser@ the box office.
His Veetile Veshanga was remade as
Mr.Bechara ( Anil,Sridevi ),Rasukutti remade as Raja Babu, Sundara Kandam remade as Andaaz,Enga Chinna Rasa remade as Beta, Avasara Police Nooru remade as Gopi Kishen, Andha Ezhu Naatkal remade as Woh Saat Din, Thooral Ninnu Pochu remade as Mohabbat ( Anil Kapoor )- so you can see he has been a good source for Bollywood
Nayee Padosan … I havent seen too many of old tamil movies, but as a kid I remembered one scene which had a “gudgudpani” and then distinct dialogues of Bhagyaraj and Radhika arguing about “Karuppu chette velle pant” … what did I know that ages eons and epoches later, I would be seeing it again in Hindi, that too in a cinema hall….
Yes PS- even I happened to see Nayee Padosan in theatre and was surprised to realise that it was a copy of Bhagyaraj’s Indru Poi Nalai Vaa- how did I leave it from my list? Thanks for reminding me- IPNV was rip roaring fun.
Tribute to the failed producers and directors should also be mentioned. Anyone, Magik, Ram, Ratnakar amyone…
that list will contain more than 80% of the directors and producers.
Mathematically becoming more accurate and can establish that — Quality in Cinema follows Normal distribution curve..
with some skewness on the right side I think.
BAAP OF ALL NON ACTORS…VIJAY ARORA DESERVES THE HONORS…
some of the lesser evils.. Mink, Vindu Singh …
To be real honest I never found Zeenat Aman and Parveen Babi could act.. emote or anything… they could just mouth dialogues… pure screen presence and ooomph… kept them rolling.. my personal opinion, I currently have the same reservation about Prateik Babbar and Jiah Khan… (I am a fan of the 3 actresses, but I cant see them act ever)
some “promising” new comers who never kept their promises … bhagyashree, Madhu, preeti jhangiani, ashwini bhave, zeba bhaktiar, Jugal Hansraj, Faisal Khan, Jai Malhotra (he was touted to be big… he did quite a few movies.. Muskurahat, Jeeyo Shaan se), there was this other actor who resembled Abhay Deol, who worked with Anjali Jhatar in a couple of movies, Karan Kapoor, Harish, Prashant, shucks I forget her name… (the one in coolie number 1 as Harish’s girlfriend, a lot of T Series movie.. I think Kanchan or something) Anu Agarwal, Kajal Kiran, Rahul Roy, Deepak Tijori, Ayub Khan, Ayesha Julka, Sheetal… hmm.. wait ll get more…
the one that is Harish the great’s gf is Kanchan.. another movie where she was paired against akshay kumar was Amaanat! Btw i thot I’m going to be the first one to mention Harish.. Few more movies n he wud have been in anyone’s top list of non actors. He started acting in mallu porn movies later.. Any comments on his as well as Karisma’s debut movie Premquaidi??
Harish acted in mallu soft porn movies before he did Hindi films.After Hindi films he did some Telugu films too.Kanchan is not to be seen at all.So also Chandni who acted in Sanam Bewafa etc.Premqaidi- I live for you, I die for you, hilarious!!!
We would call them the “STARDUST” kings. Basically during 90’s, Stardust would take any upcomming actor, and promote him as the next big thing. And every time we would hear that SRK is now over, and he should retire. SRK is still around, most of the “Next big” ones are nowhere in the scene.
Correction – Jai Mehta son of Pranlal Mehta (say it as if you are watching Lord of the Rings, Gimli son of Gloin)
@tejas… shucks, I missed that.. I am so so sorry, nothing can pardon this sin … I promise I will watch “iski topi us ke sar” 55 times to atone this sin :D
“I am making a bold prediction, Rohan Kapoor has the potential to beat all non-actors and reach the heights that nobody has ever reached. Not because Rohan is a particularly bad actor, because everybody in the industry keeps sticking super stardom on him, which means he’ll never get the opportunity to grind it and learn by working hard under a good director. Even though only few films old, RK has demonstrated enough traits in films like Saawariya and BAH to show that he may have many talents, acting is not one of them. But he has got big banners and big producers like Karan Johar probably see in him what ordinary audience members like me don’t. Wake up Sid! I doubt he ever will, but we’ll see. In the worst case, Rohan will end up like Akshaye Khanna, born superstar who never achieved what he was born to achieve, according to film pundits.”
ROHAN KAPOOR WHO………………………… I thought it was RANBIR KAPOOR
Yes, AJ. I meant Ranbir. I haven’t yet understood why I called his name wrong, signs of early Alzheimers I guess or is it Parkinsons. Remember, they mixed it up in Black too, all those geniuses who cried that Black should be given an Oscar.
hehe…mast hai! What are you smoking these days, Singh Ji?
however, forutnately there was a non actor lead actor called rohan kapoor with about 5 films to his credit, he was son of a famous singer, perhaps mahendra kapoor. however, i imho ranbir kapoor is not a non actor, he has all the elements to become a star, however i think imran khan the nephew of aamir khan is a major non actor and nither has any flair
I havent seen even a single movie of Ranbir so dont want to comment. But having seen JTYJN , Kidnap and LUCK , yes, I can say affirmativley , Imran khan is a dead non-actor. He cant emote anything. He was flat in Kidnap and proved the same skill in Luck !!
suck these basterd !!
The real Rohan Kapoor (singer mahendra kapoor’s son who made a debut with Yash Chopra’s Faasle in the mid 80s) does belong here in this list of non-actors. Maybe you subconsciously had him in mind.
too many Kapoors and Khans in the industry! Who can remember all their names.
This was like a cosine curve, low and high kept coming at regular intervals. Few people on the list does not belong here (after all everybody has different opinion, so I don’t wanna touch that point). Few times it looked biased too.
It was longgggg, but kinda funny. Good job.
Grand father of all bad actors is Ishrat Ali (male muse of RGV) how can somebody cast him and his most memorable performace is from GUNDA as lamboo atta.. kya scene hai…kundan mere bhai..tu jana nahi.. yaad hai mere bhai kundan… and that scene before his killing by Bula.. his dance steps gore gore gaal gaal gore…
dude, thats a different league altogether man.. he is not a lead actor, though that does open a whole new list including MacMohan and the guy who is always there in his movies, one of the brothers in satte pe satta ….
Agree.. thats a different league and he is not lead actor but in this different league he is the KING..
@Akash… Ishrat Ali …hmm that stayed in my mind …that definately registers the one expression Tiku Talsania into this list … he is a supreme example of how people need that one expression in every movie in 90s…. damn … my life is pretty bad… after a U2 ka opening night concert…. beer tsunami and vodka rains, the next day morning hangover reminded me of Ishrat Ali, Tiku Talsania and Mahesh Bhatt movies :(
Hey singh, you missed out on imran khan. imho, that guy is a complete dodo.
Any 1 recall Keerthi Reddy, the Pyaar,Ishq,Mohabbat female, she looked fabulous, but totally blank when it came to expressions.
Yes Ratnakar I remember Keerthi Reddy.she even did Tera Jadoo Chal Gaya and Badhai Ho Badhai.
She had done quite a few Tamil and Telugu films.Quite a stunning looker – she then came back into prominence with the Bin Tere Sanam remix music video.She was married to Sumanth, the Telugu actor !!!
yup, she was south actress even had a movie with abhishek bachchan. This list will be quite long if we start including every Tom, Dick and Harry who has done 2-3 movies.
Tom dick n harry reminds me of Jimmy. Did anyone talk abt him. i thot the guy is no good.. anyone with second thots?
I thought Jimmy was good in Maachis, A Wednesday. Not a bad actor IMO.
right..jimmy is not a bad actor and was quite good in wednesday…
Havent seen his Yahaan which was a solo act. Haasil mein woh hero hoke bhi Hero nahi tha.. It was Irfaan all the way.. So i dont think he has any hit movie against his name as a solo hero.
Some dud actors who did qiute a number of films are Aditya Pancholi and Chunky Pandey. Though Chunkey Pandey made it big in Bangladesh.
@Ratnakar – u still going string
..i remembered one more gem of a movie.. Rok sako to rok lo.. all non-actors including our own sunny paaji with a harley n bandana 
He, he, when it comes to “Cheesy” stuff, i am always in. Ur forgetting the real gem behind RSTRL, Arindam “Pony Tail” Choudhury. He said he had made the perfect movie, after doing an extensive study.
I remember that..what an idiot!
Arindham Chaudhary must have done some market survey keeping in mind the econimic situation at that time before making RSTRL and he keep on repeating that this one is best teenage school love story ever made…
NAh… he had a PLAN!!! THE PLANMAN… students of IIPM (I am not kidding, at least in blore they were) were unofficially told by their teachers that there is “group outing” and everybody has to watch this movie… or rok sako toh rok lo from getting ur internal assessments thoda screwed up … poor man plan man, forgot that there is a world beyond his college…
Nobody has mentioned Shilpa Shetty yet.
thats weird. she is as bad as riya sen, celina jaitley n any other non-actress u can think of. her marathi girl act was bloody pathetic in that even crappier movie rishtey!!
Shilpa Shetty gets away because of “Phir Milenge” and “Metro”, 2 movies in which her performance was decent.
Though i don’t understand what was so great about her performance in Metro, it was decent at the best, but every one went ga ga over it. And off screen she is so irritating, i remember during IPL2, her giggling, antics, was so irritating. No redemption for her sister Shamita, she is one of the worst performers.
So the non-actor sister duos- Shilpa and Shamita, Malaika and Amrita, Riya and Raima. Karishma and Kareena? May be, may be not.
I have no idea about Shilpa Shirodkar and Namrata Shirodkar.
Shilpa and Namrata were ok. Shilpa did put in some good performances in Khuda Gawah, and Namrata was good in Vaastav, Astitva. Not too bad.
Shilpa was fine in Gopi Kishen too- very funny.Namrata looks lovely and acts ok.Riya cant act- but Raima is a good actress.
yes, that’s why I was confused and reluctant to include them here because I too thought that Shilpa and Namrata gave decent performances here and there.
Twinkle and Rinki Khanna may be in the list too.
yeah even i thot she was pretty ordinary.. mebbe people liked her being less irritating.. for me sharmaan was the best in that movie
I liked only Konkana-Irrfan part. Rest of the movie goes in trash box.
nice one !!!….how about kamal sadanah
…
Kamal sadanah was good for nothing.. he was also in a film titled rock dancer with samanta fox..Recently he produced Victoria no.203 staring doughter of late Vinod Mehra..
Bobby Deol…biggest of them all, I can write tomes on his lack of honest expressions, actually does he have an expressions other than befuddled…single reason why Kabir Kaushik’s movie sunk!
Hey i think nobody mentioned Tanisha… too bad..
Main to yun dil de baithi jaane bina main pyar kar baithi
i was nine maine usse tv pe dekha, George Michael uska naam tha…
Nikki nikki nikki nikki
yo Nikki Bakshi sweet n sexy full on rocking hot and happening
Nikki Bakshi sweet n sexy full on rocking hot and happening…
Absolutely valid
Last heard,
His BF broken with her, when in bed she started moaning and crying “Stop Niel” :(
@Akash
And how could you forget the macho man “UDAY chopra”.. O mummy.
Heard he is pairing up with Priyanka to reviev his career.
….
….
he had a career ? ? ???
rahul roy, anu agarwal were a class non acting pair.
its unfair to include raveena. I think the 80s-90s commercial cinema were the worst ever
for the heroines. Some of the trash they had to act in ! Even madhuri, sreedevi, meenakshi shesadri etc werent spared from rolling their eyes and looking glazed. Karishma was quite sad IMO, that movie made by shyam benegal with her was quite cringe worthy..
Sanjay Kapoor I think redemed himself in Luck by Chance. I think Farhan Akhtar should be in that list, he gets away since his movies didnt really need too much of him to perform. Check that climax of Luck by chance and how konkana sen mauls him apart.
of the current starts..yeah. Celina is hillarious, Ria, Sophie, Kim Sharma…gawd knows where they come from. Katrina gets away too, for being too pretty, like wise Lara.
what about Mohit Ahlawat of James and shiva..
NAHEENNNNNNNNNNNNN
There was Sharad Kapoor… where is he these days..?
What was the name of the actor in some movie with song ’subah subah jab khidki kole baju wali ladki hi dil mera bole hello how are you. The actress was I think Antara of DD serial Ek Se Badhkar Ek (her screenname)
And Faisal Khan, brother of Amir too was very pathetic in his debut Madhosh.
OK I recalled the name of the movie was Yash.
That Yash’s guy name was some Anand, he also acted as Kajol’s fiance who ditches her in Pyaar to Hona Hi Tha. And honestly in that flick, he was pathetic.
his name is Inder Kumar and movie was ghoonghat also starring Ayesha zulka
oops that song was jaago jaago subah ho gai jaldi se pilo chai thandi ho gai.. from ghoonghat..BTW Inder kumar also comes in this list
He debuted in Masoom opposite Ayesha Julka.
Bijoy Anand is the guy who came in Yash.Heroine was Kartika Rane.It had good music- ” Subah subah jab khidki khole baaju waali ladki hai” and also
” yaaron na jaane mujhe kya ho gaya”
Inder Kumar came in many movies.masoom did decent business @ B.O.again music was good- ” gore gore paon mein, chandi ki payal” and then ” yeh jo teri payalon ki cham cham hai” and of course ” jaago jaago jaago subah ho gayi”
I used to listen these songs everyday in Chitralok on Vividh Bharti in my ‘bachpan’.
There is a actor whose name I dont remember. He was there in the movies like ‘Lal Dupatta Malmal Ka’ and ‘Nagmani’ (Dont recall any other). These movies are also not listed on imdb so I’m having trouble figuring it out. The songs of his movies were very hit. I think he was also in the movie ‘Bahar Aane Tak’ (kali teri choti hai paradna tera laalni).
Jahanpanah- you are confused a bit.Bahaar Aane Tak had Sumeet Saigal and Tariq Shah ( both gems) while Lal Dupatta Malmal Ka had Sahil Chhada ( another gem )
The guy is question is Saahil … funny, reminds me of a time when T Series were like the YRF, White Feather, KJO gang, but they just had their own set… all new fresh people from Delhi and around, the TV Anchors, Music Videos (absolute low quality, but they were there), their own music countdown,l actors, singers… everything, basically an entire industry of theirs…
Oh, PS, you PS,
Don’t make me nostalgic of those days. It wasn’t 80’s anymore, wasn’t quite 90’s yet. Gulshan Kumar dominated TV. Remember his music videos where he would appear himself in full avatar alongside Anuradha Paudwal.
Lal Dupatta-II had a nice song -”Na jane kyon dil bekaraar”. Udit Narayanan never sounded better and more fresh. GK made all his money by selling music cassettes of Lal Dupatta and the film was only a video release.
Generally a lot of songs were good, with T Series, just that they were never cut out for success… “jaate ho pardes piya” and kinds… remember Kavita Kapoor of One black Coffee, and Asif Shaikh with “jeena teri gali mei” …
Apart from himself, he had invaded delhi doordarshan (I am not sure about telecasts in other places) where we were shown countdowns of private albums only made by T Series… “tere baalon pe moti piro du, teri aankhon mei kahajal sjaaa doon” anybody rememebers?
In bahar aane tak there was Sumit Sehgal and there was also a sequel of lal dupatta malmal ka named phir lehraya lal dupatta malmal ka…but dont know the name of the hero
What? It had a sequel as well (more torcher)
So it was Sumit Sehgal was was in movie Naagmani with Shikha Swaroop (Chandrakanta fame).
Yes sir… it had a sequel too…maano ya na maano per yehi satya hai…
Chitralok on Vividh Bharati was a my regular favorite too.Ameen Sayani was splendid.The way they would promote movies like Baharon Ki Manzil,Meera Ka Mohan,Dil Ka Kya Kasoor etc- movie magic @ its best.
True sir. I actually consider myself lucky to be the last of the generation who has listened to Ameen Sayani. I couldn’t hear him on Binaca Geetmala though. It think they stopped airing it in 1994 but I’ve listened Cibaca Geetmala which ran up till 2002, if I remember correctly.
I remember the way they promotes these films and one such movie was Meet Mere Maan ka… oh my old philips radio…
Sethu ji I missed your viewpoint on Sonu Nigam… that is the best analysis of Sonu the great…
Are janta jaago, no one mentioned our own Himmesh Reshamiya. he is definetly in top ranks of non-actors. Just watched the promo of his upcoming flick “Radio” smthing. :P
For making Dino Morea look like Marlon Brando in Karzzz, Himesh deserves a Lifetime Achievement Award.
thats a blunder on our part..
it shoul’nt have happened, but no problem der aaye per durust aaye.. Himesh bhaiya is one of the credible contender for top most slot in this category. Bolo himesh Bhaiya ki jai…
Himeshji to gyani hain,antaryami hain.woh to purush hi nahin…….maha purush hain
We also forget to mention the greatest actor of all times… the one and only Sonu Nigam…Javed bhai so rahe le… to ache khase so rahe le and those beautiful land scapes in Love in Nepal..wow…
He hs been mentioned earlier, look on page 1. There is this whole song posted by Sethu sir.
oops… m sorry i did’nt notice it..
Very good post Singh. This is your first post that I have read. Hopefully you have written some more on PFC; I’ll find out soon. I wish theres a real brave director, well actually a producer who would put his money on making a movie with all these guys. Its a sure shot hit. People like to laugh and theres nothing better than these guys trying to act.
I have few questions for you and other readers of this post:
1. What would Bobby Deol do for a living if he wasn’t a Deol?
2. Arbaaz Khan and Shoail Khan? What was Salim thinking?
3. Who gives Dev Anand the money to make his movies?
Hopefully we’ll get some funny answers.
Abhra ji,
That sounds like a nice haiku
Sohail Khan
Arbaz Khan
What was Salim thinking?
:-)
Thanks man but how come I missed Salman Khan ? What was I thinking ?
Ok, here we go
Sohail Khan, Arbaz Khan
Missed Salman Khan
What was Abhra thinking?
was wondering why sunil shetty hasnt yet figured on this discussion ?
Bingo !! Suniel Shetty “phew”. jaise chattaan ka chehra hai koi emotion paida he nahi kar sakta …
Gulzar saab ki HU tu tu mei kya kiya hai viase isne ?
wow, we severly missed out counting Chunky Pandey … another one.. SNEHA ULLAL!!!!
This comment might be offtrack but I cudnt resist myself posting it here.
“Today Jackie Shroff is filling the gap that Dilip saab left behind” and guess who said this.. The non-actor Arbaaz khaan.
Man kar raha tha ek kantaap (big punch) dene ko !!
http://www.bollywoodhungama.com/features/2009/08/28/5446/index.html
This ones priceless Thanks Yaatri
Mein hukumat se guzarish karta hun ki arbaaz khan ko is gustakhi ke liye 11000 kodon ki sakht sazaa di jani chahiye… or is gustakh per koi reham na kiya jaye..
Another actor who i found quite stale and dead is RaajKumar. I dont claim to watch a lot of his films. But whatever I have seen(marte dam tak, tiranga..etc) , I found him totally unimpressive. I used to wonder , how this man got mileage in the industry by talking in “Jaani style”.
Sorry if i offended someone by introducing Jaani here !!
I also hope nobody is offended but I agree with you Yaatri, I didnt think of Rajkumar as a great actor as well, even Shatrughan Sinha in a lot of his movies came across as “apni hi duniya mei” but then I guess thats what made them stars … their apni hi duniya ki acting, which caught fancy, showed them as a different league and like, I am apart, I have my own way kinds…
aisa esliye kyonki aakhri badshah yehi hai…
Raj Kumar had an excellent track record, before his “Jaani” avataar, in Pakezaah, Dil Ek Mandir, Kaajal, Paigam. After Waqt,though every body wanted him to do the “Chinoy Sheth, Jo Sheeshe Ke Makaan Mein Rehthe Hain” kin da stuff. Regarding Shotgun, its the same again, masses loved to see him doing those lengthy monologues. And one thing for both Raaj Kumar and Shotgun Sinha, is that they had the kinda style, which could hook the audiences,yeah they were hammy, OTT, but i never felt bored, watching them.
Permission to digress!!
Anyone seen that Kylie Minogue song from Blue – Jiggy/Chiggy wiggy with you Boy?? Wish we could give out such awards to singers as well!
navin nischal…..any takers????
What about Khosla ka Ghosla ?
Speaking abt non actors and their expressions..let us wonder..how these actors give a good performance when handled by a good director or if they are put in a good story..some examples are like ABHISHEK BACHHAN-GURU/PHIR MILENGE, ARJUN RAMPAL-ROCK ON, SHILPA SHETTY-PHIR MILENGE…If we see the other way..then let us look at AKSHAYE KHANNA & VIVEK OBEOROI-gr8 actors..but one bad script or director..they jus.. look dumb.like Vivek in Masti—total useless..even i remember Fardeen putting a decent act in DEV.tht too opposite BIG B. Not forgetting Sunny Deol in Ghayal Ghatak & Border..also Suniel Shetty in BORDER..Are the actors really to be blamed and be called non performers…or its the director and the script????..this is wht i hav to say..anyone thought of this..
I dont consider Sunny Deol as an all time bad actor… its just that lately he seems to have gotten bored with all of it… so, why not do what I do the best… shout… why bother about rest.. seems to be his motto
I beleive Randhir Kapoor will join the group soon. He is most blank actor after Tushar Kapoor
I dont understand why people want to insert such links in GB’s blog and divert traffic to their website…they may get a launch the first time but they remain the Sanjay Kapoor’s…dont want to sound harsh but this is not what we deserve…my tribute to the non-actor!
Biswajit – I dont understand why people should not do that. I take the responsibility to face your ire. But what seems to be the problem? You think this is a site that needs cheap publicity? Do you really?
Singhji,
Nice article, but my brief observations:
1) its ranbir kapoor and not rohan kapoor. Rohan was Mahendra kapoor’s son who came in films such as Love 86 and then vanished. Actually, he falls in the same league as avinash wadhwan and co.
2) Sujit kumar and not acting… kya baat kar rahey ho yaar… just watch “the great gambler” to watch his oscar winning performance…. ;-)
3) I actually think that Ranbir kapoor will make it big. Not because he has it in his genes, but because the kind of films being made are fairly versatile and he will make a niche for himself. 70’s – 80’s mein hero banney ke liye dancing, fighting, horse riding, lambey baal and baggy pants chahiye they… today movies are more real… i think that he suits the young urban diaspora and should do well…
however, my expectations from the Imran Khan are too little…. tooo much hype, too much comparisons with maamu jaan etc… dont think he can pull it off… will end uo like another of his relatives – Tariq ( remember yaadon ki baraat & Hum kisi se kum nahin?)
BTW, kimi reminded me of another heroine – Kim – gave quite a few hits but was a disasterous actress..
I had a similar post a few years ago at PFC “Kahan gaye woh log” perhaps you will enjoy it!
Nice article again!
I am tempted to mention two of the most successful non actors…Aishwarya & Katrina…
Katrina, as all would agree, has no clue about acting but has one of the best commercial records in history!!! It doesn’t get more ironic than this…
Some might object at Miss Rai’s name…but I’ve always felt she is total plastic & even in her acclaimed roles I din’t find her to be natural…But the saddest part was, she featured in some kind of a poll of “greatest actresses” a few years ago with Madhubala, Nargis, Madhuri & Rekha…& at that was before Guru & JA!!! Talk of sycophancy…!
In fact I feel that AB Jr was an unfair inclusion…he is not that sad…anyway nowadays you get to see non actors making debuts every week…latest being Shruti Hassan…
@PS,Ratnakar,Sethu n many more who contributed to this article – Just one honest questions?? are we done with all the names?? I’m missing all the fun…I’m not able to move on.. Dil mein ek hi khayal baar baar aata hai..Koi to hai jo chhut gaya hai
I’m sure there are still many more that we have missed out.. did any one mention vikas bhalla? n how about chandrachur singh? n why the hell no one talked about neelam???
Mallika Sherawat- And please don’t say Pyaar Ke Side Effects, i just can’t stand her screechy voice, her grimaces.
Speaking of Neelam, there was this desi remake of Indecent Proposal, Sauda, starring Neelam, Vikas Bhalla, and Sumeet Saigal. Indecent Proposal was not a great movie either, but then it had Robert Redford, now imagine Sumeet Saigal in Robert Redford’s role.
i din really mind mallika in PKSE.. but i loved in her one of the sarabhai vs sarabhai episode. why naaat why naat..sure. dont know if u seen it.
n indecent proposal was made twice in hindi. Have seen sauda. man it was brilliant.. the godly status sumeet saigal achieves in the movie is speechless :D
the other remake of the same was karobaar. havent seen it so cant comment!!
@ MyAlterEgo- nah! I’m sure we must have still missed out a few more.Vikas Bhalla is a lovely addition to the list
Chandrachur Singh was good in Maachis and even in Tere Mere Sapne atleast.Neelam to zaroor worthy hai.BTW I dont think we have discussed Vivek Mushran either right?
I mentioned chandrachur coz of his later movies like aamdani atthani, betaabi n Daag – the fire.. even in tere mere sapne, he wasnt great.. i think i read someone mentioning mushran. the guy is back on small tv in bhaskar bharti n boy he is still the same.. irritating to the core!
Ironically i felt Arshad Warsi would be another flop actor, and Chandrachur would be the next best thing, after Maachis, TMS. But proved totally wrong. I think Chandrachur’s act in Maachis owed more to Gulzar, he was horrendous as a playboy in Silsila Hai Pyaar Ka(itself a torture flick), and then later it was all the way down. Warsi on the other hand after an indifferent start, hit it big with Munnabhai series, WBHH-2, but for me Seher is the movie that showed Warsi’s calibre as an actor, in a serious role, he was first rate, showing there is more to him than just comedy.
yeah he was brilliant in sehar. i also liked him in kuch meetha ho jaaye!!
Well, cant say much about Chandrachur Singh, though he never had outstanding performance .. (maachis had the overall tense feel that I think even if any actor was replaced, the script screenplay and the mood would have ensured that it doesnt change) … but Chandrachur singh also never got a great movie to perform, I think he was pretty decent as the corrupt lawyer in Daag the Fire, could have done a lot more in JOSH, but that apart the guy met with a serious accident, was bed ridden and gone real fat, so cant really comment about him…
Though I believe, if his health had permitted … he would ve been a lot more intense actor than Arshad Warsi … The other thing that reminds me of a dialogue from Luck By Chance…. Chandrachur Singh and Vivek Mushran, also looked very CONTENT… an amazing dialogue that can suit a lot of people mentioned in this post….
OKAY, another few bad actors… Mukul Dev, Rahul Dev, and Sharad Kapoor….
Come to think of it, if it wasnt for 2003-2005, I would ve slated Ajay Devgan in this list as well…
Yes Chandrachoorn singh in Machis was because of Gulzar saab. Remember what he did to Jeetendra in Khusboo and Kinaara !!
@Prassanna
Befor that Ajay devgan has done a few decent role. Jakhm and kacche dhage are the two films where I liked his performances and not to forget Hum dil de chuke sanam, that was really an awesome performance.
(P.S: I am a fan of AD since his Phool aur Kaante days)
Phool aur kaante was mindblowing to me as well.. AD Fan … me too big time… but I cringed seeing him do movies like hulchul, naajayaz, itihaas, (the one with akshay kumar, Karishma and Nagma forgetting the name) … it for sure made me believe that unless a role was almost made to fit his real life image (strictly image, in terms of how he looked), he could not play it…be it hum dil chuke sanam, or Ishq, Pyar toh Hona hi tha, all the characters were carried in his vague way of delivering dialogues… to me he became a mind blasting actor after, Qayamat, where he carried a 2 bit super masala idotic role to hilt (THAT ACCORDING TO ME IS ACTING, THAT’S WHY AB IS A STAR… CARRYING THE STUPIDEST OF ROLES WITH CONVICTION) and along side did what a superb variety of Bhagat Singh, Zameen, Gangajal, Apharan, Lajja (I am forgetting it, but he had 7 movies that year) … he was bang on looking the role and acting it… Khakhee took it to another level of menacing… so at an overall point, I’d still rate AD as a good actor only after that period…
Kachche Dhaage, again … I thought very rough patches of the actor..
personally thoughts… I thought Kunal Khemu was the actual hero in Zakhmn… where was AD?
@Prasanna
Yes he realised his potential in that period only. But dont classified him as non-actor! tht’s the point :D
And I just rechecked , Ajay devgan fetched his first national award for his performance in Zakham. :-)
I saw Zakhm only after I knew he won the Ntl Award man … but trust me I was pretty much disappointed with AD in …Zakhm … but yeah these are personal toughts.. and I would definately not position him as a NON actor anymore, but what I was suggesting is that maybe a few of the non actors we discussed had a few amazing directors backing em up… maybe they’d prove a point as well …
Katrina and Aishwarya – motion seconded.
Katrina surely.. Aishwarya I’m kinda biased.. she was good in raincoat
Aish i think is more of a director’s actress, she was good in Jodha Akbar, Guru, Raincoat. But she can’t carry a movie on her own like Rekha, Sridevi or Madhuri. Her performance in Umrao Jaan though was cringe worthy, gimme Rekha any day please.
@Ratnakar
Agree ,she was good in Guru but Raincoat she was offkey and totally unnatural.:( JA I havnt seen so cant say anything.
i liked her coz she was totally unnatural. Naturally she puts me off
My Favorite Aish movie remains MELA… though even in MELA she appeared was like an omlette with way too much of oil …still …didnt have to bother as to why she is supposed be a great actor… her best ever…
When did aish do Mela?It was Twinkle Khanna in Mela.But we can certainly talk of Faisal Khan from Mela – he certainly fits this list
Faisal Khan I had already mentioned in one my responses…. he certainly was one of the greatest non actors india had produced… Aish … was there for a 45 second role, right at the end, when she falls off the top of the truck and Faisal Khan falls for her, and the movie ends with the eternal “feel so good for everybody” syndrome with Faisal khan feeding her oranges, while Aamir and Twinkle sing the “mela” title song in background …
You missed her cause she didnt get a chance to overact… AND THATS WHY ITS HET BEST PERFORMACE EVER
…. though even in the limited space, she did try ..
@ Prasanna-Hmm now I understand your point of Aish wrt Mela
@ everybody … My serious question, please do prove me wrong … was arjun rampal seriously kickass in ROCK ON???? I mean what did he do in the entire movie.. he was ensured of very few dialogues, the scenes were made sure to suit his ‘gritty expressions’ but wasn’t there all there was to it? let me know if i am missed something… I thought JOE was given to a person who looked amazing, promising, but yet was a loser cuz somehow he never was able to get his act together… and somewhere they got this pitted in against Arjun Rampal … and it fit… now minimise the dialogues, take side shot reactions to what other actors talk, and voila, “mera dost mera bhai” JOE is kickass in the movie…
Exactly my point. I mentioned it some 10 times on page 1 of the comments. he is the most dead pan actor i’ve ever seen..
@ Prasanna.. my viewpoint is same as of you in case of Arjun Rampal in Rockon…infact when playing guitar in movie, his fingers were moving too slowly in comparision to the music…so what kind of actor he is…? if he can’t even move his fingers fast as per the music…
honestly Akash, I am very chota viewer… I dont bother to observe too much if an actor is moving his fingers while playing guitar (in that case, Saif was possibly one of the earlier actors, with moving his fingers on guitar, for every song in Imtihaan) … but to term Arjun Rampal as a super performer in Rock On, to me is like terming Suraj Chaddha as the best actor for playing Sun God smiling on earth, in one of those 100 mythological programmes that we get on TV..
No man,I think no body gave any sort of awesome performance in Rock on. Farhan was the best with restricted acting.
anyone not discussing… AFTAB..FARDEEN..ZAYED.RITESH..
Also Emraan ‘monkey’ Hasmi.
@ deepak … thode late ho yaar…Aftab has his own league which can be found all over te first pages of responses… fardeen aur …. naam loge toh Ratnakar sir ke muuh se gaali niklegi .. (source first pafge again.. ) ritesh … hmmm … cant dismiss him as a bad actor… not a good one as well, but this post is dedicated to the severe non actors… like the first 3 mentioned
did anybody count sonali bendre?
rather, I think bhatts make sure to make movies only with non actors… some of them groom into decent actors, but for sure when then start with bhatts… they are a sure shot non actors…