Yash’s Toxic continues a fascinating trend in Indian cinema where a single star portrays both father and son, often leading to intense on-screen conflicts.
IMAGE: Yash in Toxic.
Key Points
- Yash’s Toxic will feature him in a double role as father and son, with the son aiming to destroy his father.
- Indian cinema has a recurring theme of a single actor playing both father and son, often leading to complex, estranged relationships.
- Films like Desh Premee, Aakhree Raasta, Indian, and Jallaad have explored ideological differences and conflicts between father-son characters played by the same actor.
Toxic is one of the most anticipated movies of the year, marking Yash’s return to the big screen after the blockbuster success of the KGF duology. Once again, he returns to playing a criminal, a larger-than-life gangster in the movie, but there is a catch this time.
He is playing a double role. That of a father and son. Scratch that. That of a father and a son who wants to destroy him.
Toxic, directed by Geetu Mohandas, releases in theatres on August 26.
Yash’s dual turn as father and son in Toxic highlights a peculiar, oddly unquestioned trope in Indian cinema: The carbon-copy genetics where a parent and child look like identical twins, separated only by a dusting of grey hair.
This dual-role phenomenon is a cross-industry staple. Blockbusters across multiple languages, including the Krrish series, 24, Bigil, the Baahubali franchise, and Jawan, all bank on the same superstar pulling double duty across generations.
Often, the son simply inherits the father’s heroic traits. However, the trope gets truly interesting when the script pits the two against each other. They don’t necessarily have to fall into a strict hero-versus-villain binary; rather, the drama stems entirely from the fierce ideological warfare between two identical faces.
Sreeju Sudhakaran finds 10 such estranged onscreen father-son relationships where both parts were played by the same actor.
Desh Premee (1982)
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IMAGE: Amitabh Bachchan in Desh Premee.
Manmohan Desai’s 1982 hit sees Amitabh Bachchan, the first of two movies in this list in which he plays a dual role with opposing values.
One is a freedom fighter with Gandhian values who even manages to transform four dons in the slum where he is staying. The other is his street-smart son, who is part of criminal rackets to earn a quick buck.
So you can guess, these two don’t get along when the father learns the truth about his son, and it is only to bring down a common enemy that we have them join hands later on.
Aakhree Raasta (1986)
IMAGE: Amitabh Bachchan in Aakhree Raasta.
Directed by K Bhagyaraj in his Hindi debut, Aakhree Raasta is a dramatic remake of Kamal Haasan’s Tamil hit Oru Kaidhiyin Diary (which Bhagyaraj also penned).
Amitabh Bachchan takes on the double role mantle here, playing a vengeance-fueled vigilante father and the righteous cop son sworn to halt his murderous rampage.
The 1986 classic recently found a bizarre second life online recently when the Big B’s iconic ‘my six is your nine’ monologue went viral when it was used by a Galgotias University professor as an attempt to justify a public scandal.
Parampara (1990)
IMAGE: Mammootty in Parampara.
Sibi Malayil’s family thriller features Mammootty in a dual role, playing a young man estranged from his father over the latter’s criminal ways.
When his own son is suddenly kidnapped, he must reluctantly join forces with his father to rescue the boy.
While the rest of the movie focuses on them slowly coming to terms with one another, a final twist in the tale drives the wedge between them even further.
Jallaad (1995)
IMAGE: Mithun Chakraborty in Jallaad.
A loose remake of the Tamil film Amaidhipadai starring Sathyaraj in a double role, Jallaad came at a time when its lead star Mithun Chakraborty was doing a slew of B-grade movies.
While Jallaad still feels better than most of that lot, that’s only because Mithun was fantastic as the unapologetic villain of the movie, a perverse politician who even tries to forcibly marry his son’s girlfriend.
Mithun also plays the straight role of the son, an honest police officer determined to avenge his mother’s death by punishing his father.
Indian (1996)
IMAGE: Kamal Haasan in Indian.
Shankar’s iconic thriller doesn’t owe its legendary status just to its gripping vigilante plot, a scathing exposé of corruption, A R Rahman’s timeless score, or Kamal Haasan’s National Award-winning performance.
Its true staying power lies in its devastating father-son dynamic. Shankar pits a ruthless vigilante executing corrupt bureaucrats against his own flesh and blood — a son who thrives within that very corrupt system — and pushes their ideological war to an uncompromising, tragic conclusion.
It is precisely this lack of high-stakes, personal conflict for ‘Indian Thatha‘ that royally crippled the legacy sequel, Indian 2. Among other things, that is.
Chennakesava Reddy (2002)
IMAGE: Nandamuri Balakrishna in Chennakesava Reddy.
Nandamuri Balakrishna has done quite a few double roles in his career, a few of which see him play the father and son.
In V V Vinayak’s 2002 potboiler, he plays the titular Chennakesava Reddy, a large-hearted leader of the villagers who takes on corrupt politicians and is even sent to prison for years, while his family is made to believe he is dead.
On his return, he reclaims his old fiefdom and takes revenge on his enemies, who bring his son into the equation.
His son is a righteous police officer who stands by the law even when he finds out his father is alive and believes his vendetta is not unjustified.
Udayon (2005)
IMAGE: Mohanlal in Udayon.
Bhadran’s drama sees Mohanlal play an arrogant feudal lord who dominates his family and ill-treats his relatives, ignoring their rising animosity against him until it’s too late.
Mohanlal also plays his second son, who is no saint himself, a perpetual troublemaker but one who hates his father’s autocratic ways.
While the superstar is too good as the older man, the film disappoints in trying to expand upon the son character’s antics and not building up a stronger drama between the two.
Varalaru (2006)
IMAGE: Ajith in Varalaru.
Ajith did a triple role in the film, one as a powerful businessman who used to be an effeminate dancer and another as his spoilt son.
The third role is the one that brings a twist to the tale, that of another son, born in the darkest of circumstances and the symbol of the father’s greatest crime in his youth.
The rest of the film is about how this son creates trouble for both his father and the other sibling, using the fact that he looks exactly like his brother.
Enthiran (2010)
IMAGE: Aishwarya Rai and Rajinikanth in Enthiran.
Not every father-son relationship has to be biological, right?
You can also see the dynamic between Vaseegaran, a scientist, and the creator of Chitti, the robot, as one too. All things were fine when Chitti was this obedient android who followed Vaseegaran’s instructions to the T, until it ended in a tragedy.
But Vaseegaran makes the cardinal mistake of putting ‘feelings’ into his robot, and feelings, as you know, can be corrupted.
The result? Almost a robot apocalypse that threatens Chennai when Chitti goes berserk in love!
GOAT aka The Greatest of All Time (2024)
IMAGE: Vijay in The Greatest of All Time.
In a plot loosely inspired by the Will Smith-starrer Gemini Man, Thalapathy Vijay plays an anti-terrorism officer who loses his young son during a mission.
Years later, he is reunited with his son, now an adult, only he doesn’t realise that the son has been brainwashed into seeing him as an enemy, killing his colleagues and his own girlfriend to destroy his father.
The movie may be far from being the greatest of all time, but the uncompromising dynamic between the father and the son to the very end is what makes it interesting.
Photographs curated by Manisha Kotian/Rediff
