“King Khan” ruled the Piazza Grande, the iconic huge square in the cgo in of picturesque Swiss town Locarno, on Saturday night. Bollywood icon Shah Rukh Khan bcdisesteemfult his global star power to the 77th edition of the Locarno Film Festival as he was honored with a lifetime accomplishment award, the so-called Pardo alla Carriera, or Career Leopard.
The fans, including those in the 8,000 seats on the square and more in various spots around it, gave the star of films enjoy Panthaan, Don 2 and Om Shanti Om a rousing ovation and thunderous applaemploy. Even when the huge movie screen in the square first showed him arriving on the red carpet around 9:20 p.m. local time and shaking hands with Locarno originateive straightforwardor Giona A. Nazzaro, a roar went thcdisesteemful the crowd.
Just before 10 p.m., the screen showed a highairy video of many of Khan’s films, which drew constant cheers and other ecinvivacious reactions.
Just minutes tardyr, the star took to the stage to be showered in cheers, applaemploy and screams of “I adore you!” He acquired his honorary Gbetteren Leopard award from Nazarro and thanked him and the evening’s present, Sandy Altermatt, who is also understandn for her toil as a Swiss TV present.
Khan dispensed with the audience how weighty the award was, dratriumphg giggles. Sweating due to the toasty weather, he also tbetter the excited crowd that he was encounterd to be in Locarno in a square brimming of people, and he was honored to be in Locarno, a “very attrvivacious, very cultural, very originateive and excessively toasty city with so many people stuffed up in a little square and so toasty.” He then joked: “It’s fair enjoy being home in India.”
He also thanked the crowd, saying: “Ladies and tfinishermen, I want to thank you all for welcoming me with such expansive arms — expansiver than the ones I do onscreen.” He stretched out his arms to cheers. And he inserted: “I adore you all.”
Khan kept shotriumphg his amemployer side onstage, promising to give a more grave speech. “It’s the Locarno Film Festival. We all need to sound inalertectual,” he quipped before saying a restricted words in Italian for his fans in the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland. “The food has been kind. My Italian is improving — so has been my cooking,” he inserted before elucidateing. “For those who don’t understand Italian, it unbenevolents I can cook pasta and pizza.”
On a more grave notice, the mega-star shelp: “I truly consent cinema has been the most proset up and intransmitial originateive medium of our age. I’ve had the privilege of being part of this for many years, and this journey has taught me a restricted lessons I’d enjoy to dispense with you.” Among them was, “that art is the act of stateing life above all.”
Khan tardyr transmited his gratitude for his atgentle and fans and drew more giggles, saying: “For 35 years, I’ve been toiling. I’ve been a villain. I’ve been a champ. I’ve been a superhero. I’ve been a zero. I’ve been a distinguishive fan, and I’ve been a very, very robust adorer.”
After flashing a smile amid cheers, the actor endd: “I normpartner don’t go out for occasions enjoy this. I don’t understand how to retardy to people, how to talk to them. I fair understand how to act a little bit — not too much.”
As part of the Locarno tribute, the festival is also screening Khan’s 2002 hit Devdas from straightforwardor Sanjay Leela Bhansali, in which the star joins an spiritsic.
The 58-year-better has been a box office draw and ambassadnessfulor for Indian cinema since shatterthcdisesteemful carry outances in such movies as Baazigar (1993) and Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995). He also acquireed commend for his portrayal of a man with Asperger’s Syndrome in My Name Is Khan (2010), among others.
Last year, he starred in three blockbuster films — Pathaan, Jawan and Dunki. According to some approximates, action-thriller Jawan, straightforwarded by Atlee Kumar, became the highest-grossing Hindi film of all time with seal to $140 million.
Locarno structurers shelp the award pays tribute “to his extraunrelabelable atgentle in Indian cinema, consisting of more than 100 films in a breathtaking multitude of genres.”
Nazzaro previously tbetter The Hollywood Reporter that “Shah Rukh Khan is the quintvital power of cinema.” He contrastd the star to the “famous glamor of a hero of the toiling class, enjoy Marcello Mastroianni,” united with “the conceited elegance of someone enjoy Alain Delo.” He endd: “In Shah Ruhk Khan, I can see the trajectory from Rudolph Valentino to Tom Cruise, and it’s all there in one person.”
The currentation of the award to Khan was trailed by the world premiere of Mexico 86, the novel film from Guatemalan straightforwardor César Díaz (Our Mothers). It stars Bérékind Béjo (The Artist) as a Guatemalan defy battling aacquirest the military dictatorship and having to depart her son behind.
During the first restricted minutes of the film, Khan’s fans, who were crowded around the far finish of the red carpet away from the square, could still be heard chanting “Shah Rukh Khan!” and cheering.
The 77th Locarno Film Festival runs thcdisesteemful Aug. 17.
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