cinemaah2

Love in Simla/RNBDJ

2008-12-12T21:36:00.000-08:00

This week's release Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi is about a simple-looking man who transforms himself for the sake of love into a trendy dude. One of the early ugly duckling-to-swan films, was the romantic musical Love in Simla (1960).

It was RK Nayyar's first movie, after he had worked with the RK banner for a couple of films, and it introduced a new pair Joy Mukherjee (the producer S. Mukherjee's son) and Sadhana. She played the orphaned Sonia, who lives with her uncle (Kishore Sahu), aunt (Shobhana Samarth) and cousin Sheela (Azra). Sonia is the plain, tomboyish one with thick spectacles, Sheela is the pretty, vain sister, and she gets preferential treatment all the time. Sheela's boyfriend is Dev (Joy Mukherjee), whom she intends to marry.

One day, hurt and fed up of the cousin's cruel taunts, Sonia challenges Sheela that she will make Dev fall in love with her. It seems impossible, but in true Cinderella style, her grandmother (Durga Khote) decides to help change her into a glamorous doll. The makeover is classic—out go the glasses, the hair is trimmed (with the famous, trend-setting Sadhana fringe), she is made to drape a sari, walk gracefully and dance beautifully. She is now worthy of being in the race for snaring the eligible man.

The plot (Agha Jani Kashmiri) is sexist to the core, but garbed in humour, pleasant songs and the freshness of the actors. Then there's the dance competition (like in Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi), Sheela drops Dev as a partner because he is not such a good dancer. He takes Sonia on to the floor and they win the contest. Sonia also wins a beauty contest, much to her cousin's chagrin. Sonia goes on to beat Sheetal at her game at every step, but finds that she and Dev have fallen in love with each other and revenge is now complicated… but not too much. There is no space for melodrama in a romantic comedy, so the love birds are united in the end.

Iqbal Qureshi's score had some hummable numbers like Dil tham ke chal, Love ka matlab pyar hai, Ae baby idhar aa, Gaal gulabi kiske hain… but he did not become a major name in the film music biz.

Sadhana and director Nayyar fell in love with each other during the making of this film. After a bit of struggle with disapproving parents they got married (in 1966) and were, till his death in 1995, one of the happiest couples in Bollywood.

Meerabai/Guddi

2008-12-06T01:29:00.001-08:00

Guddi

This week's release Meerabai Not Out, about a young woman's obsession for cricket and cricketer Anil Kumble, is reminiscent of Hrishikesh Mukherjee's Guddi (1971), about a girl, who is crazy about films and star Dharmendra.

The delightful film with a screenplay by Gulzar had Jaya Bhaduri (now Bachchan) in her first Hindi film (Hrishida had spotted her at the Film Institute, Pune; she had earlier done Satyajit Ray's Mahanagar in Bengali) as Kusum, nicknamed Guddi, a school girl who loves movies and idolizes Dharmendra. To her simple and innocent mind, films are real, she imagines herself in love with Dharmendra, so much so that she refuses to marry anyone else, and turns down Navin (Samit Bhanja) who lover her and proposes to her. Her family is fed-up of the situation, till Kusum's uncle Professor Gupta (Utpal Dutt) offers to tackle the problem.

Taking Dharmendra's (playing himself) help, he decides to show her the fakeness of the film world, as opposed to reality. He takes a thrilled Guddi to Bombay to see a shootings and meet her idol. She sees that behind the scenes, films and stars are not all that fascinating, stunts are done by doubles, screen villains are nice people in real life, and that Navin is a real hero, not the screen star Dharmendra—of course the star sportingly goes along with the plan to open Guddi's eyes by agreeing to get bashed up by Navin.

A sweet coming of age film, with Gulzar's gentle wit and Hrishida's affectionate handling, the film was about Kusum's coming to grips with reality, or maybe a sad end to illusion, treated with warmth, humour and realism. Thanks to Hrishda's standing in the industry, many stars like Dilip Kumar, Vinod Khanna, Amitabh Bachchan, Navin Nischol, Mala Sinha and others, appeared as themselves, and the film could never have been as effective, if Dharmendra, dripping charm, had not played himself.

Under all the fun, games and romance, was Hrishida and Gulzar's poignant message about the grime behind the glamour, the struggles to achieve (through the character of a failed actor played by Asrani) and how ephemeral fame can be.

The film had a fine score by Vasant Desai, with the hymn Hum ko man ki shakti dena topping the charts, along with Bol re papeehara, that introduced a new singer Vani Jairam to films, who, unfortunately did not last as long as the film's lead actress Jaya Bhaduri.

Oye Lucky/ Kismet

2008-12-01T07:36:00.000-08:00

Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye! Is about a good-hearted thief. One of the earliest --and best-- Hindi films with a thief as the protagonist was Gyan Mukherjee's 1943 film Kismet, still listed among the biggest hits of all time, and the longest running (three years in a Kolkata theatre) till Sholay broke its record.

Ashok Kumar played Shekhar pickpocket and conman, on the run from the cops, he slips into the home of the famous stage dancer Rani (Mumtaz Shanti), who is now crippled and dependent on crutches. Shekhar falls in love with Rani and helps her get out of the clutches of the theatre's current owner, the villanous Indrajit (Shah Nawaz), by paying off her debts. He tries to reform, but gets into trouble by gifting her a stolen necklace. Then he steals once more from Indrajit, so that he can pay for an operation that will help Rani walk again. Shekhar is arrested, Rani gets into trouble as well, and matters are sorted out happily when it is discovered that Shekhar is actually the long-lost son of a rich man (Mubarak) and all's well that ends well.

The lost and found crime drama, written by Niranjan Pal was the biggest grosser of its time, the record set by it broken by Awara in the next decade. It was India's first blockbuster and the first with a chain-smoking anti-hero. It faced some censor problems and public outrage because of that, the cheeky anti-British song Door hato, however, surprisingly got past the pre-Independence strict censorship. Kismet was also markedly different in style from the films being made then, it was more naturalistic with realistic, low-key acting.

Ashok Kumar said in interviews that during a discussion they came up with the notion that our films were not as gripping as those from Hollywood, because the scripts were not as good. They sent for a book called Screenplay Writing by Francis Marian, which described how scenes were to be constructed and characters developed. Which probably explains why Kismet was not as stagey as other early films.

The music of the film by Anil Biswas, was a huge hit, with songs like, Door hato o duniyawalon Hindustan hamara hai, Ghar ghar mein diwali hai mere ghar mein andhera, Dheere dheere aa re badal, Ab tere siva haun mera Krishna Kanhiaya and Papiya re mere piya se keh do.

There was some behind the scenes squabbling going on between Devika Rani and Sashadhar Mukherjee at Bombay Talkies while this film was being made, and after this, Mukherjee and his brother-in-law Ashok Kumar broke away to establish their own Filmistan Studio.

Yuvvraaj/Raja

2008-12-01T07:35:00.000-08:00

Yuvvraaj, is heavily inspired by Barry Levinson's Dustin Hoffman-Tom Cruise starrer, Rain Man (1988), which had, in 1995, been Indianised into Raja by Indra Kumar. The story, is, simply, about the relationship between two brothers, one of whom is mentally challenged.

In Raja, the Brijnath or Birju (Paresh Rawal) is already disturbed by the refusal of his friend Rana Mahendra Pratap Garewal (Mukesh Khanna) to accept his brother Raja's marriage proposal for his (Rana's) younger sister Madhu. The two has been promised to each other as children, but Rana's refuses to consider it, since Birju's status does not match his own. Later, an accident causes Birju to become mentally handicapped and Raja has to look after him.

Raja (Sanjay Kapoor) and Madhu (Madhuri Dixit) meet each other again as grown-ups and fall in love. Rana and his wicked brother Vishwa (Dalip Tahil) want to keep the two apart. But when Raja suffers all kinds of humiliation and torture but does not waver in his love for Madhu, Rana pretends to give in and accept Raja as Madhu's suitor. While Raja is away, Rana invites Birju to stay with them. When he is there, they have one of their henchmen dress like Birju and attempt to rape Madhu. Rana and Vishwa forcibly send Birju to a mental hospital.

Now Raja has to choose between his brother and Madhu. She genuinely believes it was Birju who attacked her. But Raja believes his brother, who says he is innocent, and sets out to reveal Rana's evil plot. Even Madhu has to concede, finally, that she was mistaken, and her brothers had set her up. To the story of two brothers, Indra Kumar had added the romantic track and all the melodramatic masalato appeal to Indian audiences and the film did click at the box-office, helped in no small measure by Madhuri Dixit's superstar status then, and Nadeem-Shravan's hit score. The Nazrein mili.. love you Raja (with Madhuri dressed in just a kurta) was a chart-buster, along with Kisi din banoongi main Raja ki Rani.

Madhuri Dixit and Paresh Rawal were nominated for awards for their performances, and both won the Screen Awards that year. Rajawas a hit, but can't say that it was a memorable film, and it certainly didn't do anything for Sanjay Kapoor's career.

Dostana/Biwi Aur Makaan

2008-12-01T07:33:00.000-08:00

Tarun Mansukhani's Dostana is about two guys who pretend to be gay in order to rent an apartment in Miami. Way back in 1966, when the word 'gay' (to mean homosexual) probably wasn't coined, and in any case, gays preferred to remain in the closet, what did men do when they couldn't get an apartment to rent because they were single? One of them got into drag and they pretended to be a couple. In that sense, Hrishikesh Mukerjee's Biwi Aur Makaan, made 42 years ago, was a precursor to Dostana, which, made in today's relatively liberal times does not just use the word 'gay' so casually, but also joke about Sholay's Gabbar and Munna-Circuit being gay.

Back then, getting into female garb was daring enough and nobody cast aspersions on actor Biswajeet's sexuality. Though it must be said, he made a rather beautiful woman. In Biwi Aur Makaan, four young men who move to Mumbai, cannot get accommodation because most landlords prefer to rent to married couples and not to bachelors. In desperation two of them disguise as women and pose as wives to the other two and get room with the Mishra family, which did not want single men, because there were two young girls in the house.

As can be expected two of them (Biswajeet-Mehmood) fall in love with the girls (Kalpana-Shabnam) and the whole charade eventually gets out of hand.The film was reportedly a remake of Bengali film Jaya Che Kali Boardingand was later made into a Marathi film called Ashi Hi Banwa Banwi by Sachin. It was a hit in both versions, but the Hindi remake, admittedly not one of Hrishida's best, did not do too well.

The film was produced by singer-composer Hemant Kumar, and the music was far more memorable than the film, and Gulzar, in the early days of his career wrote the lyrics. The hit numbers were Jaane Kahaan dekha hai, Aise danton mein uangali dabaao nahin, Saawan mein barkha and Dabe labhon se kabhi jo koi salaam le le, but songs like Rehne ko ghar do chhat pe ho farsh ho and Jab dosti hoti hai, were written keeping the situations in the film in mind.

Ek Vivaah.../Tapasya

2008-12-01T07:32:00.000-08:00

Those were the days when a woman-centric family weepie like Tapasya could turn out to be a hit. The Rajshri's new release this week, Ek Vivaah Aisa Bhi, takes its plot from their own 1976 production, directed by Anil Ganguly.

Indu (Raakhree) is the eldest daughter of Prof. Chandranath, she is studying and waiting to marry a doctor Sagar (Parikshit Sahani), whom she loves. Her life changes drastically when her mother dies, and her father falls ill. The responsibility of looking after her father (AK Hangal) and her younger brother and two sisters falls on her. Then the father passes away too and becomes the family's only support. Her fiancé offers to marry her and share some of the burden, but Indu thinks about it and refuses. She believes it is her duty to look after family and she must do it by herself, not push it on to her husband and in-laws.

She abandons her studies and to earn a living, starts a kindergarten in her house. She puts her own future on hold, till her siblings can stand on their feet. She asks Sagar to marry someone else and not wait for her. But he understands her dilemma and promises to wait for as long as it takes. Even his mother cannot not force him to marry anyone else. His love and admiration for Indu remains unshaken over the years. The siblings, for whom she sacrificed her happiness, prove to be selfish and ungrateful. She thinks when her brother gets a job, her problems will be solved, but he decides to marry his boss' daughter and become a ghar jamai.

It looks like Indu's tapasya will never end. It becomes a test of Sagar's love and patience. The film expectedly fetched Rakhee the Filmfare Best Actress Award. It had appropriate—though not hugely successful music—by Ravindra Jain teaming up with MG Hashmat for the heavy duty, emotion-laden lyrics like: Do panchhi do tinke kab leke chale hain kahaan yeh banaayenge ek aashiyaan and Jo raah tune chuni us raah pe raahi chalte jaana.

Tapasya was a good example of what is known as the 'woman's picture' in the trade, the kind of film that made women flock to it in droves, just to be able to cry and purge their own sorrows. Whether a film like that will work 32 years later, is the question that will be answered by the box-office fate of Ek Vivaah Aisa Bhi.

Golmaal Returns/Aaj Ki...

2008-12-01T07:30:00.000-08:00

Golmaal Returns (by Rohit Shetty), picks its plot from Rajendra Bhatia's 1973 film Aaj Ki Taaza Khabar, one of those underrated comedies, which may have slipped through the cracks of moviegoers's memory, but the name of a character in it-- Champak Boomia, is unforgettable.

The original, written by S Khalil from Mulraj Rajda's story, sounds suspiciously like a Hollywood screwball comedy. And this one did not need gay gags and crude butt jokes to raise laughter, like Golmaal Returns does. The film had a fresh cast—mostly graduates from the Film and Television Institute (Pune)—maybe if it had big stars then, it might have done much better than it did. In one those bizarre things that happen only in films, Sunil Mehta (Kiran Kumar), is stuck all night in a giant wheel with a young woman (Arpana Choudhary).

When he gets home the next day and is confronted with a very suspicious wife Geeta (Radha Saluja), he looks at the paper, and comes up with Champak Boomia as the name of the friend he was with all night. The wife is not convinced, she writes a letter to Champak at the fake address Sunil gives her, to come and meet her. In a panic Sunil asks his friend Amit (Asrani) to pose as Champak and meet his wife. Matters would have been resolved, had there not been a real Champak Boomia (Paintal), who gets the letter and comes to meet Geeta in a flirtatious mood, thus setting off a spate of confusion and also bringing is own doubting wife (Padma Khanna) into the picture. Asrani's real life wife Manju played his wife in the film. Aaj Ki Taaza Khabar had comic actors like Mehmood and IS Johar in the cast, but Asrani and Paintal, both young and energetic then, created a laugh riot in the film—probably contributing to their future careers as comedians. Asrani won the Filmfare Award for Best Comedian for his role in this film.

The film was also was also nominated for Best Director, Best Film and Best Story, but didn't stand a chance with Zanjeer, Bobby, Koshish, Anurag in the running, it didn't stand a chance. Shankar-Jaikishen's music had the big Kishore Kumar hit, Mujhe meri biwi se bachao, along with Khitla hua shabab hai, Yeh mard bade bedardi hain, and Raat hai baat hai.

Heroes/Jagriti

2008-12-01T07:29:00.000-08:00

Heroes, is about two guys who go on a road trip and discover their lost patriotism—reminiscent of Satyen Bose's 1954 classic Jagriti, about a bunch of students taking a trip to understand what India is all about.

An ill-bred rich boy Ajay (Raj Kumar Gupta) is a problem kid and sent to boarding school by his grandfather. Ajay refuses to reform, despite the efforts of the kind school superintendent Shekhar (Abhi Bhattacharya). He is also befriended by a crippled schoolmate Shakti (Rattan Kumar), who tries to reform Ajay. Shekhar is a great teacher, but the stubborn Ajay tries to run away from the hostel.The teacher believes in unorthodox methods of education and takes the boys a train journey through India, so that they can see what their country is all about.

While they travel, the film talks about India's cultural heritage, so that the kids are motivated to emulate India's great leaders and believe in noble, patriotic values. The scenes of the trip also highlight the salient points of each state the train passes through—like the valour of Shivaji in Maharasthra, the bravery of Rana Pratap in Rajastan, the Jallianwala Bagh tragedy in Punjab. The evocatively written song Aao bachon gave a capsule history of India.

Ajay is finally reformed when he is responsible for an accident that kills Shakti. He starts to work hard and excel at school. The teacher moves on to carry on his good work elsewhere. The music of Jagriti remains a classic, with some of the best patriotic songs penned by Kavi Pradeep and composed by Hemant Kumar. Each songs is memorable-- Chalo chalein ma sapnon ke gaanv mein, Sabarmati ke sant tu ne kar diya kamaal, Hum layein hain toofan se kashti nikal ke and Aao bachon tumhein dikhayein jhanki Hindustan ki.

Without any major stars, Jagriti turned out to be a hit because of its educational and emotional strengths. It won the Filmfare Award for Best film and Best Supporting Actor Award for Abhi Bhattacharya. Even today, its simplicity, honesty and homespun wisdom has inspirational value.

Karzzzz/Neel Kamal

2008-12-01T07:27:00.000-08:00

Reincarnation Films Reincarnation is part of the Hindu belief system, so it's not surprising that may Hindi film hits have used a rebirth plot—the most famous was, of course Bimal Roy's Madhumati (elements of it were used in Om Shanti Om), and Subhash Ghai's Karz, which was a remake of Hollyyood film The Reincarnation of Peter Proud, and has now been remade as Karzzzz by Satish Kaushik.

The big blockbuster, was of course, Rakesh Roshan's Karan Arjun, and much before that that, the musical hit Milan. There were other lesser known films with the 'punar janam' theme—Kudrat, Mehbooba, Dharkan, Mahua, Ab Ke Baras.

Then, there's the almost forgotten Neel Kamal (1968) by Ram Maheshwari, based on a Gulshan Nanda story, which did not have a revenge theme, but a romantic plot with a reincarnation angle. In the past, artisan Chitrasen (Raj Kumar) was entombed alive by the king, in the Rang Mahal he built for his beloved, because he dared to woo Princess Neel Kamal (Waheeda Rehman). Chitrasen's spirit (singing Aaja Tujhko pukare mera pyar ) haunts Rang Mahal, waiting for Neel Kamal's return. In the present, Sita (Rehman) and her friends go on a trip and she sleepwalks on to the train tracks. She is saved from being knocked down by the train by Ram (Manoj Kumar). Later her father (Balraj Sahani) offers Ram his daughter's hand in marriage, and the two get hitched.

Ram discovers that his wife's sleepwalking is not an illness, but involves a love story from her past life. Sita is 'summoned' by a voice calling to her. Her mother-in-law (Lalita Pawar) suspects that Sita goes off to meet a lover and taunts her. One day, she sleepwalks to Rang Mahal, and there she meets Chitrasen, who reminds her of the past birth when she was Neel Kamal. The only way the two can unite is if Sita dies too, and she agrees to sacrifice her life. In the end, without Sita dying, Chitrasen's soul is liberated and she is never troubled by the past again, going on to live happily ever after with Ram.

The film was quite watchable, and Waheeda Rehman won the Filmfare Best Actress Award for 'double' her role in it . It also had a melodious musical score by Ravi, that included hit Sahir Ludhianvi-penned numbers like Babul ki duaen leti ja, Hey rom rom mein basnewale Ram, Sharma ke yun ne dekh, Meri zindagi to thi plus the haunting Aaja track.

Hello/Is Raat Ki..

2008-12-01T07:25:00.000-08:00

Atul Agnihotri's Hello is the story of one night that transforms the lives of its characters. It is set in Mumbai and attempts to captures the buzz of the city. 1996, Sudhir Mishra made a film, that also happens over one night in Mumbai—the underrated Is Raat Ki Subah Nahin.

There is not much similarity between this film and Hello, except that both take place during one night, and have characters from Mumbai, with the city playing a part too. Unlike Hello, which attempts a kind of contemporary realism and fails, Is Raat Ki Subah Nahin, is the kind of scary experience that can happen to anyone. Aditya (Nirmal Pandey) and his wife Mallika (Tara Deshpande) have a quarrel over his affair with another woman Pooja (Smriti Mishra). Aditya stomps off in a huff, goes to a bar to have a drink and picks a quarrel a man, who turns out to be a don called Ramanbhai (Asish Vidyarthi).

When he realizes what he has done, it also dawns on him that his life is in danger and he runs, with Ramanbhai and his men chasing him all night, and the other characters, including a rival don Pandey (Saurabh Shukla) getting involved. The film was stark, slick and fast paced— and catching the odd moment, when the underworld collides with the respectable middle class and both are affected by the encounter. In the end, good does win over evil, but there is always a danger that things could very well have gone the other way. Mishra used the fear and fascination that ordinary people have for the underworld and let them have a glimpse of what it is like. Mumbai was seen by night, a couple of half-way decent songs—Chup tum raho and Tere mera naam, fitted in, only slightly affecting the high-strung tension.

The film came before Satya and the other realistic city films that were made later, and had it been released today, its fate would have been quite different.

Kidnap/Hero

2008-10-03T22:53:00.000-07:00

Hero

This week’s release, Sanjay Gadhvi’s Kidnap is about a young man who abducts, for revenge, the daughter of the man he wants to punish.

One of the most popular films with the kidnap theme, was Subhash Ghai’s 1983 film Hero, which introduced Jackie Shroff and Meenakshi Seshadri. In this film, the bad guy is transformed by the power of love.

A criminal, Pasha (Amrish Puri) has to settle scores with retired cop Shrikant Mathur (Shammi Kapoor) and his police officer son Damodar (Sanjeev Kumar), so he gets Jackie Dada (Shroff) to kidnap the family’s beloved daughter Radha (Meenakshi Seshadri), in order to negotiate for his release from prison.

Jackie tells her that they are cops who have been asked to protect her from dacoits. Unlike the victim in Kidnap, this abduction victim is blissfully unaware for most part and has a picnic and singing songs on beautiful locations.

Eventually, Radha figures out the truth, but by then she is in love with Jackie (talk of Stockholm Syndrome!), and urges him to surrender. He does have a change of heart, surrenders and goes to jail for two years. The story actually ends here, but Ghai stretches it a bit more. Radha tells her brother Damoder that she is in love with Jackie, which obviously does not go down well with the family. To prevent Radha’s family from getting her married to somebody else, Jackie asks his friend Jimmy (Shakti Kapoor) to pretend to be in love with Radha, but he actually falls for her, and the family does not know that he is actually a smuggler.

When Jackie comes out of prison, he starts working in a garage and genuinely tries to reform, but he is still not welcome by the Mathurs. Also Pasha adds Jackie to his list of enemies, so he kidnaps Radha, so now the ‘hero’ has to rescue her and redeem himself in the eyes of her family.

The film’s intense romantic plot, its message of love conquering all odds, combined with a popular music score made Hero a big hit, and still one of Ghai’s most memorable after Karz. It had Laxmikant-Pyarelal at their best—that haunting flute solo, plus songs like Tu mera janoo hai, Ding Dong baby sing a song, Nindiya se jaagi Bahaar, Pyar karnewale kabhi darne nahin and Pakistani gypsy singer Reshma’s full-throated Lambi judai. Always worth revisiting.

Rafoo Chakkar

2008-09-27T22:45:00.001-07:00

Rafoo Chakkar

This week’s release, B H Tharun Kumar’s Rafoo Chakkar takes its title and nothing else from Narendra Bedi’s 1975 hit.

While the old film was a sparkling comedy-thriller inspired by Billy Wilder’s classic Some Like it Hot, the new Rafoo Chakkar is a disgusting piece of faux filmmaking. Pity it is ruining the memory of the old hit.

Getting nostalgic then, for the film in which Rishi Kapoor masqueraded as a woman, and had people joking that he looked cuter that the heroine.

Dev (Rishi Kapoor) and Salim (Paintal) are musicians, who perform at weddings. One day, they witness a murder and are spotted by the killers. To save their own lives, they disguise themselves as girls—Devi and Salma-- and get on to a train to going to Kashmir with a band of girls. Among them is Ritu (Neetu Singh), who has run away from her nasty aunt (Lalita Kumari), who wanted her to marry an old man Prakash (Madan Puri) for money. This man happens to be the partner-in-crime of Ranjit (Anwar Hussain), who is also Dev’s long-separated father.

Dev falls in love with Ritu, but his disguise comes in the way. Ritu tell ‘Devi’ that she would like to marry rich and handsome man. So Dev masquerades as a rich man. Meanwhile ‘Salma’ gets suitor in the form of Rajendranath, who falls in love thinking he is a she.

The film was a good example of the seventies masala film, a bit of comedy, some crime, lost-and-found, plenty of romance, shot on pretty locations and with great music. The Rishi Kapoor-Neetu Singh pair was also at its peak of popularity. It was the innocence of the times, that no hassle was caused by the drag act or by the romance between two men, even if it was in error.

Kalyanji-Anandji’s music was a hit, with a lot of numbers topping the charts. Remmber songs like Chook chook chak chak Bombay se Baroda tak, Kisi pe dil agar aa jaye to kya hota hai, Dil dena buri bala hai, Tumko mere dil ne pukara hai, Aye zamane, tu karle situm, Bhajan bina chain na aye Ram.

Even today, watching the 1975 Rafoo Chakkar is great fun, which is more than can be said about the new one.

Hulla/Ek Ghar

2008-09-20T10:06:00.000-07:00

Ek Ghar

This week, Jaideep Verma's Hulla, tells an urban story, about a man whose life goes haywire, because he is unable to sleep due to the building watchman's piercing whistle, and the society secretary refuses to help. The small irritant, blows up into tragedy for all concerned. In 1991, award-winning director Girish Kasaravalli made Ek Ghar (Hindi version of his own Kannada film Mane), based on a story by TG Raghava, in which the protagonists go through a similar trauma.

Rajshekhar (Naseeruddin Shah) and Geeta (Deepti Naval) are a newly married couple, eager to set up home together. They move into newly rented room in a crowded lane of the city, which they find with some difficulty, considering their limited means. The shed next door lies vacant during the day, at night a group of people come and work there, and the noise keeps the couple awake. It affects Rajshekhar's work and eventually the life of the couple.

When all efforts to get the shed vacated fail, the couple ask Geetha's aunt (Rohini Hattangady) for help. She knows a senior police officer, and the men from the workshop next door are evicted, but Geeta had to 'deal with' the cop. However, the cop lends the shed to his nephew who starts a video game parlor. The couple get out of one problem and land into another. Rajshekhar decides take Geeta away from the environment. He seeks the help of the workmen who had earlier occupied the shed, but their slum is demolished to make way for a multinational company, by the bulldozers manufactured by the factory in which Rajshekhar works.

Hulla is a comedy, while Ek Ghar was a dark film about the problems of urban living and how noise can wreck peace of mind in an already stressed environment. A director's note on the film stated, "Environmental sound is an integral character in the film. Imaginative use is made of every conceivable sound preventing a newly married couple to settle down in life. Sound plays the metaphorical villain in the film! The mixing and blending of various sounds in the soundtrack of the film offers an insight into the hybridization and mechanization of life in a small town in India , taking the film beyond the four walls of the house."

The film, which has superb performances by Naseeruddin Shah and Deepti Naval, won awards and went to many festivals. Mane is considered a classic of Kannada cinema, but unfortunately Ek Ghar did not get a wide viewership.

1920/Mahal

2008-09-13T22:47:00.000-07:00

Mahal

This week’s release, Vikram Bhatt’s 1920, a horror film about a haunted palace, brings to mind Kamal Amrohi’s 1949 film Mahal, one of the earliest Hindi thrillers dealing with the supernatural and reincarnation.

Starring Ashok Kumar and a very young Madhubala, the film was a big hit. It is about Shankar (Ashok Kumar) who moves into an abandoned mansion with an eerie atmosphere. He sees a portrait of the mansion’s former owner, and is startled with the resemblance to him. He also spots the ghost of the owner’s mistress Kamini (Madhubala), who tells him that they are lovers from the past birth and to be united, he must either die himself, or kill the gardener’s daughter so that she (Kamini) can come back to life.

Shankar gets morbidly obsessed with the woman, and to snap him out of it, his friend Shrinath (Kanu Roy) tries to get him married to Ranjana (Vijayalakhsmi). One day Ranjana follows Shankar and sees him with Kamini. She commits suicide and accuses him in her dying statement to the police.

In court, it is revealed that Kamini is none other than the gardener’s daughter Asha, who had been pretending to be a ghost. Shankar is sentenced to death but still in love with Asha/ Kamini, so he asks Shrinath to marry her, so that they are separated in this birth, but can be united in the next.

As he is about to be hanged, a letter from Ranjana confessing that she had committed suicide is found and Shankar is released, it is too late, Shrinath is already married to Asha.

The suspense in the film was terrific and a really scary milieu set up in the ‘haunted’ palace. Mahal was Kamaal Amrohi's first film as director and it was a remarkable, trend-setting debut. Cameraman Josef Wirsching shot the and pushed the magic of black and white to its greatest potential, expertly using light and shadow to create the dark, ghostly look for the film.

Ashok Kumar was also producer of the film; it was one of Madhubala’s first films as an adult, and it made her a star. With her luminous beauty, it was not hard to see why a man might lose his mind over her, like the hero does.

Some of the credit for the film’s success should go to Khenchand Prakash’s haunting music score—the song Ayega aaanewala is an all-time classic and the one that helped turn a young Lata Mangeshkar into a singing sensation.

Mahal had two other memorable Lata solos, Dil ne phir yaad kiya and Mushkil hai bahut mushkil. The other singer for the film was Rajkumari, who sang for Vijayalakhsmi -- Ghabra ke jo hum sar ko takraayen, Yeh raat phir na aayegi, Ek teer chala dil pe and Main woh hansi hoon-- but the film is still identified with Aayega aanewala and Madhubala.

Tahaan/Halo

2008-09-13T22:45:00.000-07:00

Halo

Santosh Sivan’s new film Tahaan, set in Kashmir, is about a little boy’s love for his donkey and his efforts to get the animal back, when he is sold to a merchant. On his journey to retrieve the donkey, nine-year-old Tahaan meets a variety of people and viewers get to see a slice of life in troubled Kashmir.

1n 1997, Sivan had made his first Hindi film Halo, set in Mumbai, about a little girl’s search for her pet dog. And through her eyes, you see a side of Mumbai and its bizarre characters, not seen too often in films. Obviously, right from the start of his career as a filmmaker (he is a cinematographer first, though now works only on his own films), he has an empathy for children and a cameraman’s knack for spotting and shooting the unusual. (In between these two he made Malli, about a little girl, this time in search of a magic stone).

In Halo, seven-year-old Sasha (Benaf Dadachanji) is a motherless child, who, when told by her servant that God grants everyone’s wishes, prays for a companion. The next morning, to her delight, she finds a puppy. Much against the wishes of her father (played by filmmaker (Rajkumar Santoshi), the pup named Halo, becomes her ‘best friend.’

Then, one day, Halo is lost and Sasha is distraught. She sets out to find the pup and meets strange people, like a dog-catcher, a gang of smugglers, a batty newspaper editor, to a menacing commissioner of police. Among her helpers is a kid keeping up a running commentary and another filming the action.

On being advised by a girl who aspires to be a politician, Sasha makes the rounds of the police station and newspaper offices, till finally, a gang of urchins leads her to her beloved Halo. But when she finds the pup, she realizes that someone else need it more.

The tone of the film was zany and mostly comic, unlike the serious Tahaan, but Sivan seems to understand the psyche of a child and is able to, if only for a while, see the world from a kid’s point of view. Just like Sasha is not too intimidated by the perils of city life away from the safe haven of her home, the Kashmiri kid Tahaan, seems to surrounded by, but also strangely unaffected by, the presence of the army and militants lurking around. It’s as if children neutralize the evil around them, in Sivan’s fairytale like world.

Mukhbiir-Chamku/Ankhen

2008-08-30T00:27:00.000-07:00

Ankhen

In some current films ‘RAW’ and ‘IB’ are bandied about, but very few Bollywood have explored the espionage or spy genre, which Mani Shankar has done in this week’s Mukhbiir, or to an extent Kabeer Kaushik in Chamku.

However, in 1967, Ravkant Nagaich made a James Bond rip-off called Farz, whose success led to Ramanand Sagar making a much more sophisticated and complex spy thriller Ankhen a year later.

The style of the film may be dated, but the subject is astonishingly contemporary. Back in the 60s, India is facing acts of terrorism and attempts by a neighbouring country to destabilize it. Now it may seem corny but then Ankhen was a bit ahead of its times. Shot in Japan and Lebanon, it showed characters using spy paraphernalia like hidden cameras and mikes, secret codes, disguises, bizarre dens—and the rubber mask that is still being used even in Hollywood films.

When problems start in the country, fomented by then hostile China (India had just been through a major war with China when the film was made), the Indian government swings into action, as do some patriotic citizens who spread out their own network of spies to keep tabs on the plans of the enemies. There was an array of baddies—Jeevan, Madan Puri, Zen Rehman and Lalita Pawar among them.

Sunil (Dharmendra) is a secret agent working for the Major (Nasir Hussain) who has set up this spy group. Sunil has returned after learning martial arts in Japan, where he also met half-Japanese Meenakshi (Mala Sinha), when he is sent to Beirut from where guns are smuggled to India. Another agent, Salim, has been killed and Sunil is his replacement.

He works with a group of agents who are disguised as nightclub singers and dancers, headed by none other than Meenakshi. But there is a double agent at work and Sunil’s cover is blown. (The identity of the mole will come as a surprise.)

There are attempts to kill him—there’s the famous Dharmendra vs tiger fight—and then Babloo, the son of his sister (Kum Kum) is kidnapped. This is the part that would make today’s audiences laugh and perhaps also get nostalgic, because similar scenes were used in so many later films.

Babloo is imprisoned in a den that goes through a hospital into an underground bunker, and put in a glass cage, which, at the touch of a button moves a wall of spikes towards him, that threaten to cut him to bits. He is rescued, of course.

The film had a fabulous music score by Ravi, with songs like, De De Allah Ke Naam Pe, Gairon Pe Karam Apno Pe Sitam, Meri Sun Le Araj Banwari and Milti Hai Zindagi Mein Muhobbat Kabhi Kabhi

Phoonk/Gehrayee

2008-08-23T23:40:00.000-07:00

Ram Gopal Varma’s Phoonk has the tagline, ‘It’s superstition till it happens to you’. The film is about a little girl being possessed by an evil spirit.

In 1980, Arunavikas’s controversial film Gehrayee was released, also about a spirit possessing a girl. It starred Padmini Kolhapure in the role of a pre-teen, and the nude scene she did caused quite a hullaballoo then.

Inspired by The Exorcist (1973), but not a copy, Gehrayee started with the line, “For those who believe no explanation is necessary -- for those who don't, no explanation is possible!” It was one of the best horror films to have come out of Bollywood, and used none of the stock shock tactics (no heads spinning or people flying), but told a story without resorting to gimmickry-- about a man’s thoughtless act of cruelty, that has repercussions on his young daughter.

Shreeram Lagoo played Chennabassapa, who inherits a large land holding from his father. He decides to sell the land to a factory, thus throwing the tenant farmers cultivating the land out of a livelihood. One of them, Baswa, declares that he will seek retribution.

Later, Chennabassapa settles in Bangalore with his docile wife Saroja (Indrani Mukherjee), son Nandu (Anant Nag) and daughter Uma (Padmini Kolhapure).

Uma is bright and intelligent, but suddenly goes through a personality change. Her performance in school shows a drop. Then she gets some kind of fit, in which she takes on a masculine personality and rants about injustice done to him.

Her parents take her to doctors, and she is given electric shocks, but nothing helps. Her father does not believe in mumbo-jumbo, but her mother makes the rounds of priest and tantrics. After being duped by tantrics (one of them played by Amrish Puri), finally a servant beings a good priest who understands the problem.

By the time the mystery of Uma’s condition is revealed, a dark secret from the past also spills out. During one of Uma’s fits the male voice says that not only had Chennabassapa taken away Baswa’s land, he had raped his wife, who had committed suicide. Baswa also died and his spirit returned to wreak revenge on Chennabassapa’s family. Then there’s a surprise ending.

Padmini, who was just about 12 then, gave an fabulous performance as the troubled girl. Today, after seeing so many special effects laden horror films, it is possible to appreciate Gehrayee in retrospect. The husband-wife team of Arunaraje Patil and Vikas Desai split a little later, and both followed their own careers individually, but this film was the highpoint of their careers.

BAH/TD

2008-08-23T23:34:00.000-07:00

Bachna Ae Haseeno is about a man who falls in love with three women. It is probably inspired by, and definitely reminiscent of Dev Anand starrer Teen Devian (1965), directed by Amarjeet—the three leading ladies being Nanda, Simi Garewal and Kalpana.

Devdutt (Anand) works in shop selling musical instruments. Encouraged by his boss (IS Johar), he also writes and publishes his poems. The three 'Devi's – the first (Nanda), who is the girl next door, the second (Kalpana), an actress, who meets the hero when her car breaks down; the third (Simi), a rich woman he meets when he goes to deliver a piano to her house. All the three women are attracted to Devdutt and he to them, but he can choose just one to marry.

The story of the film (credited to Sadashiv Brahmam), was unusual and bold for the time, and explored the unlikely, though not impossible, scenario of a man carrying on a flirtation with three women. He is not insincere, he genuinely likes the three, and they like him, in spite of knowing about the other two. (Anant Mahadevan tried a variation of this story with Shahid Kapoor with Dil Maange More, without much success.)

When he can't make up his mind, a goes to a hypnotist, who makes him dream of his future with each one of them so that he can make the right decision. (The dream was in colour in an otherwise black-n-white movie). The conventional part of the film is that he chooses the homely Nanda.

The light, breezy (surprisingly underrated) romantic film, had a magical SD Burman score, with songs like Aaise to na dekho, ke humko nasha ho jaaye, Arre yaar meri, tum bhi ho gazab, Khwaab ho tum yaa koi haqiqat, kaun ho tum batalaao and Likha hai teri aankhon mein, kisaka afsana. The kind of film that made the audience come out of the theatre humming.

SIK/JDMGBT

2008-08-23T23:28:00.000-07:00

Parallel Cinema

If the plot of Singh is Kinng were to be written in one line it would be “Village simpleton reforms a gang of criminals.” This could be said to be the plot line of Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hai.

There is no real similarity between SIK (which is inspired by Frank Capra’s Pocketful of Miracles) and the 1960 film produced by Raj Kapoor and directed by Radhu Karmarkar, but the idea of simplicity and honesty conquering all odds has travelled the distance.

Raj Kapoor plays Raju, a poor and innocent musician. Once, while helping a wounded man, he is taken to be a policeman and abducted by a gang of dacoits. The bandit leader, is Sardar (SB Nayampalli), whom Raju had helped. He is treated like a guest after he manages to convince the dacoits that he is not a cop. Sardar’s daughter Kammo (Padmini), who falls in love with Raju, tells him they are socialists who ensure that wealth is distributed equally to all.

But soon Raju witnesses a mass killing, figures out the truth and informs the police, but he also wants to warn the dacoits, because he does not want them to be killed by the cops. But rebel bandit Raka (Pran) kills Sardar takes over the gang, wants to wed Kammo by force and fight the cops, while Raju begs them to surrender. The stage is set for a confrontation between the forces of good and evil.

The film, written by Arjun Dev Rashk, made a case for non-violence and compassion, and the peaceful surrender of dacoits who have become what they have due to circumstances.
It won the Filmfare Award for best film in 1961, and had a fabulous music score by Shankar Jaikishan, including such hits as O Basanti, O Maine Pyar Kiya, Begani Shaadi Mein, Aa Ab Laut Chale, Mera Naam Raju and the title track Hum Us Desh Ke Waasi Hain, Jis Desh Mein Ganga.

A bit simplistic and too melodramatic by today’s standards, the film is nevertheless a classic.