50 years of Zanjeer: A look back at the movie which revolutionized Bollywood

On the face of it, 1973 resembles a typical golden year from the classic Bollywood era of sixties and seventies. Romantic adventures (Bobby) and musical medleys (Yaadon Ki Baarat) with a usual sprinkling of social dramas (Namak Haraam) were the successful cinematic events of the year. However, amidst this usual array of song and dance features lay a landmark film, which was to change Bollywood forever.

Prakash Mehra’s blockbuster hit Zanjeer starring Amitabh Bachchan, Jaya Bachchan (née Bhaduri), Pran and Ajit, with music from Kalyanji-Anandji and screenplay by Salim-Javed, went beyond the run-of-the-mill action movies of the era. This is important because till then most Bollywood “action” movies (barring the patriotic fares like Shaheed or Haqeeqat) included fighting sequences as a side gig, to accompany the main servings of romance or drama.

This action fuelled spectacle captured the imagination of Indian audiences. They appreciated a lead who looked the part of a young police officer and was capable of carrying it out too in the form of realistic on-screen tussles.

But Zanjeer wasn’t all action. Its plot ushered a good mix of mirth, pathos, tensionand drama. The story about a wronged man’s rage was supported by a strong script. Each dialogue took the film forward, while also adding depth to the characters.

So, honest cop Vijay (Amitabh) shows his disgust for crime when he rebukes local strongman Sher Khan (Pran) with “Jab tak baithane ko na kaha jaaye sharafat se khade raho, ye police station hai, tumhare baap ka ghar nahi”. Despite being on the wrong end of law, Sher Khan redeems himself in the eyes of audience with, “Sher Khan kaale ka dhanda karta hai, lekin Imaandari se”. And Teja (Ajit) reads Vijay’s upright nature with an immaculate, “Jo log partiyon mein alag thalag rehte hai, woh aamtor pe bahut ziddi hote hai”.

Other things that stood out in the film’s favour were its strong characters.

Sher Khan, Vijay’s ally, became the very definition of a trustworthy friend in Bollywood fiction. To some modern viewers, it might appear that Sher Khan is a fantasy rendition of the nice Muslim trope, with little nuance to his personality other than advancing the story of Vijay. However, the character’s relevance can be understood in context of the time period: the seventies India had seen a bloody partition only a few years ago, and several famed Muslim Bollywood actors (including Ajit in this very film) still carried Hindu names for greater acceptance among the masses.

In that lens, Sher Khan was a big creative step forward to bridge this social divide.

Even though Vijay’s love interest, Mala (Jaya), had a small appearance as a poor street artist and knife seller, but at least the makers did justice to her by showing that the character was no damsel-in-distress. Rather in keeping with her profession, Mala is streetwise, more than capable of defending herself while also helping out Vijay and Sher Khan in their quest to eliminate the evil of Teja.

But Zanjeer’s status as a trendsetter was sealed with the introduction of the Angry Young Man. While this character helped Amitabh showcase his multiple skills as an artist, it also launched the actor into stardom. Its impact, however, went beyond this film, altering the Bollywood protagonist forever and becoming an influence for several years to come.

Unlike the conventional Bollywood hero of the day, the Angry Young Man did not run around trees wooing the female leads or preach some moral precept to the viewers. He was a man wronged by fate and circumstances. His story arc was defined by a quest for vengeance. His primary aim wasn’t love but revenge. It seemed as if he was destined for torment instead of happiness in his life.

Many leading stars of the era who were used to essaying romantic or tragic heroes, including Dilip Kumar, Raaj Kumar, and Dev Anand, refused to take the role of Vijay as this conceptualization seemed too outlandish for the day.

However, the relatively inexperienced Amitabh not only delivered but managed to find a special space in the hearts and minds of the audience with his performance. Perhaps the character’s basic appeal lay in the fact that by identifying with him, the viewers could imagine taking on their real-life troubles in the same fists-and-blow fashion as their hero did.

But there was much more to the Angry Young Man, which helped sustain the phenomenon over a number of years. Some of these facets were birthed in Zanjeer itself.

The anguish over his parents’ murder, brought forth a form of righteous anger which made Amitabh’s character an enemy of all social evils. Though Zanjeer’s Vijay was on the right side of law, this trait would remain inside the future iterations of the Angry Young Man, irrespective of backgrounds, whether it be in the form of a dock worker who is forced by social circumstances to take a life of crime in Deewar or a coal mineworker in Kaala Patthar.

While Vijay had Mala in this movie, his quest for vengeance always trumped their romantic aspirations. Though Vijay has traits of a sajjan Bollywood hero, he is completely consumed in this never-ending war against the seemingly invincible Teja. Though he loves Mala, it is only at the very end that they come close to what one may call a normal life.

In movies like Deewar, this is taken a step further, where Vijay’s love never finds a meaningful end.

Zanjeer depicts its protagonist as someone who is well aware of the socio-economic circumstances he’s risen from and that informs his understanding of the world. Hence, he targets Teja, a famed industrialist who is the secretly the kingpin of smuggling operations, directly in order to bring down the evil empire. This awareness runs deeply through other features like Trishul and Deewar.

Other than an immediate impact on the cinema of seventies, the Angry Young Man would go on to inspire the socially aware vigilante heroes of future cinema, as seen in Rahul Rawail’s Arjun, N Chandra’s Ankush and Ram Gopal Varma’s Shiva.

Much like Vittorio De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves, which inspired neorealist tendencies in Indian cinema, Zanjeer paved the way for a different sort of lead, one who would refuse to give up against the evils of the society and fight to better his position.

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