The underside line of the Indian movie business, or wherever on the planet for that matter, is that an actor’s capacity to shepherd a success determines their profession graph. If one sees a spate of box-office flops over a protracted time period, it’s protected to imagine that their prospects dwindle. However one Bollywood legend has defied this logic. In a profession spanning 5 many years, this man has gained a Nationwide Award, starred within the highest-grossing Indian movie of its time, after which gone on to star in a staggering 180 flops, the highest-ever for a lead actor.
India’s most unsuccessful actor
Mithun Chakraborty started his appearing profession in 1976 with Mrinal Sen’s Mrigayaa, which earned him a Nationwide Movie Award, making him one of many few actors to obtain it for his or her debut movie. Success adopted with Shaukeen and Ashanti within the 80s, earlier than Disco Dancer turned him right into a family identify in 1982. However after the mid-80s, the actor opted for amount over high quality, usually working in 8-12 movies a 12 months. The consequence was that lots of them bombed on the field workplace.
Within the 90s, as youthful stars took over, Mithun resorted to working in small-budget motion movies that may very well be churned out in lower than a month. Throughout this decade, he starred in near 100 movies, a majority of which bombed on the field workplace. His final solo hit as a hero was the 1995 launch Raavan Raj, over 30 years in the past.
Within the 50 years that he has labored in movies, Mithun has appeared in over 270 movies (an actual quantity is unattainable to find out). Of those, a staggering 180 have flopped on the field workplace. This consists of at the very least 45 movies labelled as box-office disasters. Solely two different actors – Dharmendra and Jeetendra – have given even half as many flops as Mithun. For many prime stars, the quantity is below 50.
The 2 milestone bookends for Mithun
Mithun’s profession shot up within the 80s, with Disco Dancer being his largest hit. In 1985, when the movie launched in Russia, it turned the primary Indian movie to gross ₹100 crore worldwide, taking on the mantle of India’s highest-grossing movie from Sholay. It held the document until Hum Aapke Hain Koun surpassed it in 1994. This was Mithun’s zenith.
Within the 2000s, the actor moved to supporting roles, showing in lots of huge movies. His largest success on this section of his profession got here in 2022, when the actor was 72. He appeared in Vivek Agnihotri’s The Kashmir Information, a sleeper hit that grossed ₹350 crore worldwide. It stays the highest-grossing movie of the actor’s profession.
