And the Award Goes to

  • IndiaGlitz, [Tuesday,February 28 2006]

The 51st Fair One Filmfare Awards night held at MMRDA grounds Mumbai witnessed Bhansali's film Black walk away with awards in the popular categories - the best director, best actor and best actress awards. Amitabh Bachchan, who couldn't attend the previous Star Screen and Apsara Award functions due to his ill health, collected the best actor award for "Black" from director Vidhu Vinod Chopra. Rani Mukerji received the best actress award for the film from Hollywood actor Will Smith. Bachchan and Rani also won the critics award for best actor and best actress respectively at the function held at the Bandra-Kurla Complex. Child artist Ayesha Kapoor, who played the young Rani in "Black", won the critics award for best actress in a supporting role, while Abhishek Bachchan was given the critics award for best actor in a supporting role for "Sarkar".

Akshay Kumar won the best actor in a comic role for his hilarious act in "Garam Masala" and Nana Patekar the best actor in a villainous role for "Apaharan". Rani presented Shabana Azmi the lifetime achievement award for her contribution to Indian cinema and her unforgettable performances in both parallel and commercial cinema.

Charismatic director Yash Chopra and his son Aditya Chopra were presented with the Filmfare Power Awards, an award specially instituted for the father-son duo, who have given more than a dozen super hit films. The elder Chopra is the director of memorable hits like "Silsila" and "Kabhie Kabhie", while his son has directed the evergreen hit "Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge". They also produced some of the recent blockbusters, like "Dhoom", "Hum Tum", and "Bunty Aur Babli".

Newcomer Vidya Balan, who won the audience's hearts with her classic performance in "Parineeta", won the face of the year award and also the award for the best newcomer female, while Shiney Ahuja bagged the best male debutant award for "Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi". Pop singer Alisha Chinai won the best female playback award for the "Kajra Re" qawwali number in "Bunty Aur Babli", while Himesh Reshammiya won the best male playback for the title song of "Aashiq Banaya Aapne" becoming the first music director to win an award for the best playback singer. Gulzar won the award for best lyrics for "Kajra Re" while the musical trio of Shankar Ehsan and Loy won the award for best music for "Bunty Aur Babli".

In the technical section, Keshto Mondal, Tanushree Sarkar and Pradip Sarkar won the award for best art direction for "Parineeta", Bishwadeep Chatterjee won the award for best sound design. The best choreography award went to Howard Rosemayer for "Parineeta". "Black" received other awards too - Monty Sharma for scoring the best background music, Ravi K. Chandran for best cinematography and Bela Sehgal for best editing.

Shantanu Moitra was given the R.D. Burman Award for the best new musical talent. Other winners were: Best action - Allan Amin for "Dus"; Best screenplay - Nina Arora and Manoj Tyagi for "Page 3"; Best story - Sudhir Mishra for "Hazaron Khwaeishen Aisi" and best dialogue - Prakash Jha for "Apaharan".

The Saturday night show will be remembered also for its glamorous dancing by Bollywood beauty Aishwarya Rai, who danced sinuously to "Kajra Re", and also by Abhishek Bachchan. Madhuri Dixit came down from the US, where she now lives, to present a special dance on the occasion. The night anyway belonged to Black as it walked away with as many as 11 awards leaving all the nominees bereft of awards.