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Vox populi: Aamir is King Khan
The response to the two-day HT online survey has been an eye-opener. As many as 1,664 people aired their views. The opinion poll
HindustanTimes.Com's two-day survey on The Khan War has been an eye-opener — one that would make Aamir Khan a very happy man.
This week, when we asked the question: Who is the better Khan: Aamir or Shah Rukh, we expected a fifty-fifty response. But we were surprised. Aamir Khan clearly stood out as King, the 'actor' who dares to experiment.
Sadly, Shah Rukh, with all his trappings of stardom, paled in comparison to his perfectionist counterpart. Our surfers termed him as 'repetitive'.
The response to our survey was overwhelming. As many as 1,664 people from all over the globe, aired their views.
1,058 of our surfers were unanimous that Shah Rukh Khan is an overrated actor. Only 480 of them felt he is not so. And the unbiased ones in this category made for a mere 105.
Aamir scored well on the versatility factor. As many as 1,116 respondents have said Aamir is more versatile, considering the roles he's played. Supporters of SRK are in the minority here, with only 249 people vouching for him. Again, there are 278 non-judgemental surfers, who say both the actors have their unique traits.
Another plus for Aamir was the response to his latest flick Fanaa. A whopping 891 people said they liked Fanaa and felt that Aamir gets better with every movie he plays. 556 people liked the Aamir-Kajol pairing in the movie, while 196 surfers said AK should have done a better job.
Now for the clincher: Will Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna outdo Fanaa? Our surfers were wary of this one, with 653 of them saying the outcome depends on what people prefer. 529 people were categorical, saying KANK would definitely outdo Fanaa. And only 460 of our surfers stood by Aamir, saying Fanaa will do better than KANK.
After this 'indecision', Aamir came up at top once again. We wanted to assess SRK's ability to play Rehaan, the character Aamir essays in Fanaa.
An overwhelming 940 of our surfers said this would be a disaster: Only Aamir could have done justice to that role. A more perceptive 469 people felt Shah Rukh as Rehaan is not a bad idea. After all, his chemistry with Kajol is very well known. Interestingly, 234 people are sure that Shah Rukh would, indeed have been the better option.
The last question we asked was whether other talented actors are being sidelined in this Khan war. And we were surprised.
A majority (855 people) said the Khan war is all bogus and that true talent will always be recognized in Bollywood. As many as 604 of them felt that the Khan war is indeed taking its toll on the other actors. And there were 184 surfers who were amused enough to say that they watch a movie and forget all about it!
The written responses were a treat to read. Many of them were astute comments on the state of Bollywood as an industry, while a lot of them tried to analyse the position of actors in the industry.
While many of the responses were passionate arguments in defence of their respective idols, a few of them were unbiased views on the uniqueness of the two Khans.
We begin with a surfer, DAV, from Manchester. He made a very telling comment:
"There is no comparison between Aamir & Shahrukh. Shahrukh can never be expected to work in the kind of movies that Aamir does. Can you ever expect Shahrukh doing a role like Rang de Basanti or a not so glamorous role like Lagaan? Never. SRK likes to be in a comfort zone and work with tried and trusted directors who keep producing the same kind of movies. All of them are so similar that if you miss the title of any of Shahrukh's movies you'd struggle to know which movie you are watching."
Then there was a passionate outburst from Tara Deshpande of Mumbai.
"Aamir Khan is the best. He simply rocked in Raja Hindustani. After watching that movie, I had blow ups of Aamir all over my house and I wanted to marry him! He was amazing. I will always remember Raja of Raja Hindustani. And that's the power that Aamir has! He gets into the skin of a character and you don't forget it. EVER! O, I could go on and on about Aamir. My only complaint is that I don't get to see more of him!"
Thoroughly amused, we passed on to a response from Azizul Haque of Montreal, Canada, who was vocal about his favourite Khan.
