Mohanlal: Emperor of Mollywood

One remembers an interview in which a journalist from Kerala asked an actress her opinion on Vijay, the Tamil superstar, as a dancer. Fantastic, was the answer. He then asked her about Mohanlal. The actress politely said he was good. You could see it fell below the journalist’s anticipation and for a reason. In the Malayali massmind, Mohanlal is the pinnacle of all arts, but who can ever be that? He did not even have much of a reputation for dance in his initial years. Mimicry artists had a good time imitating his movements. But then, for a movie, he learned Bharatnatyam and did the role of no less than an instructor of that dance form, including a long performance. He might not have been perfect, but there was enough authenticity to lead to awe about his willingness to test himself.

Mohanlal has just received the Dadasaheb Phalke award, the highest recogni­tion that the govern­ment gives for those in movies. Chances are not many beyond South India would be familiar with him. But they would know the many movies of his that have been re­makes in Bollywood, like Drishyam. It broke the box-office record of Malayalam when released, even though an understated thriller where he played an everyman. A few years later, box-office records were broken again with Pulimurugan and then Lucifer. Movies he acted in changed the nature of comedy in Malayalam in the 1980s and 1990s. There is almost nothing in any genre that he hasn’t played, from art movies to middlebrow romance to pedestrian entertainers. Altogether, he has notched up more than 400 movies in an extraordinary career that began as a villain.

New actors, new stories, and new forms are taking centre­stage in Mollywood. His own son is part of that movement. Recently, a movie of Mohanlal was a moderate hit but sound­ly beaten at the box office by a superhero movie with a female lead that released simultaneously. The rope of longevity still stretches, even though the flavour of the audience is turning Gen Z in Kerala. But he will adapt as he has always done.

Dadasaheb Phalke AwardDrishyamKeralaMohanlalMollywood