Author Nivas Banuchandar wrote a book on Tamil superstar Vijay by the name of ‘The Icon of Millions’, which will be available online from 2 March. Book is mostly a tribute to the demi-god status of Vijay for his fans which are genuinely in millions and would do anything for their superstar. Vijay has been honored by his fans with the title of Thalapathy which means commander-in-chef because they don’t only look at him as a film star but their actual leader. There are people who would follow him to hell and back and book is intended to capture this spirit.
The stardom has always been prevailing in Indian cinema and people made other people into heroes beyond their screen presence. One of the first star in Indian cinema could be called as Rajesh Khanna because the hysteria around that man was unbelievable, women would write letters with their blood to him on daily basis. While MGR and NTR were ruling South Indian cinema. In 1970’s Amitabh Bachchan happened and people actually realized what stardom can be, as nobody in the history of world cinema has quite tasted stardom like him and still continuous to.
At the same time Rajinikanth happened in Tamil cinema and broke all barriers of demi-god structure as he is practically worshiped in many parts of Tamil Nadu. Since than many superstars have arrived and gone but true heir of Rajini is only Joseph Vijay. Thalapathy Vijay’s stardom goes way beyond the peripherals of this country and has created it’s own appeal in foreign lands as well. The generation of Vijay, Shahrukh Khan, Salman Khan, Ajith, mahesh Babu, NTR Jr. is said to be the last of the stars because when this generation passes there will still be famous film actors with certain following but modern day audience would not give anybody the stature of demi-god.
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