Gandhi My Father & TZP shine at National Awards

The results of the 55th National Awards for the year 2007 were announced yesterday and like always there were quite a few surprises in store. It was the cinema of South India that bagged all the top four honours with the Priyadarshan directed Tamil film Kanchivaram bagging the award for Best Feature Film and also fetching Prakash Raj the Best Actor Award. Veteran filmmaker Adoor Gopalakrishnan won the Best Director award for the Malayalam film Nallu Pennungal while Umashree was adjudged Best Actress for her portrayal in the Kannada film Gulabi Talkies.

While Bollywood failed to bag the top four honours, it did quite make up in the other categories. Leading the pack was Anil Kapoor's maiden production Gandhi My Father which bagged three awards for Best Screenplay (Feroz Abbas Khan), Best Supporting Actor (Darshan Jariwala) and even won the Special Jury award. Even Aamir Khan's directorial debut Taare Zameen Par was not one to be left behind. The film won awards for Shankar Mahadevan (Best Male Playback Singer) and Prasoon Joshi (Best Lyrics) for the soul-stirring song 'Maa', besides also bagging the Best Film on Family Welfare award.

King of Bollywood Shahrukh Khan too had reasons to smile as two of his films Chak De India and Om Shanti Om bagged one National Award each. While Chak De India deservingly won the award for Best Film providing Overall Entertainment, Om Shanti Om bagged the award for Best Art Direction (Sabu Cyril).

Rituparno Ghosh's Big B- Arjun Rampal starrer The Last Lear bagged two awards winning the Best Feature Film in English and also fetching Shefali Shah the Best Supporting Actress award while the Shahid- Kareena smash-hit Jab We Met also bagged two awards for Best Choreography and Best Female Playback Singer (Shreya Ghoshal).

The Indira Gandhi award for the Best First Film of a Director went to Frozen while the Nargis Dutt award for Best Film on National Integration went to the Pankaj Kapoor starrer Dharm. Even Indian Films - Studio 18's war film 1971 won the award for Best Hindi film award in the regional films category. All in all, the National Awards has surely given our B-town guys yet another reason to celebrate.