In any artist's career remuneration is a bliss only till some point, after which he/she yearns for recognition, praise, applause, encouragement and here's the keyword - AWARDS. In India, if at all there is an honour equivalent to the most prestigious Academy Awards of USA , its the 'national film awards' , started in 1954 and run by the Indian Government's Directorate of Film Festivals. Like every other award , this too has been controversial at times with a huge section of crowd not finding itself in agreement with the decisions made. But more often than not, the national awards, (also known as "Silver Lotus" ) get the judgement right. For the true actors of India, these awards mean more than a hundred days of house full shows.

Kamal Haasan, along with Mohanlal leads the list of silver lotus winners with a grand total of Four National awards. Three of them for the best acting performance by the male lead and the other for the best performance by a child artist (in his very first film. kalathoor kannama). Mohanlal too has only 3 awards under the category of best actor, the other being a special jury award he got for kreedom.

This post is an analysis of kamal's performance in Moondram Pirai, Nayakan and Indian - The three movies for which he bagged the top honour. Then there is a competition between his portrayal of these three roles and the winner will be declared right here at the end of the post :) . Thirdly there is also a list of kamal performances that should have definitely won the national award.

Moondram Pirai - Call it reading Shakespeare's King John or watching Harold Llyod perform in safety first, something had got to Kamal Haasan. The actor was possessed with a new spirit and started putting all his body and its language into every scene he acted in. The result was extra ordinary and continued into many future attempts starting off with saagara sangamam. I am talking about getting physically involved with emoting. There is no better scene to prove this than the legendary railway station climax scene where kamal's cries hit you like a hammer on the head. The actor had made himself immortal with just seven minutes of inimitable brilliance.

(vote for )Moondram pirai - for a subtle yet strong execution of a role which on paper was not as brilliant as it was made to look on screen.

NAYAKAN - I don't have to write anything about this most often talked about role of Kamal Haasan . (Though as a hardcore kamal maniac, I consider it insulting when this role is rated above that of Devar Magan). From the jury of Time magazine to Feroz Khan, everyone is a fan of Velu Nayakar. I too love the film but feel the actor in Kamal has given many better products than this one. However some of his expressions and dialogues from this film have left me dumbstruck. The scene where nayakar is introduced to his north indian and telugu counterparts is a gem. Kamal talks about how he knows each of the gang lords in a style that can hardly be matched. Also the way his eyes go when his daughter asks him to leave her house and spare her son are a complete gem. Otherwise there is a lot of brando in the nayakan Kamal and he does full justice to the character obviously written with every nuance of Brando in mind.

(vote for) Nayakan - for a performance that made the entire world look back at south India.

INDIAN - "Take this old mentally disturbed jerk to the prisons" , shouts the young corrupt son with hatred and guilt in his eyes. The father growls back with anger and shock. If there is any actor who can effortlessly pull off all these 'not so easy to differentiate' emotions and depict them with an amazingly accurate efficiency, then its got to be Kamal Haasan. Kamal Haasan it is !!, in INDIAN - a very commercial movie with a host of mindless scenes parallely running with a complete stunner of a performance in a double role by the male lead. Kamal's facial reactions in beautiful 'pachai kiligal' song sequence are phenomenal. The actor, then aged 42 capturing the mannerisms of a 70 year old man is a treat to watch. The short senapathy segment is an icing on the cake.

(vote for) Indian - for one of the most stunning acting feats in mainstream commercial Indian Cinema.

AND THE WINNER IS... - Any guesses? Hold your breadth... Its Indian. Senapathy and Chandru together form the deadliest of disguises. The corrupt licence officer and the strict freedom fighter simply take your sleep away. Powerful portrayal - redefined.

The Kamals who missed out (were overlooked) - I know its not practical but i would want the national awards committee to recognise Kamal for at least ten other performances of his... But as that would be obviously asking for too much, here is a list of FIVE kamal roles which definitely deserved the silver lotus -

Salangai Oli (1983) - won by kamal himself for moondram pirai -

Pushpak (1986) - won by shashi kapoor for "new delhi times" -

Devar Magan (1992) - won by mohanlal for "bharatham" -

Hey Ram (2000) won by mohanlal again for "vanaprastham"

Anbe sivam (2003) - won by Ajay Devagan for "The legend of Bhagat singh"