Nag Ashwin’s dystopian sci-fi epic Kalki 2898 AD begins with a nostalgically familiar yet oddly unsettling image: a young Amitabh Bachchan. For those born in the 1960-70s have seen the superstar in his heydays, charming the audience with his youth and intimidating them with his seering intensity. But for those of us who’ve missed out on witnessing his Angry Young Man persona on the big screen, Kalki 2898 AD has got us covered.
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Nag Ashwin de-ages Amitabh Bachchan, but not as a gimmick. He introduces him as Ashwatthama in Kurukshetra, the Mahabharata battleground – with jet-black long locks and moustache – a look he’s never exhibited. That helps since the de-aged Bachchan we see in Kalki 2898 AD isn’t the Vijay of 1970s films like Zanjeer and Deewaar. But he’s the Angry Young Man who gets punished for his rage – however righteous it is – and bears the brunt for it for 6,000 years to come.
Nag’s centuries-spanning vision makes Bachchan’s character arc the grandest it’s ever been in ages. Now in his 80s, Bachchan continues to experiment and make his presence felt, but his brand has been largely restricted to the polished interrogator (Pink, Badla, Runway 34), the cantankerous cartoon (Paa, Piku), the amiable host (Kaun Banega Crorepati), or the meticulous blogger and tweeter (he still numbers his tweets and apologises profusely upon missing the count). Never has he been imagined like how Nag Ashwin did – as a prehistoric war machine.
It’s not the case that Bachchan has shied away from action in his second innings. He did land a few punches, kicks and more in Bbuddah Hoga Tera Baap (2011), Thugs of Hindostan (2018), and a film as recent as Brahmastra (2022). But those have been more of tokenistic tributes than him actually getting his hands dirty. He pulls no punches in Kalki 2898 AD as the Immortal Ashwatthama, aided by the judicious and smart use of CGI to make his action set pieces look larger than life. With the technology of today, one doesn’t always need extensive training to stage great action. All it takes is the expressions, and the body language. Given his rich experience in the genre back in the 1970s, Bachchan doesn’t need much to pull that rabbit out of his hat.
It also helps that Nag Ashwin doesn’t write Ashwatthama as a verbose character. He does most of the talking with his eyes and that towering screen presence. It’d have been a convenient crutch to use Bachchan’s voice to mouth profound dialogues, but Nag steers clear of that and treats Bachchan like a juggernaut – a rolling stone with no moss attached. He just goes by doing his destined job – protecting the mother of the Chosen One – with a desperate streak to obliterate everything that obstructs his path. The only time he lets out an emotion is towards the end, upon the discovery of an old friend, and that turns out to be his Kryptonite.
Bachchan is a curious casting choice also because he’s a fine blend of tradition and modernity – of the character and the actor that he is. Once a tour de force rebelling against oppression, he became the face of patriarchy during his second innings in films like Mohabbatein, Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham, and Baghban. He’s the most tech-savy, but also a heckler for textiquette. He oscilattes between shawls-kurtas and hoodies as his choice of wardrobe. He’s an old soul in a new body – just like his portrayal of Ashwatthama – a reawakened mummy whose weapon of choice is traditional brute strength, but one that’s achieved through modern technology of de-ageing and CGI-created action.
