In 1990s, many of his films had underperformed at the box-office. After the big hit of the film Shehanshah in 1988, the films like Ganga Jamuna Saraswati, Toofan, Jadugar, Agneepath, Krodh and Ajooba failed at the box office.
At one point he lost his hopes and was stating before every new release as, 'Yeh film to flop hogi' (This film will be a flop). He felt as if he had lost his career and he decided to quit acting. At that time he took a break for some period.
During the beginning years of his career around 11 of his films had flopped in a row, at that time Amitabh Bachchan had decided to quit the industry forever.
The film Zanjeer, released in 1973, had become his breakthrough film. Even many leading actresses rejected to work with Amitabh in the film Zanjeer because of his flop career. Finally Jaya Bachchan accepted to act in the film opposite Amitabh and the film brought him wide popularity with the role of Inspector Vijay Khanna.
After Zanjeer many of his films were superhit and he became a superstar with the films Deewaar, Don, Amar Akbar Anthony, Shakti and many more.
In his filmy career of more than 5 decades he starred in more than 200 films. Saat Hindustani was his debut film released in 1969. In his long career he struggled a lot for 2 times to keep up his career.
In his second innings, film Mohabbatein in 2000 gave him a good break, after that he never turned back. Since 2000 he is continuously acting in leading character roles. Some of his best performances in character roles are Black, Satyagraha, Piku, Pink, Paa and 102 Not Out.
He is now 82 years old but his passion towards acting is as it is, there is no limitation for that. Amitabh Bachchan has starred in over 200 films in over 5 decades of his filmy career. In 2003 Time magazine called him the 'Star of the Millenium'. The list of his accolades is very big, a few important awards of Bachchan are, 6 National Film Awards, 16 Filmfare Awards, Dada Saheb Phalke Award, he is the receipient of Padma Shri, Padma Bhushan and Padma Vibhushan.
In the recent film Kalki, his character was widely appreciated. Recently Amithabh Bachchan made his Tamil debut with the film Vettaiyan which was released on 10th October 2024 in which he did the role of Justice Dr. Satyadev Brahmadutt Pande, National Human Rights Commission of India.
Amitabh Bachchan completed the shooting for his upcoming films Section 84 and Be Happy which are scheduled to release in 2025.