Team FC
Vishal Bhardwaj cast Irrfan as the gangster protagonist of his Macbeth adaptation, a role in which the actor was equally haunting and haunted.
Irrfan played Ashoke Ganguly, the protagonist's patient father, a role he imbued with grace and honesty, the hallmarks of his character's stereotype, with a uniqueness that was entirely his own.
Irrfan headlined Tigmanshu Dhulia's biopic of the soldier-athlete who became a rebel in the ravines of Chambal, a role which won him a National Award.
In Ritesh Batra's film, Irrfan played with dignity and wisdom an ageing widower called Saajan Fernandes, who bonds over letters with a lonely homemaker whose husband's lunchbox always ends up in Saajan's hands.
Irrfan cameoed as the mysterious Roohdaar in Vishal Bhardwaj's Hamlet adaptation: he turned the brief appearance into one of the film's most memorable elements with a brooding demeanour and tongue-in-cheek wit.
As Rana, the reassuring, forthright owner of a taxi company who gets behind the wheel himself, Irrfan embodied the best of men with a glint in his eye and just enough grey.
In Meghna Gulzar's crime procedural, Irrfan played Ashvin Kumar, a weary detective whose methods flit between the smooth and the harsh.
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