October poll - results

The results of the October poll are in - and it's a tie! Your favorite Shabana Azmi movies are Mandi and Masoom; each of these received 12 votes. Following in second place is Fire, with eight votes - there had been a three-way tie for a while earlier in the month, before Mandi and Masoom pulled ahead. Arth and Ankur gave a respectable showing, coming in at four and three votes, respectively. Honorable mention to 15 Park Avenue, Parvarish, and Sparsh, which picked up a vote each.

The results of this poll are interesting. I expected Fire to put up a solid showing. SLP has plenty of readers in North America and I suspect that many of these, like me, were first introduced to Shabana ji in Fire. I am also not surprised by the strong showing for Masoom. When I first wrote about this movie on Filmi Geek, I was pleased to learn that it is a popular favorite among desis. People my age fondly remember it from their childhood, and others love it just as strongly; my review of Masoom has received more comments than any other review I've written. So it stands to reason that it would come out on top in a poll like this one.

I am especially intrigued, though, by the strong showing for Mandi. I haven't yet seen this film, and I didn't know it would fare as well as it has in this poll. I'm now looking forward to seeing it - even more than before.

The relatively poor performance of Shabana ji's classic, iconic films like Arth and Ankur is, I think, an artifact of restricting the poll to a single film per voter. I suspect that at least one of these films would make most people's top three.

Of course this is all somewhat artificial, as it's not always meaningful to choose a single "favorite" film. The criteria are vague - is the best film? The one I enjoy the most? The most meaningful? The one closest to my heart? - and the answer can change with shifting moods. Still, it was a fun poll, and I thank you all for voting. I have a much more interesting question in mind for the next poll, so you can look for that in the beginning of November - work permitting.