How come a South Indian who usually never care about Bollywood at all fell in love with an actor who is not even a star, who hasn’t played lot of roles, who was not someone who will catch your attention with his page three appearance?
As far as I remember, my first experience of Irrfan was the Roohdar from Haider. What a powerful character- from that unfocused walking intro through snow to the scene in the underground of a torture room somewhere in Kashmir. Till date I cannot think of anyone else playing Roohdar.
The dialogues, monologues of Irrfan are always so charming and those who follow his works have always fallen in love with his voice. But I have always fallen in love with his eyes. Saajan Fernandas was not a person who can go for a powerful monologue about life, he was an ordinary older person who was melted by the letters he received through a lunch box. Saajan didn’t speak much, but the eyes of Irrfan was enough to convey us a sea of emotions.
The older self of pi has only very few screen presence in the Life of Pi movie, but those last few scenes was enough for Irrfan to steal the entire film. When the older self of pi was concluding the very challenging and unique life story, with the details only Irrfan’s eyes can deliver He was literally showing us the Life of Pi that unbelievable journey of the character was going through the eyes of Irrfan.
An actor becomes complete only when he can control each and every part of his body and move it in the context of different characters, I have always wondered about the way he acts with his eyes, a very melancholic pair of eyes, you feel something for him even when Saajan was silently going through the letters, the same way When Roohdar was saying ‘Dhariya bhi Mein Daarakht bhi main’ it was convincing for us because of the eyes of Roohdar, We could see in the dim light of that underground torture center.
Rana from Piku was a very lazy person. The character Rana was so easy, simply because of the screen presence of Irrfan. It was not easy to steal a scene when talented actors like Amitabh Batchan and Deepika Padukon were also sharing the screen.
It was always his eyes that have given the needed extra to all of his characters. Obviously all the physical and mental efforts he puts to each characters matters, but just with a look or a just a mid close or close shot which reveals those melancholic eyes have always connected me to each character he played.
I Will definitely miss that Irrfan touch on the screen forever.
Adieu dear Irrfan. You will definitely live by the eternal characters you played, you will be remembered till light creates life on the screens.
Darya bhi main, darakht bhi main … Jhelum bhi main, chinar bhi main … dair bhi hoon, haram bhi hoon … Shai bhi hoon, Sunni bhi hoon, main hoon pandit … main tha, main hoon aur main hi rahoonga – (Roohdar, Haider)
