Successful films are made every year in the Hindi film industry, but there are very few such films which have the power to change the trend. In the ’70s, with this thought, director Prakash Mehra took the initiative to make an out-of-the-box film ‘Zanjeer’. He had to face a lot of difficulties to make the film but all the hard work of the entire team paid off. ‘Zanjeer’ was a mega success and it gave birth to an iconic character Vijay Khanna, played by Amitabh Bachchan. Today it has been 50 years since ‘Zanjeer’ hoisted the flag of success. We are going to tell you five interesting stories related to the film.
Amitabh was the last choice for the film
Zanjeer was released on May 11, 1973 and it was the first super hit film of Amitabh’s career. It also earned him the name of Angry Young Man. However, Amitabh was not the first but the last choice for the film. Earlier, ‘Zanjeer’ was rejected by stars like Dharmendra, Shammi Kapoor, Rajkumar, Dev Anand and Dilip Kumar.
Chewing gum got Big B a film
When ‘Zanjeer’ was offered to Amitabh, he was very surprised because his films were flopping in those days, due to which he was wondering why he was being cast. Big B asked this question to the film’s writer Javed Akhtar. He told him that in a scene of ‘Bombay To Goa’ (1972), when Amitabh’s character was chewing gum, a man beats him. Amitabh stands up and keeps chewing gum in the same style and because of this scene, he felt that he is absolutely fit for this role.
Pran prepared his own getup
It is said that actor Pran himself prepared his getup for the role of Sher Khan.
When Ajit met the real don
Ajit played the role of a don in the film. His character on the big screen won a lot of accolades, but very few people know that Ajit had put in a lot of effort to bring his character alive on the silver screen. He met a real-life don and spent a long time with him from Indore before the shooting.
Amitabh had planned to return home
Before ‘Zanjeer’, many of Amitabh’s films had failed at the ticket window. As a result, he was very disappointed. He had told Prakash Mehra during the shooting that if this film did not work, he would return to Allahabad (Prayagraj). During an interview, Prakash revealed that when the film was released, it got a good response in Kolkata, but could not perform well in Mumbai for the first three days. Everyone felt that this film would flop. Seeing the performance of the film, Amitabh was so scared that he even got fever. However, on the fourth day, the film picked up pace and created history in no time.
