Amitabh Bachchan ruled in 2005. It was the year of Sarkar, which reclaimed the Amitabh of yore when his eyes said it all.

The performance came as a moment to celebrate for Amitabh fans and all afficianados of good cinema waiting for quality work from one of the finest performers on the silver screen.

The film derived its incredible turbo charge from a top-draw Amitabh Bachchan star turn. The Big B, normally compelled by lesser directors to waste his enormous emotive talents on slight material, acted with his eyes and face as much as he did with his famous baritone.

He brought alive the character of a politically powerful underworld patriarch, a la Don Corleone, and left moviegoers speechless in admiration.

Carrying on from where he had left off in 2004, Amitabh Bachchan took his tally of releases in 2005 into double figures. Ek Ajnabee, which opened in the first week of December, was his ninth film of the year and a tenth, Rajkumar Santoshi's Family - Ties of Blood, hit the screens just a couple of weeks before 2005 became history.

- Saibal Chatterjee/HindustanTimes.com