Remembering Smita Patil: Nine memorable films of the actress

One of the brightest stars of Indian cinema can remember, Smita Patil would have been 62. Born in 1955, the actress featured in over 80 films during her career but left the world at the age of 31. Here are nine of Smita Patil's most memorable performances.

Bazaar (1982) - Directed by Sagar Sarhadi, 'Bazaar' is set in Hyderabad and revolves around the issue of young girls getting sold off to expartriaite Indian in the middle-east as brides. Patil stars as Najma with Naseeruddin Shah, Farookh Shah and Supriya Pathak playing major roles.

Namak Halaal (1982) - A golden jubilee hit, 'Namak Halaal' directed by Prakash Mehra, is one of the major commercial films in which Smita Patil acted in.

Manthan (1976) - Co-written by Marathi playright Vijay Tendulkar, 'Manthan' was based on the milk co-operative movement of the 70's. Smita Patil played Bindu, who leads the village women against the monopoly held by local dairy owners in procuring milk from local farmers.

Bhumika (1977) - Smita plays Usha, an actress and grandaughter of a yesteryear singer belonging to the Devadasi community of Goa. Based on the memoirs of Hansa Wadkar, a 1940s stage actress, Shyam Benegal's film features Patil in a powerful character, bagging her the National Award for Best Actress.

Chidambaram (1985) - Written and directed by Malayalam auteur G Aravindan, 'Chidambaram' is about Shivagami, Tamil village woman (played by Smita Patil), whose dislocation from a barren landscape to a noisy farm and the role of three men plays in her life forms the crux of the story.

Chakra (1981) - Directed by Rabindra Dharmaraj, 'Chakra' is about Amma (Smita Patil) and her son Benwa and their struggle to survive in a Bombay slum.

Mirch Masala (1985) - Hailed as one of the greatest acting performances of Indian cinema, Smita Patil plays Sonbai in Ketan Mehta's 'Mirch Masala'. The movie set in the 1940's is about the conflict between a powerful, perversive village Subedar (Naseeruddin Shah) and Sonbai.

Arth (1982) - Based on Mahesh Bhatt's real life realtionship with actress Parveen Babi, 'Arth' featured Smita Patil, Raj Babbar and Shabana Azmi. Patil played an actress suffering from a mental illness falling for a married man.

Nishanth (1975) - Directed by Shyam Benegal, 'Nishanth' was based on a screenplay by Vijay Tendulkar with dialogues by Satyadev Dubey. The movie also featured actors like Naseeruddin Shah, Amrish Puri, Satyadev Dubey, Shabana Azmi, Anant Nag and girish Karnad.