The Style Icon

By: Poonam Bisht

In a glorious career spanning over more than three decades, Amitabh Bachchan has tasted phenomenal success. He has been appreciated, revered and even worshipped in India and abroad. Most of his contemporaries or immediate successors, however successful they might have been, have either bid adieu to the industry or joined/rather forced to join an alternative career-or are leading a retired life away from the limelight.But Amitabh Bachchan is timeless. Right from the beginning of his career, he learnt the craft of moving with the times pretty well. He has never shown inhibitions in “treading the path less travelled by”. Thus, he mastered the craft of innovating himself every now and then. At 65, Amitabh Bachchan’s fan following ranges from a four-year old to a 70-year old. The youth look up to him as their icon and want to be like him.From Saat Hindustani in 1969 to Kabhie Alvida Naa Kehna in 2006, Amitabh Bachchan has shown such great variety in terms of looks, style and attitude apart from remarkable progress in acting that none can make a more powerful fashion statement than our own “STYLE GURU’. Here’s look at the conscious and unconscious ultimate fashion trend set by Big B since his debut:Deewar: Dressed in faded brown trousers, unbuttoned shirt with rope on left shoulders and of course badge number 786, keeping unkempt hair, smoking a beedi and face reflecting oodles of attitude- Amitabh Bachchan created magic of sorts. The easiness with which he carried this style was appreciated by one and all. Trishul: Dressed as an ordinary mine labourer, Amitabh’s stylish walk (eyes reflecting intense pain for his ill mother) with the background of powerful explosions, still remaining unruffled made the youth go ga gaga over him. The transformation of Amitabh`s clothing from that of a labourer to that of a rich businessman was truly outstanding. His bell-bottom pants became a rage. Silsila and Kabhie Kabhie: Having firmly established his reputation as the Angry Young Man, Amitabh was assigned the task of playing a poet (suffering from love loss) in Yash Chopra’s brilliant classics. And what a superb job Amitabh did. While in Silsila, he was seen mostly wearing a poet style white kurta payajama with a shawl or long collared shirts (with two upper buttons off) with smart blazers. In Kabhie Kabhie, his high necks and fur coats created a rage among the guys. Another style statement about him here was his long whisker, something that imitated by most of the young men. Mohabbatein: Amitabh Bachchan has by this time gracefully adopted the roles that suited his age hence leading to a new experiment with his looks. He spotted a goatee in the movie and thereafter which suited him so well that it actually became his trademark. Kabhie Alvida Naa Kehna: “Sexy Sam”-well, this is not merely a character of Karan Johar movie. It is in fact a symbol. A celebration of the ever-so-youthful spirit of Amitabh. Sam, believes in living life to the fullest and wears his heart on his sleeves. He is seen wearing amazing glasses, mostly black suits with a dash of vibrancy in the form of shocking shirts in pink or red. He is also wearing lots of fur detailing around the jacket collars. Amitabh gets full marks yet again for this eye-catching look.His gait, postures, trademark style of keeping hands inside the pockets or sometimes one hand placed on the waist and the other hand inside the pocket, his style of talking, holding gun in left hand and many other things that have been imitated by several silver screen or television actors. But their efforts have been futile and failed to bring the desired impact. Such has been the influence of his persona that today we can find large number of Amitabh clones anywhere and everywhere in the Indian cine world, but none has been able to come even an inch closer to what is ‘Real Him’. Amitabh is matchless, a pure magic. Hats off to his unique style!