FLASH BACK 2008

As we gear up for the NOKIA 15th Annual STAR-Screen Awards, here’s a replay of who clinched the trophies in the year gone by.

The New Year heralds new beginnings and last year this time the industry was abuzz with the nominations of Nokia 14th STAR-Screen Awards. It was a rewarding box-office year as experimental, small-budget films worked as well as big-budget formula films. 2007 had seen diverse kind of films churned out by the industry and the Screen nominations aptly picked the different shades. From Chak De! India,which will go down in the history of Indian cinema as one of the finest sports films, to Life In A...Metro, one of the best films to bring out the ethos of an urban life and Taare Zameen Par that simply raised the bar for Indian films, the nominations netted a neat spread. Guru, inspired by the illustrious life of industrialist Dhirubhai Ambani, Om Shanti Om, a commercial blockbuster and Saawariya, a box-office dud got their fair share of nominations. In fact, OSO and Saawariya were running neck-to-neck in the list with nine and eight nominations respectively, which just shows that excellence is the sole benchmark for the Screen Awards.

It was King Khan who walked away with the Best Actor (Male) award amidst a thunderous applause for his understated but determined hockey coach act in Chak De!India. It was also adjudged the Best Film. However, it was Aamir Khan’s Taare Zameen Par that bagged the maximum number of awards, eight in all, with Aamir himself bagging three trophies for Best Director, Most Promising Debut Director and Best Actor in a Supporting Role. Child artiste Darsheel Safary who wowed one and all with his outstanding performance as a dyslexic child, won the Best Child Artiste as well as the Special Jury Award for Best Actor. Amole Gupte, the writer and creative director of the film walked away with the Best Story and Best Dialogue awards. The heart-rending song Maa rightly fetched Prasoon Joshi the Best Lyrics award.

Chak De! became the nation’s catchphrase, thanks to Shah Rukh Khan and his all-girls’ hockey team of Chak De! India. On the awards night too, one could hear the war cry every time the film bagged an award and that was one too many. Even our hosts Sajid Khan and Shreyas Talpade did a spoof on the film, dressed as girls, which brought the house down.

SRK’s hockey team won the Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Female) award – the first time in the history of awards that so many girls were nominated and won together. Shimit Amin shared the Best Director award with Aamir Khan and Amitabh Shukla won the Best Editing award.

The other SRK film Om Shanti Om bagged three awards. In fact, Shah Rukh stole the thunder with his energetic performance on Dard-e-disco in the grand finale. He also won the STAR Jodi No.1 with his OSO co-star Deepika Padukone who won the Most Promising Newcomer (Female) award beating Sonam Kapoor nominated for Saawariya. However, co-star Ranbir Kapoor won the Most Promising Newcomer ( Male). In fact, Sajid did a hilarious take on Ranbir’s hit number Jab se tere naina, draped in a towel. Needless to say, that was the highlight of the show and had others aping it at their functions.

Life In A...Metro and Guru,which had 15 and 14 nominations respectively, bagged three awards each. Anurag Basu’s take on life in a metropolis earned for him the Best Screenplay, while Irrfan Khan’s subtle and dry humour won him the Best Actor in a Comic Role and Soham’s haunting melody Inn dinon was the winner for Best Playback Singer (Male). Mani Ratnam’s Guru dominated the music category winning three awards including Best Music, Best Background Score (both for A R Rahman) and Best Playback Singer (Female) - Shreya Ghoshal for the lively number Barso re megha.

The star-studded evening was memorable also for the scinitllating performances by Shahid Kapoor who danced to Mauja hi mauja, Katrina Kaif, who grooved to Soni de nakhre, Riteish Deshmukh who arrived atop a truck and gyrated to his hit song Dil mein baji guitar and Urmila Matondkar who did a medley of Lifetime Achievement awardee Manoj Kumar’s songs.