tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22183663694776176622024-03-08T09:33:53.490-08:00The Cinema CorridorNivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.comBlogger25125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-72448791721222308672013-01-31T08:15:00.002-08:002019-04-28T12:22:18.980-07:00One day I discovered Suraiya<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i>When Suraiya passed away, I wrote this piece for India Abroad, March 12, 2004. On the occasion of her ninth death anniversary today, I post it here.</i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Suraiya in Dastan (1950)</td></tr>
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When I heard that Suraiya, the singing star of yesteryear, is no more, I felt a twinge of sadness for the lost world of old Hindi cinema. Suraiya's songs are so inextricably intertwined with memories of my growing up years in India. As a schoolkid in Bombay in the late eighties, I had just stumbled upon the magical world of old Hindi films, old being pre-1960 for me. The first movie I watched was Raj Kapoor's <i>Shree 420</i> (1955). Immediately, I knew I had found my own little dreamy retreat. Black and white had permanently cast its spell on me. With their crackling prints, exquisite songs, and breathtaking orchestra (<b>why do they not use such orchestration anymore?</b>), these films captured my imagination in a way nothing else did. One film led to another, one song led to another, and soon I was cruising along the road of Hindi film music's golden years. Each day would bring the thrill of a new find—a rare Anil Biswas composition, a soulful Naushad number, or a Kishore Kumar song as early as 1948. And then one day I discovered Suraiya.<br />
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Always on the lookout for vintage songs, I was addicted to a radio program called Raymond Sargam Smriti (it later became Centura Sargam Smriti) that played rare pieces from the 1930s, 40s, and 50s. I heard Suraiya for the first time on this program: the song was "Tu mera chand main teri chandni," a duet with Shyam, composed by Naushad in the film <i>Dillagi</i> (1949). I was struck by the beauty of the song and the simplicity of its rendering. Suraiya, I later found out, was a natural singer; she had not learnt classical music. Yet, her singing was effortless and had a certain genuineness about it. Her voice was not cloyingly sweet. It rang vibrant, full of spontaneity and life. Her immortal "Ta rari ta rari" duet with Mohammed Rafi in <i>Dastan</i> (1950), where she acted opposite Raj Kapoor, bespeaks that inherent sense of frolic. This Naushad song with the Western classical touch brings to mind a faraway world, a kind of wonderland almost. It is a world I still periodically escape to.<br />
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Suraiya was that rare thing: an accomplished singer as well as a graceful actress. I remember seeing some of her films like <i>Dard</i> (1947) and the aforementioned <i>Dillagi</i> and <i>Dastan</i> at the Kardar film festival in Bombay. (A. R. Kardar was a famous producer-director from the 1930s to the 50s.) While Suraiya started as a child star with a small role in Mohan Pictures’ <i>Taj Mahal</i> (1941), she recorded one of her early songs as a playback singer for a Kardar movie called <i>Sharda</i> (1942). The song was "Panchhi ja," and the composer was Naushad. The Kardar-Naushad-Suraiya collaboration resulted in some very memorable movies and songs. After lending her voice to other heroines in the initial years, Suraiya went on to become the biggest heroine of her times.<br />
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She also had the rare privilege of acting opposite the legendary K. L. Saigal in <i>Tadbir</i> (1945), <i>Omar Khayyam</i> (1946), and <i>Parwana</i> (1947). With the Partition in 1947, Noorjehan, the other great singing star of Hindi cinema, left for Pakistan. Suraiya chose to stay on and soon became the acting-singing sensation of independent India. 1948-49 was the turning point of her career. Famous Pictures' <i>Pyar Ki Jeet</i> and <i>Badi Bahen</i>, together with Kardar’s <i>Dillagi</i>, all released during this time, made Suraiya a household name. In <i>Badi Bahen</i>, she sang the haunting "Woh paas rahe ya door rahe" for Husnlal-Bhagatram, possibly the first music-director duo of Hindi cinema. Suraiya had reached the dizzying heights of stardom.<br />
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After 1952, however, the scene changed. Lata Mangeshkar's arrival a few years earlier had heralded a new era in playback singing. Suraiya’s fortune was on the wane. Her films could not repeat the earlier magic at the box office, and she was also doing fewer films. The songs were still exquisite though, many of them hits. Sohrab Modi’s <i>Mirza Ghalib</i> (1954), opposite Bharat Bhushan, was one of Suraiya's best performances as an actress. She sang the soothing "Dil-e-nadan tujhey" duet with the velvet-voiced Talat Mehmood. Suraiya and Talat faced the camera together in the 1954 film <i>Waris</i> (one of Talat’s rare screen appearances). Two of Hindi cinema’s finest voices sang the lilting "Rahi Matwale," composed by Anil Biswas.<br />
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After <i>Rustom Sohrab</i> (1963), Suraiya quit the silver screen permanently. She left movies but did not leave the hearts of her countless fans. For me, Suraiya's songs and movies will always be a reminder of the carefree days of my childhood—of that happy, spellbinding world of old Hindi films. In some fundamental ways, life has not changed. <br />
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Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-59143312074633415622013-01-18T09:28:00.000-08:002013-01-29T11:33:59.989-08:00Kundan Lal Saigal and Kailas Puri<i>Today being Saigal's 66th death anniversary, I post here a Saigal anecdote by my late father, S.V.Ramakrishnan, which he wrote for The New Indian Express, July 2, 2009. </i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Saigal in his last film, Shahjehan (1946)</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">S.V.Ramakrishnan, circa 1962</td></tr>
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My friend Kailas Puri and I, both in our twenties, were furiously preparing for IAS etc (now called Civil Services) exam. Our 'combined study' extended far beyond our academic options of History and Law. Kailas hailed from Sialkot in West Punjab—he would proudly refer it by its ancient name, Sakala, famous in Indian history. He also informed me that his surname 'Puri' is nothing but the corrupt form of Pururavas or Porus who fought Alexander the great. His claim of such illustrious descent could neither be proved nor disproved and I had to give him 'the benefit of doubt'. With his vivid memory and imaginative expression, Kailas was full of interesting tales, of which the anecdote about K.L.Saigal, whose 'hamesha jawan' (literally 'ever young') songs that both of us admired no end, stands forth in my memory.<br />
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One day we were discussing the date of the death of the great singer. I distinctly remembered the day and month; it was the 18th of January. But I had a doubt whether it was 1947 or 1948, while being sure that it was only either of them. Hearing this, Kailas instantly filled up the gap, affirming that it could be only 1947. How was he so sure, I asked. His explanation makes this story. <br />
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Until the Partition divided the land of five rivers and the accompanying holocaust displaced millions from where they belonged for generations, Kailas' family lived in comfort in their spacious ancestral house in Sialkot. His father was a music lover and a fan of K.L.Saigal too. He had a good collection of Saigal songs in gramophone records, the only form of sound recording available in those days. One day there was some commotion among the elders and Kailas' father in particular looked very sad. Learning on enquiry that, alas, Saigal was no more, Kailas, then eight or nine year old, had a prompt doubt in his mind. The immortal singer was no more, but what about his immortal songs? Kailas rushed to his father and asked him "Will his records sing now, that Saigal is dead?" This innocent question moved everyone to laughter and lightened even his father’s somber mood. It became a joke in the family and neighbourhood and everyone would pull the boy's legs for months afterward.<br />
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All this, Kailas concluded, could be only before August 1947 when the family had to flee for their lives as refugees to Delhi, leaving all their belongings including his father's treasured gramophone records. He recollected putting his famous question to his father in a hall where the latter was reclining on a large wooden swing (a popular piece of furniture in those days). It certainly did not take place at Delhi where they lived a severe life, crowded in a single room, for months before resettlement. With little space even for the family, there was no question of accommodating a gramophone or a swing. So, if the answer lies only between January 1947 and the next January, he was certain that it was the former.<br />
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With this rather uncommon sort of evidence, comic and tragic at the same time, we clinched the date in question.<br />
<br />Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-37839112294205629332013-01-07T21:40:00.000-08:002013-01-29T11:34:31.527-08:00Bimal Roy’s first film: New Theatres’ Udayer Pathey (1944) and the socialist dream<i>This first appeared as "Udayer Pathey: Bimal Roy's realistic inference of socialism" at <a href="http://dearcinema.com/article/udayer-pathey-bimal-roys-realistic-inference-of-socialism/3755" target="_blank">dearcinema.com</a> on </i><br />
<i>January 5, 2013.</i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Radhamohan Bhattacharya and Binota Bose in the film</td></tr>
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Before soaring to pan-India—and, indeed, international—fame
with <i>Do Bigha Zameen</i> (1953) that spoke of the travails of Shambhu the
peasant, Bimal Roy had, almost a decade earlier, in 1944, become a household
name in Bengal with <i>Udayer Pathey </i>(Towards the dawn), his directorial
debut in Bengali for Calcutta’s New Theatres, remade in Hindi as <i>Humrahi</i>
in 1945. The hugely successful <i>Udayer Pathey</i>, made by New Theatres on
the smallest budget, actually became the studio’s biggest earner. The music was
by Raichand Boral and the lyrics by Shailen Roy—in addition, the film featured
three very memorable Tagore songs.</div>
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Bimal Roy’s works all have a distinct flavor of social
realism about them, and <i>Udayer Pathey </i>is steeped in that flavor. It is
the story of Anup Chaudhuri, an intrepid writer-intellectual who upholds the
cause of the proletariat in a system where the balance of power is skewed
towards the moneyed class. Just the previous year, in 1943, Bimal Roy had made
a documentary for New Theatres on the subject of the moment, the Bengal famine.
Thus, <i>Udayer Pathey</i> came about when the rich-poor divide was in plain
view, and inescapably so. The famine, the inflation of the war years, and the
economic hardships that were the exclusive lot of the poor had irredeemably
polarized the haves and the have-nots into two incompatible camps. </div>
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This social divide rings loud and clear in the opening
scenes of <i>Udayer Pathey</i>. A luxurious chauffeur-driven car makes its way
to a poorer part of Calcutta as the wealthy Gopa Banerjee (actress Binota Bose
before she married the film’s story writer Jyotirmoy Roy to become Binota Roy)
drops off her poor classmate Sumita (Rekha Mitra, later Mullick) at the
latter’s home. Inside Sumita’s frugal home, her mother is at a loss about where
to seat the rich visitor who has come to invite her daughter to a niece’s
birthday party. </div>
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But for all the lack of material wealth in the house, there
seems to be an abundance of moral and intellectual wealth. Sumita’s brother,
Anup (Anup Lekhak as he is known), quite literally, lives and breathes
celebrated minds—the walls of his room are covered in his drawings of Tagore,
Bernard Shaw, Vivekananda, Aurobindo, Bankim Chandra, Gandhi and Karl Marx. An
amazed Gopa reads out from a Tagore poem that Anup has inscribed on the wall,
which has the words “udayer pathey” in it—the inspiration for the film’s title.
So, before we see Anup, we see the august company he keeps. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tagore's poem on the wall of Anup's room with the words "udayer pathey" </td></tr>
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We then see Anup (actor Radhamohan Bhattacharya, until then
cast only in villain roles) return home to find Sumita stitching a frock as a
birthday gift, and he cautions her against getting too close to her rich friend
as he is convinced that her gift will not be appreciated in a society where
price is all that matters. Sumita protests that not all rich people can be
categorized so, but Anup is dead sure that all rich folks look down upon the
poor. Sumita insists, though, that Gopa is different. And the unassuming and
immensely likeable Gopa does seem to be very different from her snooty
brethren.</div>
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The class divide is laid out in black-and-white at Gopa’s
lavish house. The birthday party is on with music and dance, and Sumita sticks
out like a sore thumb amidst the rich guests in their finery, and the liveried
servers. (Actress Smriti Biwas—whose chubby face I clearly remember in <i>Baap
Re Baap</i>, 1955 and <i>Jagte Raho</i>, 1956—dances to the remarkably
beautiful Tagore song “Basante phool ganthlo,” very aesthetically picturized
with a Nataraja statue, lit with lamps, in the background. I must say that
“Basante phool ganthlo,” in this case visuals included, makes it to my category
of <a href="http://cinemacorridor.blogspot.com/2009/07/enduring-power-of-certain-old-hindi.html" target="_blank">deeply elevating</a> songs.) The table overflows with expensive gifts, with
people busy discussing who gifted what and how much it cost. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Smriti Biswas dances to "Basante phool ganthlo"</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rekha Mitra as Sumita</td></tr>
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Sumita’s discomfort mounts by the minute and is not allayed
when Gopa compels her to sing. Sumita’s soulful singing only receives a cold response
from the gathering. Then, much to her (and Gopa’s horror), Sumita is accused of
stealing from the gift table. A mortified Sumita faints, and Gopa discovers—in
the folds of Sumita’s sari—the frock that her poor friend had brought along and
was ashamed, perhaps, to leave on the table. The accuser, Gopa’s sister-in-law,
is silenced, and Gopa accompanies her distraught friend home. There she meets
Anup, who is angry to see his sister return crying and refuses to accept Gopa’s
apology on behalf of her family. Anup rubs Gopa the wrong way and, after she
leaves, Anup tells Sumita that her insult at Gopa’s house is an insult of all
the poor by the rich. </div>
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Anup ekes out a livelihood through his writing and leads a
hands-to-mouth existence—a fact that, however, does not ruffle him much. When
his newspaper editor gives him the lead for a position as publicity officer at
Modern Industries Ltd., Anup gives it a shot and meets the boss’s son there who
is in charge, Shouren Banerjee (actor Devi Mukherjee), who is impressed by the
candidate’s writing talents and extends a job offer. Anup accepts it for the
sake of his family though he isn’t exactly thrilled that he has traded in the
unfettered world of literary writing for the fettered world of publicity
writing. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Devi Mukherjee as Shouren</td></tr>
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At this point, there is a scene, funny in an understated
way, where Anup, his pockets newly full, wakes up his landlord (Tulsi
Chakraborty, whose bulging eyes are etched deeply in the public imagination by
the movie poster for Satyajit Ray’s <i>Parash Pathar</i>, 1958) in the middle
of the night with the rent money. This is in return for the landlord’s demand,
earlier on, of the overdue rent from Anup at an odd hour.</div>
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Shouren greedily eyes Anup’s writerly imagination and, when
Shouren is asked to deliver a speech at the local university’s student union,
he orders Anup to write the speech for him, which, he specifies, be peppered
with grand words like bourgeois and democracy while also condemning the rich.
The dialogue between Shouren and Anup brings out the contrast between the
former’s smug, cocky thinking and the latter’s socialist thinking. The
cigar-toting Shouren tells Anup that the rich are unshakably at the top of the
social order and condemning them is just for the sake of winning popularity
from the students. Anup retorts that the rich are at the top only because they
possess the means to do so: they buy their way through. When Shouren
condescendingly points out that it is the rich who create job opportunities for
people like Anup, the latter notes that these jobs barely provide subsistence. </div>
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Indeed, as the socialist argument goes, in the capitalist
system profits are flagrantly tilted in favor of those who own the means of
production. The rich have the means, which the poor don’t, and that is what
makes all the difference. The socialist framework of <i>Udayer Pathey </i>plays
out in the context of the nationalist struggle against British rule. With
economic and political subjugation thus inextricably intertwined, the film’s
capitalist-worker divide is concurrent with the ruler-ruled—and
West-East—divide of the times. So, in this scene it is not at all surprising
that Shouren and Anup, in addition to mouthing ideologically opposing lines,
are presented in Western, and Indian, clothes, respectively—and thus visibly positioned
as opposites.</div>
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Shouren delivers the ghostwritten speech to much acclaim,
and soon Anup arrives at his boss’s house to ghostwrite, in the comforts of a
fabulous home library, another speech. Shouren shows off his original Jamini
Roy painting—and this reminds the viewer of the earlier scene where Gopa sees
Anup’s room covered in wall drawings and Sumita explains that her family cannot
afford to buy paintings. Shouren says rather proudly that while he has a book
collection spanning all subjects, he is too busy to read. Clearly, Shouren owns
these status symbols not out of any genuine appreciation but because he has the
brute means to buy it all, like a wholesaler does. </div>
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Anup sees Gopa at Shouren’s house (in keeping with the small
world of filmi melodrama, she predictably turns out to be Shouren’s sister) and
realizes that this is the house where Sumita was once humiliated. He resigns
his job right away, actually glad to have the justification to quit working for
a rich man. A persistent Shouren, who tries to write the speech himself and
gives up, reaches Anup’s house to ask for forgiveness from Sumita and even
promises that he will publish Anup’s novel. Anup returns, not so much to see
the novel published, but because of his earlier promise of writing Shouren’s
speech.</div>
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Gopa comes across Anup’s manuscript called “Purbachal” and
is totally absorbed by its stark depiction of the lives of the working class.
She has questions for Anup who is glad that the book has made her think outside
of her class. When Gopa wonders if the homelessness and the poverty are really
all that dire, Anup remarks that the very fact that she has to be told about
such an obviously grim reality (and does not know it for herself) is
disturbing, and indicative of the insensitivity of the rich. From here on, Gopa
and Anup warm up to each other. Sure enough, the next time she goes to meet
Anup, she wears a simple sari and happily drinks tea from a handleless cup; she
also accompanies him to the huts of factory workers. </div>
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<br /></div>
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Meanwhile, Shouren acts foul: he publishes “Purbachal” under
his own name. Anup is not shocked, but Gopa is, and she tells Anup that he must
confront Shouren. Anup is surprised to see Gopa upset and in tears but he is
too disgusted to pursue the matter. He happily realizes that Gopa is very
different from her ilk and his regard for her goes up. Shouren’s friends all
fawn over him and compliment him on his first-hand knowledge of the hardships
of workers. Gopa boycotts the celebration at an expensive restaurant and
instead she and Anup attend the workers’ union meet at a hut. Roy juxtaposes
the party where food is overflowing and laughter is hollow, with the
tension-filled hut where Gopa sees a poor child who has not eaten in two days.</div>
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<br /></div>
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The growing bond between Gopa and Anup is further cemented
as they take a stroll together and, appropriate to the context of the
moonlight, Gopa sings the soothing “Chander hashi badh bhengeche” by Tagore,
with the fog rolling in ethereally. The magic of the scene is unmissable. </div>
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<br /></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Chander hashi badh bhengeche" and the fog</td></tr>
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<br /></div>
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When Shouren hears of a workers’ protest in the offing and
is told that Anup is behind it, he promptly bribes a worker to disrupt the
event. When Gopa overhears her brother, she rushes to the meeting just in time
to see a riot break out and Anup hit with a stone. An annoyed Shouren pulls his
sister away from Anup, but the damage is done: the newspaper headlines scream
of the love between factory owner’s daughter and labor leader. As matters get
out of control at the workplace and at home, Shouren’s father, Rajendranath Banerjee
(actor Bishwanath Bhaduri), enters the picture and tries to make peace with
Anup—buy his loyalties, rather. Anup feels contempt for his boss’s manipulative
tactics and refuses to oblige. Shouren then lies to Anup that Gopa is sorry
about her friendship with a person beneath her class. Anup’s face falls as he
hears this.</div>
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<br /></div>
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A disillusioned Anup sends his mother and sister away to the
village, and is planning to leave Calcutta soon. As he tears asunder the
newspaper with his and Gopa’s pictures, Gopa shows up and is surprised to see
Anup suddenly cold and distant. She clears up his misunderstanding and tells
Anup to take her along, wherever he goes. Gopa’s father, meanwhile, desperate
not to lose his daughter, tries to fix her alliance with a wealthy friend’s
son. He visits Anup and requests him to give up Gopa. Anup promises, but
apparently Gopa’s mind is made and she puts on a dour expression when her
brother arranges her meeting with the suitor. </div>
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<br /></div>
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Meanwhile, thinking that it is Gopa who has had their demands
met, the workers go to her house to thank her and invite her to a felicitation
function. Gopa replies that the credit should go to Anup, and the workers reply
that he is going away and give her his letter addressed to her father. Gopa
reads it and realizes that Anup is going away at her father’s request. She
tells her father that she has to meet Anup and when Shouren tries to stop her
from going, Rajendranath stops Shouren. The path clear, Gopa rushes to Anup’s
house, where the landlord tells her that Anup has gone walking all the way to
Asansol (to deal with yet another labor issue). Gopa gets into her car one last
time and catches up with the wayfarer on the Grand Trunk Road, quite the
solitary figure against an open landscape. Gopa tells Anup that she has left
behind all riches to join him in the path of his choice, now hers as well. To
which Anup replies that she has not left behind riches—rather, they lie ahead
in this new path that she has chosen. As the two joyously walk away
hand-in-hand towards the horizon, it is the dawn of a new beginning. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Walking together on the new path</td></tr>
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<b>Concluding reflections and a postcolonial reading</b>: <i>Udayer
Pathey</i> was, at various levels, an innovative film and one that set the
standards for realism in Indian cinema. It was the first New Theatres film to
touch upon the theme of socialism and, although the film’s decidedly
black-and-white treatment of the rich-poor divide does seem rather simplistic
(and predictable in a filmi way), the exposition of class differences was
relevant at a time of rising national consciousness, when the country was busy
setting aside differences of class, caste, gender, and religion to coalesce
against foreign rule.</div>
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<br /></div>
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The battle that Anup wages against the class divide, and in
which Gopa joins him, is a stepping-stone to the larger battle against
colonialism. The new path that Anup and Gopa together take, in the end of the
film, is a path that will create not just the wealth of classlessness but also
the wealth of freedom and self-governance. </div>
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There is a sense in which the larger nationalist aspirations
of the day merge into the film’s socialist aspirations: that <i>Udayer Pathey</i>
opens to <i>Jana Gana Mana</i> (a historic first in an Indian film, although
the scene is missing in the DVD from Angel—was it originally censored by the
British perhaps?), not yet the national anthem in 1944, suggests that the
film’s socialist dream is at once a dream of free India—free from the skewed
power structures of capitalism and colonialism, both of which alienate and
dispossess the worker/colonized. Shouren not just strips the workers of their
rights to a dignified life but goes one step further to villainously rob Anup’s
intellect and his creativity. This sort of an elemental plundering—or ravaging
of the life force—is fundamental to colonialism, which dispossesses not only at
the material level, but also, very significantly, at the inner level. Thus the
image of Shouren in his western suit, throwing his weight around,
unscrupulously appropriating what is not rightfully his, is indisputably in the
colonialist mould. Gopa’s rising rebellion and her final desertion of Shouren,
one of her own, to join hands with Anup—and the people— disturbs the status quo
of the capitalism-colonialism combine and is symbolic of the weakening colonial
grip over India. The path towards dawn at the end of the film presages the path
towards a new, independent India. </div>
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<i>On a minor, lighter, and perhaps irrelevant note:</i> I
couldn’t help but notice that people are constantly drinking tea in the film. </div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>And, finally, a question</b>: I have been very baffled
about the missing <i>Jana Gana Mana</i> in the DVD from Angel. Film historian Firoze Rangoonwalla has clearly stated in a few places that <i>Jana Gana Mana</i> featured in the film as the opening song—and Radhamohan Bhattacharya, the film's lead actor, has recounted the same. So, then, did the British
cut it in 1944, or did Angel cut it out unimaginatively in recent times? I
emailed Angel and here is the response: “... please note that the original
Video of Bengali Film 'Udayer Pathey' (B/W) was supplied to us by New Theatres
itself. Therefore you are requested to kindly contact representative of New
Theatres directly to clarify the matter.” So far, I have not been able to
locate the contact information for New Theatres. Anyway, I find a very short
excerpt of <i>Jana Gana Mana</i> in the film in this video <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YR575_l5wrc" target="_blank">here</a> (starting at 1:21 and ending at 1:35)--which leaves me even more baffled. It
does appear to be in the film, after all. Can anyone please throw some light on
this mystery?<br />
<u>An update</u>: I asked <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._K._Nair" target="_blank">Mr. P.K.Nair</a>, and he says that the National Film Archive of India's print of <i>Udayer Pathey</i>, which is copied from the original negative, doesn't have <i>Jana Gana Mana</i> either. The mystery continues ... </div>
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<i>Acknowledgements</i>: I am grateful to: Forhad Hossain of
Fremont, California, for patiently translating the film credits into English
for me; and my cousin Vasanti Muthukumar of Bangalore, for reading out the
names written in Bengali on the walls of Anup’s room from the screenshots that
I sent her.<br />
<br />
<i>Disclaimer:</i> My screenshots from the film are used for academic/discussion purposes only; they may be reproduced only if accompanied by a link to this blog.</div>
</div>
<br />Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-8267916949719735592012-11-13T22:02:00.000-08:002012-11-13T22:15:55.093-08:00Introducing Lola the therapy dog<table border="0" style="width: 150px;"><tbody>
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Yes, this is certainly a film blog, but I simply could not resist introducing my dog here. The occasion calls for it. My dog is now a therapy dog! Lola, who is a mutt—we are guessing she is an Australian Cattle Dog mixed with Akita or Retriever—is five years old, and we have had her for a little more than two years now.<br />
<br />
As far as this blog goes, Lola’s contributions are immense: she is my man Friday (or should that be dog Friday) who, day or night, keeps me steadfast company as I watch, research, reflect, and write about old films. Of course she is snoozing most of the time, but her presence—registered by a periodic tail thumping—somehow always brings that much-needed perspective when I am stuck on a sentence or an idea. And, as far as the daily business of living goes, Lola is a friend, philosopher, and guide; she unceasingly reminds me, in her alternating clownish and sedate manner, that nothing in life is worth getting ruffled about. We call her Saint Lola. Without her, I wouldn’t be the same, and this blog wouldn’t be this blog.<br />
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<br />
So Lola, in her newly acquired regalia, now does the rounds of hospitals, nursing homes, and homes for seniors where she brings much cheer and comfort. Her duties also include listening to children who read to her at the pet therapy program organized at the local library.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dog and owner</td></tr>
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<br />Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-18594672359428300082012-11-01T16:24:00.000-07:002012-11-01T16:54:32.288-07:00Satyajit Ray on Balasaraswati: Bala (1976)<i>This first appeared as "Satyajit Ray's 'Bala': Lesser work of a master filmmaker?" at <a href="http://dearcinema.com/article/satyajit-ray-on-balasaraswati-bala-1976/5402#.UJIifG8xpc8" target="_blank">dearcinema.com </a></i><i>on </i><br />
<i>October 31, 2012.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Satyajit Ray</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">T. Balasaraswati</td></tr>
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<br />
When a colossus in the field of cinema crosses paths with a
colossus in the field of dance, it makes for a historically significant moment.
And so it was in 1976 that the worlds of Satyajit Ray and Tanjore Balasaraswati
briefly came together, when the former was commissioned by the NCPA and the
Government of Tamil Nadu to make a documentary film, <i>Bala</i>, on the
latter.<br />
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The film, at little over half hour in length, offers a peek
into the craft of one of the most acclaimed <i>Bharatanatyam</i> exponents
ever. For the most part, Ray is a bystander who is interested in objectively recording
the world of the dancer rather than defining it in subjective ways for the
viewer. (The notable exception to this approach is discussed in this piece.)
With his rich, baritone voice he is the physically absent narrator who looks
out of the window at the world beyond to create snapshots of Bala for the sake
of posterity. </div>
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Speaking of documentary style, Ray’s work is closer to
Direct Cinema than it is to the related, yet subtly different, Cinema Vérité
(literally “Cinema truth”)—where both styles aim to capture and present reality
as it is, though it can be pointed out that any such presentation is
necessarily a representation because the filmmaker’s subjectivity is
inescapable. So, then, there are no spontaneous, unfiltered truths that can be
captured by the camera—everything in the film is staged, and what the audience
sees is shaped by the sensibility of the filmmaker. </div>
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Apart from certain technical differences between the two
styles, Direct Cinema and Cinema Vérité can be distinguished from each other by
the level of the viewer’s consciousness of the filmmaker’s presence in the
documentation of reality—in Direct Cinema, where interviews and narration are
sparingly used, the filmmaker recedes more into the background and actively
tries to minimize, as much as possible, his or her ideological considerations;
on the other hand, in Cinema Vérité, the filmmaker steps more into the
foreground, determined to cull out the truth or the essence by probing into the
workings of the subject’s inner world—with this probing reflective of the
filmmaker highlighting certain themes over others, thus shaping the trajectory
of the narrative.</div>
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<i>Bala</i> opens with images of South Indian temple <i>gopurams</i>
(or towers) and temple sculptures as Ray traces the historical roots of the
classical dance form of <i>Bharatanatyam </i>to Bharatamuni’s <i>Natyashastra</i>,
that seminal work from the 4<sup>th</sup> century B.C on theatre and related
arts. Ray’s introduction is a useful starting point, almost a primer, for the
uninitiated viewer on the basics of this dance form, before he or she can move
on to appreciating its complexities and subtleties. The concept of <i>mudra</i>
or hand gesture is explained, and we see how meaning is created out of Bala’s
demonstration of the peacock <i>mudra</i> and its variations. </div>
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Ray then goes back in time to sketch, in sepia-tinted hues,
Bala’s generations-old family ties with dance and music, and places
Bharatanatyam in its original socio-cultural context of the temple where it
flourished, when temple dancers or <i>devadasis</i> were patronized by Indian
royalty. With the onset of colonial rule and the disappearance of royal
patronage, the <i>devadasis</i> lost their means of livelihood and came to be
seen as morally reprehensible beings who were a disgrace to so-called
respectable society. Both <i>devadasis</i> and their art came to be sullied. </div>
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When, in 1920, two-year-old Bala decided that she wanted
to be a dancer and not a singer, her encouraging mother boldly decided to
disregard the mores of the time. At this point, we see Bala speak for the first
time, in rather hesitant English, about her pupil days under her guru, Kandappa
Pillai. Then, music and dance historian<br />
Dr. V. Raghavan comments on Bala’s
dance and draws special attention to her younger days. Later, dance maestro
Uday Shankar who played a crucial role in Bala’s rise to national fame—conveyed
by images of old newspaper clips—recalls how exceptional he found her dance to
be. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Krishna nee begane baaro</td></tr>
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Now comes the part where Ray does more than just document
the world of the dancer: he presents it in a definitive, steadfast way for the
viewer. After his use of the Direct Cinema technique in filming his subject so
far, Ray suddenly takes a detour—in what can be called a poetic (or cinematic)
license—when he decides to frame Bala’s dance to the “Krishna nee begane baaro”
song in the background of the ocean, for which he has drawn flak from dancer
and academic Avanthi Meduri who writes that the “ocean backdrop is so imposing
in its magnificence that it manages to effectively subsume, efface, and
abstract the quotidian details involved in the rendering of the <i>padam</i>,”
which she defines as a “lyrical, poetic, melodic composition sung in a
leisurely manner” (Albright and Gere, 2003, pp. 141-150). Indeed, the mighty
ocean gobbles up all the nuances and intricacies of Bala’s rendering of the <i>padam</i>,
something that is undoubtedly discomfiting to the discerning <i>rasika</i> (or
aesthete). Ray’s “deep admiration of the subject” (in Andrew Robinson’s words,
1992, p. 274) is, perhaps, to be blamed for this.</div>
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The fact that Ray chooses the ocean—an embodiment of the
imperishable that is sure to inspire awe even in the most prosaic of minds—as
the context for Bala’s performance gives away Ray’s unconcealed awe for Bala’s
artistry, an artistry which, for him, is just as boundless as the waves of the
ocean, waves that—as the camera shows—dance in and out perennially. This is the
one scene in the documentary where what the audience sees is explicitly shaped
by Ray’s sensibility, with his littoral interpretation of the inner world of
Bala’s art suddenly bursting forth onto the screen. Direct Cinema briefly gives
way to a kind of Cinema Vérité here in that the audience is more conscious of
Ray’s invisible presence, which instills one particular view of Bala and her
art, both cast in the mould of eternity. </div>
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Towards the end of the <i>padam</i>, the sweep of the ocean
gives way to the sweep of Bala’s worldwide recognition. Music and dance scholar
Dr. V. K. Narayana Menon speaks of the “Indian year” that was 1963 at the
Festival of Arts in Edinburgh with other greats such as Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar
Khan, and M. S. Subbulakshmi. Bala had “eight solo recitals,” with the
reception “rapturous.” This leads to the bit about Bala’s appeal bringing her
teaching assignments in American universities and more honors back home. Then
the camera captures a few candid moments in the day-to-day life of Bala: at
home in Madras, she sits on the floor weaving a flower garland, with a
reclining cane chair visible in the background; she plays a game of dice seated
on a mat (or <i>paay</i> as it is called in Tamil); she enjoys a quiet meal at
the dining table with her family; later, she teaches her daughter Lakshmi.</div>
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The final segment—a major chunk lasting nearly 14 minutes,
which is roughly one half of the film—begins with Bala getting ready for a
stage performance of a <i>pada varnam</i> (the pièce de résistance of a <i>Bharatanatyam</i>
recital), which is a <i>raagamaalika</i> (garland of raagaas) based mainly on
the Carnatic Bhairavi. As she ties her anklets last, “the same pair, which Bala
wore for her debut more than fifty years ago,” the context is the stage—modern
Bharatanatyam’s terra firma—with the accompanying musicians to one side, and
this is certainly a far cry from the earlier context of the ocean. The backdrop
of the stage is undoubtedly more conducive to the viewer’s getting a grip on
the dancer’s use of <i>abhinaya</i> or expression, and the essential unity of
the three elements of <i>Bharatanatyam</i>—<i>bhava</i> (emotion), <i>raaga</i>
(melody) and<i> taala</i> (rhythm). This time, it seems, the camera is content
with capturing the performance without imposing any specific meanings on it.
Bala’s conclusion of her recital is the conclusion of the film, and the viewer
is left with the final image of Bala’s salutation to her audience.</div>
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My experience of <i>Bala</i>: The film distinctly leaves the
viewer with wanting for more. Despite my dissatisfaction with the treatment of
the subject, which, I felt, demanded a deeper engagement with the multiple
elements that constitute <i>Bharatanatyam</i>, it was thoroughly gratifying to
see the legend come alive onscreen. And this etching of Bala on celluloid is
what posterity will thank Ray for. His evocation of Bala—ocean or no ocean—is a
testament to her genius, and what the film offers is just a very small sample
of that genius.</div>
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<b>References:</b></div>
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Andrew Robinson, <i>Satyajit Ray: The inner eye</i>,
Calcutta: Rupa & Co., 1992.</div>
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Avanthi Meduri, “Multiple pleasures: Improvisation in <i>Bharatanatyam</i>,”
in <i>Taken by surprise: A dance improvisation reader</i>, Eds. Ann Cooper
Albright and David Gere, Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2003.</div>
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<b>Image credit for Satyajit Ray</b>: <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2012/sep/08/world/la-fg-india-intellectuals-20120909" target="_blank">Los Angeles Times</a>, September 8, 2012.<br />
<i>Disclaimer:</i> My screencaps from the film are used for academic/discussion purposes only; they may be reproduced only if accompanied by a link to this blog.<br />
<br />
<b>Film availability</b>: <i>Bala</i> is finally available on YouTube <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ak_a1RJ2DZc" target="_blank">here</a> (courtesy of blogger <a href="http://cinemanrityagharana.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Minai</a> who uploaded it in the first place and <a href="http://cinemanrityagharana.blogspot.com/2012/03/found-bala-1976-satyajit-ray-and-extant.html" target="_blank">wrote</a> about it as well) or <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2cC2Y0mJvw" target="_blank">here</a> (a higher quality print, courtesy of Imagineindia Film Festival).<br />
<br />
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Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-44061354214353284502012-10-17T12:56:00.001-07:002018-01-16T10:12:18.853-08:00The importance of being funny: Sullivan’s Travels (1941)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3-iPeVFksKY/UH2m-vdUdaI/AAAAAAAACtY/E5wdBwb9G28/s1600/Sullivantramp.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3-iPeVFksKY/UH2m-vdUdaI/AAAAAAAACtY/E5wdBwb9G28/s1600/Sullivantramp.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Actor Joel McCrea as Sullivan</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Raj Kapoor in Shree 420</td></tr>
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In writer-director Preston Sturges’ film <i>Sullivan’s Travels</i> (1941), Sullivan, a young, successful Hollywood film director (played by Joel McCrea) takes to the road by foot, in rags that he borrows from the studio’s costume department, to discover for himself what poverty is so that he can return with aplomb to make his dream project, a cinematic treatise on poverty. <br />
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In his tramp-like outfit, complete with a poignant-looking
bundle hanging from a stick over his shoulder—very Chaplinesque—Sullivan verily
resembles, in the Indian context, Raj Kapoor in <i>Shree 420</i> (1955), who,
in the beginning of the film, in ill-fitting attire, is pitted against the open
landscape as he sets out on foot to Bombay. However, while Raj is really an
impoverished tramp who plans to make it big in Bombay, and is all alone in the
world, Sullivan, who is anything but impoverished and alone, plans to make a
big social statement, and has an entourage following in a truck—this at the
insistence of his producers who want him to stay safe. Sullivan is hell-bent on
making a grand film on indigence, much to the chagrin of his shrewd producers
who wish that Sullivan would stick to his trademark comedies, which make people
laugh and rake in the profits.<br />
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In the character of Sullivan, an eager beaver for social
realism in cinema, Sturges was caricaturing the contemporary trend of
filmmakers trying, perhaps, a bit too hard to portray the grim realities of
post-Depression America—this at the expense of the comic aspect inherent in
human experience, regardless of what the tragedy might be. Sturges frowned upon
the tendency to deliberately banish or expunge laughter in the name of social
realism. Indeed, even in life’s starkest moment, there is something of the
humorous, just as there is something stark in the most comically absurd
situation. Sullivan—who wants, first-hand, to savor poverty, hunger,
homelessness, joblessness, indignity, and despair, among other misfortunes—has
the zeal of the immature on a mission at hand. Although Sullivan is earnest and
sincere in acquainting himself with the hardships of the unfortunate, he is
misguidedly, naively, and patronizingly so, as Sturges shows.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-eDtrWND2gyc/UH2_l18DbKI/AAAAAAAACt0/tHwmVUa8diY/s1600/Veronica.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-eDtrWND2gyc/UH2_l18DbKI/AAAAAAAACt0/tHwmVUa8diY/s1600/Veronica.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Actress Veronica Lake as "The Girl" is kind to Sullivan</td></tr>
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Himself a master of the comedy genre, Sturges makes the
viewer laugh at the irony of Sullivan imposing himself upon poverty, with not
much success initially, and with a comic timing in the form of slapstick as the
protagonist bumbles his way along in the first half of the film. Although
Sullivan makes a deal with the entourage to just leave him alone for a while so
that he can authentically lose himself in the world out there, he is strikingly
inept at itinerancy, as he unfailingly ends up right back in Hollywood, in the
midst of the familiar. Disheveled, disgusted with his inability to experience
hardship, and with ten cents in his pocket, he meets a girl (Veronica
Lake, referred to in the film as “The Girl”) at a lunch wagon, a frustrated
extra in Hollywood, on the verge of quitting her dreams of making it big in the
movies. She is kind to him—she buys him ham and eggs—and he commiserates with
her on her rotten luck. Later, he tells her who he really is and she is adamant
about joining him as a fellow hobo.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-V6YSictUfXA/UH3AizKSuMI/AAAAAAAACt8/sFNuiWvyuMs/s1600/vlcsnap-2012-10-15-15h43m55s48.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-V6YSictUfXA/UH3AizKSuMI/AAAAAAAACt8/sFNuiWvyuMs/s1600/vlcsnap-2012-10-15-15h43m55s48.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A clumsy pair of tramps</td></tr>
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Together, Sullivan and The Girl make a clumsy, inexperienced pair of tramps as they struggle to court hardship the hard way. Sullivan’s enterprising butler
even calls the train station to find out if freight trains carry tramps, and, if
so, where the tramps could get on. This information procured, the tramps are dropped off near the tracks, where a freight train is shortly to pass
by. They maladroitly climb into the moving freight train, into a compartment
filled with hay, nearly breathless by the exertion, in sharp contrast to the
deft climb of the professional hobos around them. The latter look on wryly, and
as one burly hobo sums it up: “Amateurs.” Sullivan’s attempt at a friendly
conversation starting with “So what do you think of the labor situation?” is
met with disdain by the hobos who simply walk out. As Sullivan settles in, he
tells his companion “Let’s just sit here and try to feel like a couple of
tramps.” This is followed by a sneezing session as the novice hobos battle with
the hay.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-MXX_gqBtALs/UH3BtlPUZfI/AAAAAAAACuE/hyPlxImPKN4/s1600/vlcsnap-2012-10-15-16h23m02s229.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-MXX_gqBtALs/UH3BtlPUZfI/AAAAAAAACuE/hyPlxImPKN4/s1600/vlcsnap-2012-10-15-16h23m02s229.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The impoverished crowd at the freight yard</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ready to clamber into the moving freight train</td></tr>
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Sturges presents the gulf between the haves and the have-nots in his characteristically comic vein, which does not detract from the starkness of social realism. In fact, the comic element of the advantaged Sullivan sticking out like a sore thumb in the impoverished crowd underscores the social reality that it is only the poor who know what it is to be poor. It is they who climb into moving freight trains with practiced ease; it is they who sleep peacefully anywhere; it is they who, inured to hardship, grow a callus, in a boorish sort of way.<br />
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At one point, finally, Sullivan’s “noble experiment” takes off, with Sturges filming this sequence in the form of a silent musical interlude, almost an ode to Chaplin. We see the face of poverty: huts and slums; wrinkled faces and unkempt beards; overcrowded shelters and public showers; communal eating and sleeping; garbage dumps and empty expressions. The experiment is at last over and Sullivan returns to Hollywood with his companion, ready to make his picture.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sullivan sees the headline of his own death</td></tr>
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When, in gratitude to the poor folks he has spent time with,
Sullivan returns to the scene of poverty one last time to distribute dollar
bills, he is hit unconscious and pushed into a moving freight train by a beggar
who steals the money. This is the same beggar who had earlier stolen Sullivan’s
boots (that have his studio identity card sewed inside). An oncoming train
kills the beggar and, going by the identity in the boots, the next day the
newspapers report Sullivan’s mysterious death at the train tracks. In a twist to the narrative, Sturges has Sullivan taste what
the latter had all along been looking for: <b>hardship, the real way</b>. Sullivan
wakes up in the moving freight train with a severe headache, battered and
confused. When the train pulls into the freight yard, he gets off and is
accosted by a railroad officer for trespassing. Sullivan, who temporarily
cannot remember who he is, pelts the officer with a stone, for which he is
arrested and sentenced to six years of hard labor. It is only after he is
inside the prison that his memory of who he is comes back to him. But it is too
late and no one believes that he is a famous Hollywood director. By chance,
when he sees a newspaper with the headline of his own death, he realizes what
exactly has happened, but to no avail.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-eB-LufyBw5k/UH3P6EGjQFI/AAAAAAAACu0/AlzjiyRVMlQ/s1600/prisoners.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-eB-LufyBw5k/UH3P6EGjQFI/AAAAAAAACu0/AlzjiyRVMlQ/s1600/prisoners.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In fetters, and forming a sad sort of line</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wm_FtNP1J98/UH3Qo_WN_ZI/AAAAAAAACu8/7neP3iPsjrs/s1600/laughter.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wm_FtNP1J98/UH3Qo_WN_ZI/AAAAAAAACu8/7neP3iPsjrs/s1600/laughter.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Laughter in the dark</td></tr>
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A Sunday brings some respite in the lives of the prisoners,
who are treated to a picture show at a nearby church. Faces downcast, the
prisoners come in their fetters, in twos, forming a sad sort of line as they
walk up the aisle to their seats in the front three rows, reserved for them.
The lights dim, the projector rattles, and the screen comes alive with a Disney
cartoon, filling the church with laughter. As Mickey Mouse and Pluto goof
around, the prisoners laugh away in the dark, unbound, temporarily free from
the sordidness of life. To his surprise, Sullivan catches himself laughing as
well. This laughter is a revelation to the film director who has so far
believed in the moral superiority of social realism to comedy.<br />
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Sullivan, determined to set himself free, declares himself
to be the murderer of Sullivan, the Hollywood director. The plan works, and
photos of the confessor are splashed in all the newspapers. The Girl and the
producers rejoice that Sullivan is alive, and he is freed. Excited about Sullivan’s pet project
on poverty, his producers give him the green signal. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Laughter in the dark in Shree 420</td></tr>
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Sullivan, though, has had a change of mind. Watching
hardened men roll hysterically at antics onscreen has somewhere touched a nerve
in Sullivan who realizes that laughter in the dark is all that some people have
in their caged lives. On a comparable note, there is a scene in <i>Shree 420</i>,
where the poor folks in the <i>bustee</i>, or the slum, yet another day of their
difficult lives over, tell Raj the newcomer that their own lives are very sad,
and so they want to hear him narrate something entertaining. Raj lightens the
darkness of the night (and of their lives) with the lively “Dil ka haal suney
dilwaala” number with his <i>dafli</i>, or tambourine. As he regales the
audience with his comic mannerisms, the<i> bustee</i> people shut themselves off for a
while by escaping into Raj’s story—which despite its sad undertones, engrosses
them and makes them laugh. </div>
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In what can unequivocally be ranked as one of the best last
lines ever in cinema, Sturges has Sullivan say, “There’s a lot to be said for
making people laugh. Did you know that’s all some people have? It isn’t much,
but it’s better than nothing in this cockeyed caravan.” As Sullivan decides to
make another comedy, it seems that the genre cannot, after all, be discounted.<br />
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<i>Disclaimer:</i> My screencaps from the films are used for academic/discussion purposes only.</div>
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Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-43736639084874311922012-09-22T18:26:00.001-07:002012-09-23T20:45:49.943-07:00A page from Maratha cultural history: Ramshastri (1944)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i>A truncated version of this post first appeared as <a href="http://www.thehindu.com/arts/cinema/of-truth-and-politics/article3922260.ece" target="_blank">"Of truth and politics"</a> in The Hindu on September 21, 2012.</i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Actor-director Gajanan Jagirdar as Ramshastri</td></tr>
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<i>Ramshastri </i>(1944) is considered to be one of the most significant Indian films of all time—in the same way that <i>To Kill a Mockingbird</i> (1962) is thought to be one of the greatest American classics ever made. The two have more in common: both feature exemplars of the legal profession. In their respective contexts and very different time periods in which they are set—the political intrigue-ridden world of eighteenth-century Maratha India and the racism-ridden world of early twentieth-century Southern America—Ramshastri and Atticus Finch boldly epitomize the ideal of judicial integrity. Finch, played by actor Gregory Peck, unshakably adheres to the truth at all times and helps shape public sentiment the way Ramshastri, played by actor-director Gajanan Jagirdar, does in the eponymous film from Prabhat Film Company in 1944.<br />
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The very successful <i>Ramshastri</i>, made in Marathi and Hindi, was Prabhat’s swansong of sorts—despite later films such as Dev Anand’s first starrer <a href="http://cinemacorridor.blogspot.com/2010/09/dev-anands-first-film-hum-ek-hain-1946.html" target="_blank"><i>Hum ek hain</i> (1946)</a> and the Khurshid-Dev Anand starrer <i>Aage badho</i> (1946)—with co-founder V. Damle’s death in 1945 leaving a void that resulted in the company’s decline and eventual bankruptcy in 1953. V. Shantaram, one of Prabhat’s co-founders, had clearly laid down the company’s motto at the start in 1929: "art for life’s sake," as opposed to art for art’s sake. Prabhat’s films tackled social problems head-on, thus hoping to improve the day-to-day quality of life for its viewers. With <i>Ramshastri</i>, Prabhat traveled back in time to the eighteenth-century Maratha Empire, although highlighting issues of contemporary relevance, such as the importance of fairness of judgment and the indispensability of ethics in administration.<br />
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Keshavrao Bhole composed the music for the Marathi version, with lyrics by S. A. Shukla and Shantaram Athavale, while the Hindi version (which, woefully, seems to have vanished) had music by G. Damle (relation of V. Damle?) and lyrics by Qamar Jalalabadi.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Anant Marathe as the young Ramshastri</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Baby Shakuntala? as Ramshastri's child-wife</td></tr>
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Based on the life of Ramshastri Prabhune (1720-1789), the legendary chief justice at the court of Peshwa Madhavrao, the film starts with the young Ram (Anant Marathe), eager for knowledge, battling odds to educate himself in the face of adversity. In the opening scenes, we are introduced to the boy who will not lie, no matter what, much to the annoyance of his greedy uncle, who hopes to make money off the lie that his nephew is attending scripture school for Brahmin children. Ram’s widowed mother and his child-wife, Janaki (Baby Shakuntala?), are pleased by his integrity, but times are tough. Ram leaves home for Benares in search of a teacher but is turned down for not knowing enough to start with. This only fuels his desire to learn, and in Ekalavya style, he educates himself by overhearing the teacher’s lessons—the big difference here being that the guru is nowhere as unkind as Drona. Impressed, the teacher accepts Ram as his student. Twelve years roll by, and Ram is now Ramshastri. Ram’s mother is dying, and she is happy to see her scholar son before her death.<br />
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The scene then shifts to Pune, where Ramshastri settles down as a religious scholar. This part of the film appears rather disjointed, and that is probably because the film had three different directors (Raja Nene and Vishram Bedekar other than Jagirdar) at different times, with the result that there is a jerky feel to the narrative.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hansa Wadkar? as Shyama</td></tr>
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The film suddenly cuts to a slave market, where Shyama the slave girl (possibly Hansa Wadkar) is being auctioned off. Ranoji, a poet-singer, and an employee of the ruling Peshwa Madhavrao, falls for Shyama—together they sing the lovely "Hasoon Bolna," my most favorite song in the Marathi version—and runs away with her to get married. There is opposition from Ranoji’s rival at the auction, Tulaji (an employee of the peshwa’s wily uncle Raghunathrao), who argues that since slaves don’t have the right to marry, the marriage is invalid, and that Ranoji’s hands must be cut off. The peshwa, not very imaginative in such matters, agrees.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Meenakshi as Ramshastri's wife</td></tr>
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Ramshastri intervenes on behalf of the newly-weds, and argues that the slave market is in itself an illegal institution, and can neither be authorized by religion nor by the state, and that marriage under Hindu law cannot be invalidated because the girl is a slave. Ramshastri’s earth-shattering conviction wins over the peshwa, who then appoints this fearless advocate of human rights as the chief justice of his court. It is jubilation back home, where Ramshastri’s wife (actress Meenakshi I would guess from the resemblance to her granddaughter Namrata Shirodkar) looks on fondly as her son sings "Me Kaashila janaar"—he, too, will go to Benares like his illustrious father—with Shyama and Ranoji joining in, as the royal guards bring in the newly appointed chief justice’s regalia. A note about the music: Keshavrao Bhole's compositions are irresistibly beautiful and have a simplicity that cannot be ignored.<br />
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Soon, Ramshastri becomes famous for his impartial judgments that are based on the case’s merits, as opposed to his favoring the mighty and the influential. In one instance, he condemns the peshwa’s governor who has swindled the plaintiff, a foreign contingent, much to the dismay of the peshwa’s chief secretary who had slyly granted the governor a reprieve.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lalita Pawar as Anandi, oozing villainy</td></tr>
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At this point, the film abruptly and somewhat jumpily cuts to Anandi (Lalita Pawar oozing villainy), the wife of Raghunathrao, colluding with General Sumersingh Gardi—buying his loyalty rather—against Peshwa Madhavrao. The sickly peshwa is dying, and Anandi is busy hatching a plot to ensure that her husband will be the next peshwa. Just before he dies, the peshwa gets Ragunathrao to promise that he will protect the former’s younger brother, the heir, Narayanrao, which Ragunathrao does, carried away by the emotions of the moment.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pomp and splendor of the peshwa's durbar</td></tr>
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On coronation day, the pomp and splendor of the peshwa’s durbar come alive as the film recreates the pageantry of bygone days: there is the swish of swords and spears, as the cavalry rides by and the royal flag flutters, while flower petals are strewn at the feet of the monarch-to-be. Prabhat’s co-founder S. Fattelal, the film’s art director, was known for his keen artistic eye that he had honed under his mentors—the famous artist brothers, Anandrao and Baburao Painter.<br />
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In keeping with protocol, Ragunathrao, as guardian to the new ruler, is supposed to offer the first salute to his nephew Narayanrao—a fact that has the uncle wincing. Ramshastri insists that Ragunathrao, regardless of his guardian status, offer the first salute since there is only one occupant to the peshwa throne. Ragunathrao complies but an irate Anandi stomps out of the court. She mocks her husband for not staking claim to the throne; the meek Ragunathrao then promises that he will listen to her.<br />
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During the festival of Ganesh Chaturthi, Anandi gets a chance to put her evil ideas into action. Without her husband’s knowledge, she rewords a royal order, thereby instructing the generals to kill Narayanrao, who is mercilessly slaughtered in front of a stunned Ragunathrao who then becomes the peshwa. Orders are issued that the public celebrate Raghunathrao’s ascendancy and the people are forced into merrymaking, which Ramshastri denounces.<br />
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Meanwhile, the faithful Ranoji manages to bring to Ramshastri the royal order that had Narayanrao executed. Ranoji’s wife, Shyama, also tells Ramshastri that she had heard Anandi commanding Sumersingh to finish off the young peshwa. Outraged, Ramshastri confronts Ragunathrao on his coronation day, and calls him a coward and a sinner for abusing the custodianship of Narayanrao. When Ramshastri produces evidence in the form of the royal order, Ragunathrao’s bad conscience pricks him and he is willing to atone.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Away from power mongers</td></tr>
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An uncompromising Ramshastri pronounces that death is the only atonement for such a sin. Ramshastri is hailed for protecting the honor of the peshwa throne, but, having exposed the truth, he decides to leave the power-mongering world of the court once and for all. He walks away with his family as people sing, “Till sun and moon shine in the sky, your praise will be sung everywhere.”<br />
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<i>A concluding thought:</i> The choppiness in the film does not, however, detract from the powerful characterization of Ramshastri, who comes across as an emblem of rectitude, indeed as the very personification of truth. Given the context of India’s independence movement, and Gandhi’s overriding belief in the ultimate triumph of truth, the iconic figure of Ramshastri must have been, undoubtedly, reassuring to viewers. During a period when the national imagination was in search of glorious, idealized visions from the past, the heroic figure of Ramshastri could very well have been that.<br />
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P.S. Please help fill in the blanks/confirm the names of the cast members whom I have not identified/am not sure of.<br />
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<i>Disclaimer:</i> My screencaps from the film are used for academic/discussion purposes only; they may be reproduced only if accompanied by a link to this blog.</div>
Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com27tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-54262705793466316462012-09-07T16:29:00.000-07:002012-10-17T13:09:03.626-07:00Reflections on K. A. Abbas’s Rice and other stories, 1947<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I recently chanced upon an old, yellowed copy of writer-journalist-film director Khwaja Ahmad Abbas’s <i>Rice and other stories</i>, published in 1947 by Kutub, Bombay, with a preface by writer Mulk Raj Anand. Having seen most of the films that Abbas (1914-1987) wrote—all classics in their own right—such as Chetan Anand’s <i>Neecha Nagar</i> (1946), his own <a href="http://cinemacorridor.blogspot.com/2011/12/page-from-indian-film-history-dharti-ke.html" target="_blank"><i>Dharti ke Lal</i> (1946)</a>, V. Shantaram’s <i>Dr. Kotnis ki Amar Kahani</i> (1946), and Raj Kapoor’s <i>Awara</i> (1951), <i>Shree 420</i> (1955), and <i>Jagte Raho</i> (1956), I was curious about Abbas the short-story writer.<br />
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The book is a thin volume of ten short stories that can be read in one go. The stories are about ordinary people in ordinary situations— with candid glimpses into life’s extraordinary moments. Every now and then the veil lifts to reveal life’s surprises, its splendors, its ironies. Reality is what we see on the outside, but it is also what we fleetingly see on the inside, made visible through cracks and gaps. And it is those cracks and gaps that Abbas draws our attention to—although I distinctly felt a certain predictability about Abbas’s style, which kind of dampens the reader’s attention. The same does not hold true of his films, which are vastly more imaginative. Halfway through many of the stories, I correctly guessed what the ending would be! For me, maudlin is the word that describes the treatment of many of the stories. <br />
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The title story, “Rice,” is about Durga, a poor mill worker’s wife who delivers her baby when she is out standing in the long queue to buy rations. It is stark and grim, and yet represents the joys of new beginnings. The queue is relentless, but hungry mouths have to be fed, and hundreds of women patiently wait their turn outside the government grain store, miraculously open after many days, during a period of grain shortage (which is reminiscent of the darkness of the Bengal famine of 1943 captured on celluloid in <a href="http://cinemacorridor.blogspot.com/2011/12/page-from-indian-film-history-dharti-ke.html" target="_blank"><i>Dharti ke lal</i>, 1946</a>). As the crowds teem around and bags are filled with rice, birth—at once mundane and magical—unfolds.<br />
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In “Sylvia,” a nurse is elated at the thought that it is her last night of work at the hospital, but then as dawn approaches, she confronts a mind that goes in loops. The more she looks forward to her new life, the greater her wavering. Expectedly, the stories have a certain cinematic feel about them, and it is not difficult to imagine the characters playing themselves out before the camera. In “Sparrows,” Rahim Khan, who is callously indifferent to his family and fellow beings—he is constitutionally incapable of amicability towards his kind—is like moldable clay in the company of the chirpy sparrows that make his hut their home. There is a certain self-destructiveness about Rahim that he is unable to help, which makes the reader at once loathe and pity him. He has a touch of Thomas Hardy’s Henchard about him.<br />
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In “Twelve hours,” Vijay, a revolutionary leader released after sixteen years in prison is briefly freed for a few hours—and in that time, he goes to see a film, a talkie, in the company of Bina, a female comrade. It is 1943 and, as Abbas says, Vijay, having missed out on the arrival of the talkie in 1931, has neither heard Saigal’s songs, nor seen stars such as Joan Fontaine, Paul Muni, Bette Davis, Ashok Kumar or Kanan Bala. Vijay and Bina go to the screening of a rather outdated action movie called <i>Toofan Mail</i> (1934), famous in its days, produced by Ranjit Studios, starring Billimoria and Madhuri. (For the vintage-film buff in me, these references to big names from the past were most entertaining.) Vijay is absorbed in the picture for a while, but then it triggers certain emotions that he has not known in a long while. Restless, he leaves midway. Having been a prisoner for so long, Vijay has forgotten the pleasures of life, and the reawakening is painful.<br />
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The most filmi (if I may use that word) of the stories is “Flowers for her feet,” where a prostitute called Chandra purposely spurns, in the end, the kind young man who loves her because she has lost her legs, a fact that she hides from him because she does not want to ruin his life (somewhat like Deborah Kerr trying to throw off Cary Grant in <i>An Affair to Remember</i>, 1957); and while he still brings flowers for her feet as always, Chandra pretends that she favors somebody else. “Saffron Blossoms” is a figurative tale, though no less melodramatic, of the blood from a dying Kashmiri bride, shot by soldiers putting down anti-establishment protests, giving the saffron flower its red color. “Three Women” takes a look at three women, all disillusioned for various reasons, dying on the train tracks, and the reactions that the deaths evoke. It is the least sentimental of the lot.<br />
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In “The Umbrella,” a man, on his payday, gets ripped off a by a woman, a petty thief, during a bus ride on a rainy day: this was a giveaway from the start. “Reflection in a mirror” is about Radha, a beautiful nautch girl who briefly becomes the mistress of a wealthy man, only to realize that a mistress can never take the place of a wife, and decides to return to her courtesan life. That familiar, age-old wife-mistress divide of Hindi films, beaten to death. Finally, “The mark of an Indian” is about an Indian bravely taking on a drunken British cop, and earning the latter’s respect in the process.<br />
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In his preface, Mulk Raj Anand praises Abbas’s lyricism, but I would qualify that. There is a certain lyricism but, unfortunately, the soppy treatment of many of the stories detracts from that lyricism. Anand also mentions that Abbas has captured both the strengths and weaknesses of his characters: while this may be true to some extent, one puts down the book with a feeling that the characters are not as well rounded and fleshed out as they ought to have been. And, finally, as I said before, the predictability of the stories kills it for the reader. One had rather read Abbas’s script of <i>Shree 420</i> (1955) or his other films—that is inspired writing—than wade through this insipid stuff.<br />
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Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-26178299688141592242012-07-21T10:45:00.001-07:002012-09-22T23:54:51.289-07:00The poetry and egalitarianism of Chandidas (1934)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i>A truncated version of this post with a missing punch line first appeared as <a href="http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-metroplus/article3651407.ece" target="_blank">"Messages in black and white"</a> in </i><br />
<i>The Hindu on July 18, 2012.</i><br />
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Calcutta's New Theatres’ 1934 Hindi version of its 1932 Bengali film <i>Chandidas</i> has a strong ballad-like feel to it as it musically lays before the audience the story of the legendary poet-saint from fifteenth-century Bengal. Reminiscent of the Romantic poets for his staunch belief in humanity, Chandidas was quite the recalcitrant figure of his times who opposed orthodoxy, rituals, and social stratification; favoring humanity as the only true religion, he saw the caste system as man-made, not God-made, and consequently invalid.<br />
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The Bengali <i>Chandidas</i>, directed by Debaki Bose (himself a Vaishnava follower), with Durgadas Banerjee in the lead role, was a runaway hit—indeed, it was New Theatres' first hit, which played for 64 weeks at the Chitra theatre in Calcutta. Two years later, the Hindi version directed by Nitin Bose (the cinematographer of the Bengali <i>Chandidas</i>) and starring K. L. Saigal—his first major success—was released. With his dreamy eyes, Saigal is a convincing Chandidas, a Brahmin fearlessly in love with the lower-caste washerwoman Rami (played by Umashashi, who made her Hindi film debut in 1933 with New Theatres’ <i>Puran Bhagat</i> after the Bengali <i>Chandidas</i>, before which she acted in silent films). Early in the film, Rami, while at her washing chores, sings “Premnagar men banaoongi ghar main,” when Chandidas comes by to the ghats and joins in, in a very memorable duet by the two actors. Song 1:<br />
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Music composer R. C. Boral, who is credited with introducing the playback system of recording in Indian cinema in <i>Bhagyachakra</i> / <i>Dhoop chhaon</i> (Bengali and Hindi, 1935), pioneered the use of background music in <i>Chandidas</i> to heighten the film’s lyrical movement. There is a sense in which the music is a character all by itself as it helps drive the narrative forward in this film filled with poetry from medieval Bengal. Indeed, Boral’s music and Chandidas’s poetry together create an aesthetically significant film that has, at its heart, the theme of liberation from the clutches of organized religion. Agha Hashr Kashmiri wrote the lyrics for the Hindi <i>Chandidas</i>. Listen here to the heart-tugging strains of “Tarpat beete din rain” in this very characteristically Saigal song. (Boral, who composed music for over 150 films, was, of course, one of Saigal's early mentors.) Song 2:<br />
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The film depicts a time when temples were closed to the lower castes. Chandidas, an apprentice to a temple priest, flouts the rules by insisting that the lord’s bounties are for everyone. His egalitarianism irks Gopinath (actor Nawab?), the local Brahmin merchant, who, in true filmi fashion, lusts after Rami. For all his condemnation of the lower castes, Gopinath has no scruples about hounding Rami, who is at a disadvantage because of her gender, caste, and economic status.<br />
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When Gopinath traps Rami in his house, the latter mockingly wonders about the irony of such an action by a supposedly incorruptible being such as a Brahmin. Rami’s outspokenness angers Gopinath, who sets fire to the house she shares with her brother Baiju—actor Pahari Sanyal, who sings quite a bit in the film. Listen to him here in "Chhayee basant aayee basant karke solah shringaar," my most favorite song in the film. (There is no audio from 0:20 to 0:26 with the print freezing; I apologize for that and for the poor print of all these clips.) Song 3:<br />
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Chandidas rescues Rami, and the priest rules that Chandidas will have to atone to be accepted back into the Brahmin fold. An aghast Rami goes to meet Chandidas, when Gopinath’s goons assault her. When Chandidas sees the battered Rami, he is disgusted enough with the rigidities of his brahminical roots to decide not to perform repentance, and, convinced that the human cry for justice is the greatest cry, he abjures forever his ties to the orthodox religious order. No longer bound by any societal shackles, at last he is free. Chandidas, Rami, Baiju and Baiju’s wife make a foursome as they walk away, singing “Prem ki ho jai jai,” vindicating the religion of love. Song 4:<br />
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<i>A concluding thought</i>: It would be a more somber ending for the lovers—the low-caste girl and the Brahmin boy—two years hence in Bombay Talkies’ hit film on the evils of caste in contemporary India—<i>Achhut Kanya</i> (1936). The lesson was the same, however: the caste system and untouchability were vices that ate into the Indian psyche, and could not be afforded when the nation needed to unite against the conqueror. According to <i>Chandidas</i>’s credits that commented on the lingering national problem of caste, the film is “based on the life problem of the poet Chandidas—a problem India has not been able to solve.”<br />
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Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-20494767038576846342012-02-16T21:26:00.000-08:002012-09-23T19:33:41.441-07:00The surrealism of a non sequitur world: Un Chien Andalou (1929)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i>This post first appeared as <a href="http://www.thehindu.com/arts/cinema/article2896026.ece" target="_blank">"The real and the surreal"</a> in The Hindu on February 15, 2012.</i> <br />
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A sharp blade slices through an eyeball just as a cloud slices through a full moon. This perhaps is the singularly most unforgettable scene from one of the most intriguing films ever made—Luis Bunuel’s <i>Un Chien Andalou </i>(<i>An Andalusian Dog</i>, 1929), which, at just 17 minutes duration, packs in bizarreness on such a mammoth scale that it leaves the viewer desperate for any sort of meaning. Bunuel made this silent film, his first, in collaboration with fellow Spaniard, the famous surrealist painter Salvador Dali, after the two exchanged notes on their dreams—the dream world being central to their surrealist imagination, according to which the unseen powerful reality of life lies in the darkness of sleep, or in the subconscious, and not in the rationality of daylight. <br />
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As surrealist French director-writer Jacques Brunius has observed, sleep is akin to film viewing in that both involve a descent into darkness and a shutting off of the immediate physical world: In sleep, the mind commences its journey into dreams, just as, in film viewing, the mind embarks on a journey into a world of fast-changing images. Both are subterranean travels that subvert the notions of time and space, which are rendered meaningless by the merging of past, present, and future, and the merging of geographically distinct spaces. As Bunuel and Dali record the disjointedness on celluloid, the resultant onslaught of unanchored images and events is disconcerting to even the least rationally inclined of viewers. The human mind naturally tends to discern meaning or pattern in any information that it is presented with—and the film precisely staves off that tendency to find comfort in the act of comprehension. <br />
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In the dream state, we are faced with random situations, and while all that disjointedness may make sense in sleep, governed as sleep is by its own dream logic—where conventional logic is temporarily suspended, and just about anything is possible—the waking state shows the same disjointedness to be impossible and unrealistic. The film’s realism is then a surrealistic realism, and the film could be described as an ode to the realism of the irrational—something that it portrays in the form of a stark bunch of incidents which, in the waking world, may just as well signify or not signify anything. If entropy is the natural state of the universe, then <i>Un Chien Andalou</i>, with its clash of random images, stands for entropy—and here I am succumbing to my human tendency to rationalize as I sift through chaos in search of beauty.<br />
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Dali himself appeared fleetingly in this film whose visuals defy the orderly world of a meaningful narrative. A range of fantastic and absurd images float around in no particular order, untethered, rooted in nothingness: ants crawl out from the palm of a human hand; books turn into pistols; a dismembered hand is poked at with a stick; the hand is then placed into a square box, which, earlier, a man in nun’s attire, wears around his neck when he cycles down the street; a figure on the road is mowed down by a passing vehicle; and two pianos with donkey carcasses on top, tied to two priests, are dragged across a room, with ropes. These visuals frustrate the viewer in their non-amenability to any sort of pattern. Yet, the non sequitur-ness that is irritating is, paradoxically, liberating since everything is both relevant and irrelevant, real and unreal. A surrealist work such as <i>Un Chien Andalou </i>is everything that the viewer wants it to be, and everything that the viewer does not want it to be.<br />
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Image credit: <a href="http://eclecticipher.blogspot.com/2010/05/un-chien-andalou.html" target="_blank">http://eclecticipher.blogspot.com</a></div>
Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-38076698796751420312011-12-08T23:44:00.000-08:002012-10-04T01:02:54.886-07:00A page from Indian film history: Dharti Ke Lal (1946)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i>A shorter version of this post first appeared as <a href="http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-metroplus/article2666468.ece" target="_blank">"Life, the way it was"</a> in The Hindu on November 28, 2011. (A note: The accompanying photo in The Hindu is not from Dharti Ke Lal as the caption mistakenly says, but from Do Bigha Zameen to which the article refers.)</i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The "Bhookha hai Bengal" chorus song in Dharti ke Lal<br />
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Khwaja Ahmad Abbas’s directorial debut film <i>Dharti Ke Lal</i> (1946) begins and ends on an idyllic note, with a sailboat gently wafting across the water in rural Bengal. But what happens in between is the epic ugliness of hunger, poverty, and human suffering. Set against the backdrop of 1943’s Bengal famine in which nearly 5 million people perished, the film documents the anguish suffered by the family of a farmer and his two sons.<br />
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The film was a first in many respects. It was the multifaceted Abbas’s first film as a director. It was actor Balraj Sahni’s first major role, and a distinct precursor to his famous role of Shambhu in Bimal Roy’s <i>Do Bigha Zameen</i> (1953). Theatre couple Shombhu Mitra and Tripti Mitra appeared on the screen for the first time, as did veteran dancer-actress Zohra Segal. It was the first film presented under the aegis of the Indian People’s Theatre Association (IPTA) and starred, for the first time, a non-professional cast of “the people”—from organizations such as the Dhulia District Kisan Sabha and the Navjavan Mazdoor Party, among others. </div>
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The IPTA, formed in 1942, brought together intellectuals of the day who felt, in the then context of a growing nationalism, that theatre could be an effective medium for both social and artistic awakening among the people. The worlds of art and nationalism collided to produce plays that helped formulate the public ethic on important issues of the day. Socialist realism—rooted in songs, dance, and drama—was the mainstay of IPTA productions. </div>
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It was a shaky time: The war was on, and with it, a rising inflation and the consequent curse of starvation that was the lot of the impoverished. 1943-44 saw an exodus of hungry people from the villages to Calcutta and their disappointment at the apathy of the city dwellers. Many died, while others returned to the villages, forced to rely on themselves. This is broadly the context in which Abbas decided to make his first film that would highlight the people’s power in fighting against the plague of degradation and various institutionalized injustices. Individual empowerment would lead to collective empowerment, which, then, would create an enlightened public psyche that would keep at bay all the greedy zamindars, moneylenders, grain hoarders and other go-betweens of this world. </div>
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An advertisement in <i>The Times of India</i> dated 31 August 1946 invited audiences to Capitol Theatre to watch <i>Dharti Ke Lal</i>, “the story that had to be told in all its simple grandeur and stark realism!” The film merged its socialist realism with the new cinematic style of social realism that it helped set off—where the camera’s meaningful engagement with reality meant capturing life the way it was for the poor, dispossessed folks, in all its utter rawness, indeed in all its brutishness and nastiness as Thomas Hobbes would have said. </div>
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During his numerous visits to Calcutta around 1943-44, Abbas was appalled by the villagers’ starvation-induced deaths and other miseries that he saw playing out routinely on the streets. A successfully running IPTA play of the time, Bijon Bhattacharya’s <i>Nabanna</i> (The New Harvest), powerfully captured the grimness of the situation while offering hope for a new beginning in terms of rural self-sufficiency. This fuelled Abbas’s desire to tell the story and convey its positive message to the rest of India as well—through the medium of celluloid. After all, a Hindi film on a contemporary issue could have a strong pan-India appeal. Abbas was also influenced by three other works—Bhattacharya’s plays <i>Jabanbandi</i> and <i>Antim Abhilasha</i>, and Krishan Chander’s story <i>Annadata</i>—all of which strengthened his vision of <i>Dharti Ke Lal</i>. </div>
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Except for a couple of outdoor shots that were filmed in Calcutta—wartime restrictions made shooting impossible in Calcutta—the film was mostly shot outdoors in Dhulia in modern Maharashtra that was the setting for rural Bengal, with city scenes shot in the studios in Bombay. </div>
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The film is set in the fictitious village of Aminpur in Bengal, which is home to Samuddev Pradhan, his wife, elder son Niranjan (played by Balraj Sahni), elder daughter-in-law Binodini ((played by Damayanti, Balraj’s Sahni’s wife) and younger son Ramoo (played by Anwar Mirza). Communal harmony is depicted in the form of Ramzaan, Pradhan’s close family friend and neighbour. After a bucolic opening celebrating the expanse of Bengal’s landscape, to the accompaniment of Pandit Ravi Shankar’s music (his second film after <i>Neecha Nagar</i> that also released in 1946), the film immediately cuts to the reality of people’s hardships, signified by plaintive notes on the sitar. Dark poverty and doleful sitar—there is a certain <i>Pather Panchali</i> air about that. </div>
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Ramoo is to be married and, to afford the wedding, Pradhan sells off his stock of grains to Kalijan Mahajan, a devious grain hoarder who is busy stockpiling rations to sell later at a steep price. Actor David plays the tout who prods Pradhan to sell his grains to Mahajan. As the days go by, Pradhan’s is just one family that is faced with severe scarcity of food. When Ramoo goes one day to buy grains from Mahajan, he is shocked to notice the latter’s overflowing granary. Indeed, the man from the kisan sabha or farmer’s association had rightly cautioned farmers from giving in to the grain hoarders. Ramoo belatedly realizes the family’s mistake in selling off the grains. The astute Niranjan had foreseen this situation. </div>
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From this point on, Pradhan’s family has no choice but to buy grains from Mahajan on credit in the form of a promised next harvest or by pawning off jewellery, with the illiterate Ramoo leaving a thumb impression on the ledger each time, thus getting more and more entangled in debt. Meanwhile, Ramoo’s new wife Radhika (played by Tripti Mitra) wants to learn to read books and urges her husband to learn so that he can teach her. Ramoo goes to Dayal, the local schoolteacher, and starts lessons that he then imparts to his wife. Illiteracy, which is the reason for the impoverished getting mired deeper and deeper into degradation, is no less a bane than starvation, and the film addresses that issue, as an undercurrent though. </div>
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When Ramoo’s baby is born, there is not a morsel of food in the house. The family loses its cow Lakshmi (Ramoo’s pet) to the zamindar for not paying lagaan or taxes in two years. As Lakshmi is dragged away, Ramoo says, “Today the son is not able to save his own mother.” Later, when Ramoo, in a fit of helplessness, tells his family to sell the land (over which the zamindar, the tout, and Mahajan all have a vulturous eye), Pradhan and Niranjan are shocked. </div>
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Niranjan reminds his brother of the sacredness of the land and reminds him that “the land is our mother.” In keeping with the nationalist discourse, the land and the cow—that provide sustenance to the villagers—represent the life-giving mother figure, a primal inner force, now threatened by the collusion of corrupt outside forces. The recovery of this inner power—or the ability to protect the mother figure, which, in turn, means protecting oneself—is at the heart of <i>Dharti Ke Lal</i>’s socialist parable. With Ramoo affronted by a slap from Niranjan and breaking away from the family to try his luck at the city, the task of realizing the socialist dream will ultimately be up to Niranjan, who is aware that the scarcity of food is just an artificially created phenomenon by the larger power nexus that excludes the farmer.</div>
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With grain hoarders sending away their loot to Calcutta to be sold at astronomical prices, shops in Aminpur all shut down, resulting in sordid wretchedness all around. Dayal sees his family die before his eyes and almost loses his mind. As Aminpur turns into a “bhooton ki nagari” or a place of ghosts, the surviving few decide to brave it all the way to the city to beg for food. And then comes the famous exodus scene in the film, with many dropping dead en route, to dirge-like background music. </div>
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In Calcutta, the degradation of the hungry reaches a new low as they squat on the streets outside mansions, begging, scavenging dustbins, fighting with each other for scraps, grunting miserably—while the city around turns a blind eye. The rich dine luxuriously, while outside the glass door, the hungry look on: the disparity is Dickensian. When it is impossible to suffer further, respite comes in the form of death to many. </div>
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Moreover, the communal divide is fomented in the form of separate relief kitchens for Hindus and Muslims. As pots clang, Hindus shoo away Muslims, and vice-versa—this is in contrast to the religious unity of the village. The city’s inhumanness is personified in the rich Seth saheb (played by K. N. Singh, as villainous as ever), a grain-hoarding merchant who is permanently busy on the phone, making profitable deals. </div>
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Meanwhile, Ramoo who has been working as a rickshaw puller loses his job and, reminiscing about the good old days in the village, turns to alcohol for comfort. Pradhan’s family is languishing: Radhika prostitutes herself in exchange for milk for her child; her mother-in-law, weak and mad with hunger, steals the child’s milk; Pradhan is dying; and an unsuccessful Niranjan watches all this helplessly. </div>
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When Niranjan turns to a kind, conscientious relief worker named Shambhu dada (possibly Shombhu Mitra) for moral strength, the latter says with conviction that the people’s awakening will definitely happen, and that Niranjan, as a tiller of the soil—tillers are, after all, known for their indefatigability—should not get dispirited. It is just that hunger has crushed people’s spirits. The voice of hunger needs to be heard by all of the country for help to arrive, and that should be the mission of the hour. The stage is set for the chorus song, “Bhookha hai Bengal” (Bengal is hungry), a hard-hitting plea for help addressed to the rest of India. On a map of undivided India stand the singers, and, in the background, silhouetted, are images of Bengal’s misery. </div>
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As the news spreads to the rest of India, Niranjan has finally some reason to hope for the better, and he tells his dying father about this encouraging turn of events. Pradhan is delusional and sees green fields, clouds, oxen, and a golden harvest. He tells his family and Ramzaan to return home and start life again, and dies. Niranjan resolves to make the golden harvest a reality. Shambhu, too, reminds Niranjan of the power of the people, of their power to help themselves, and Niranjan is convinced. </div>
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Everyone returns to Aminpur, except Radhika who despises herself so much they she can never go back home again. Radhika and Ramoo cross paths in a very unmemorable way: when he hears that there are only two items for sale in the market—“woman and food,” in the words of the same vile tout from Aminpur—Ramoo, with no job and no food, forces himself to be a pimp and tries to strike a deal with a woman who turns out to be Radhika. She informs him that his father is dead, and the rest have returned home with their child who has been entrusted to Binodini. Ramoo and Radhika are reunited in their suffering, and Ramoo is deeply pained that he came close to selling his wife. </div>
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Back in Aminpur, Niranjan tells his fellow farmers about the new concept of collective farming, where everyone will jointly plough the land, sow seeds, water the crops, and harvest food, and enjoy the fruits of hard work equally; then no land will go unused and no one hungry. The villagers are first taken aback by this radical idea, but then realize that there is no other option, and agree. The sense of togetherness among the people is echoed by schoolchildren who chime in unison: “Hindustan is our country. This field is yours. This field is mine. We will together make a big field, which will be neither yours nor mine, but everyone’s.” This grand lesson in the people’s empowerment pays off as the next harvest turns out to be a dream harvest. </div>
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As the villagers make merry, and sing cheerful songs about the power of unity, Ramoo and Radhika—the wistful outsiders—look on. As the idyllic mood of Bengal’s landscape is reaffirmed, the film ends on a fable-like note with Radhika reminding her husband that as long as the country suffers from oppression and hunger, until then will the flame of their—the outcasts’—memory burn brightly in the hearts of the people of Aminpur. </div>
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One wonders at this bittersweet ending: why does Abbas not reintegrate the couple into the social fabric? They have, perhaps, strayed from their roots very far, but do they deserve to face permanent alienation? Perhaps it is Abbas’s way of equating the sanctity of womanhood with the sanctity of land: despite pressures, Niranjan could never be forced to part with his land; in contrast, Ramoo urges his brother to sell the land and, later, tries to sell his wife; Radhika goes one step ahead and sells herself. In the nationalist discourse of the time, women and land were routinely conflated, with each signifying the other, and representing what was sacrosanct. Selling one is the same as selling the other—and both are transgressions of the highest order that confer on the seller an outcast status. </div>
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That <i>Dharti Ke Lal</i>’s social realism made it an unusual Indian film for its time is illustrated in a rather interesting anecdote from Abbas’s autobiography. When Abbas visited the Cinematheque film library in Paris in 1955, the librarian told him that of all the Indian films they had received, there was one particular film (without titles) that seemed to stand out in that it was not the typical fighting-dancing movie; she was curious to know who had made it, and what its name was; when she described what she had seen to Abbas, it turned out to be <i>Dharti Ke Lal</i>. <br />
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(P.S. I am away from my home turf now. When I have access to my video equipment, I will post the "Bhookha hai Bengal" song and other excerpts that I have with me. Watch this space.)<br />
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Image credit: <a href="http://www.google.com/imgres?num=10&um=1&hl=en&biw=1280&bih=677&tbm=isch&tbnid=cq5VGnihwvuc7M:&imgrefurl=http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Repository/getFiles.asp%3FStyle%3DOliveXLib:LowLevelEntityToPrint_EDU%26Type%3Dtext/html%26Locale%3Denglish-skin-custom%26Path%3DTOIM/2010/12/26%26ID%3DPc00408&docid=vIWbW4Bya97NcM&imgurl=http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Repository/getimage.dll%253Fpath%253DTOIM/2010/12/26/4/Img/Pc0040800.jpg&w=310&h=260&ei=pMNfULLVMZH1iQLD_oHoBg&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=413&vpy=163&dur=2202&hovh=206&hovw=245&tx=137&ty=84&sig=108928959145983915425&sqi=2&page=1&tbnh=156&tbnw=186&start=0&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0,i:93" target="_blank">The Times of India</a>, Mumbai, December 26, 2010</div>
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Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-14064394943417496252011-11-06T00:07:00.000-07:002019-04-28T18:03:07.885-07:00The eternal and the transient: Jean Renoir’s The River (1951)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i>A shorter version of this post first appeared as <a href="http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-cinemaplus/article2602131.ece" target="_blank">"The River sutra"</a> in The Hindu</i> <i>on November 6, 2011</i>.<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xDfJj1myAmA/TrbddenBbZI/AAAAAAAABzE/SHz0oEHRsOY/s1600/the+river_2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xDfJj1myAmA/TrbddenBbZI/AAAAAAAABzE/SHz0oEHRsOY/s320/the+river_2.jpg" width="224" /></a>Watching Jean Renoir’s film<i> The River</i> (1951), made in Technicolor, is like watching a picture book come to life—a picture book of the young English girl Harriet’s girlhood days, spent in Bengal in the early years of the twentieth century. Growing up by the river that is punctuated with rice fields and jute fields, Harriet and her siblings lead a carefree life that is splendidly caught by Renoir’s camera in a way that is reminiscent of a series of Impressionist paintings. Indeed, the film could be described as one long painting that captures life’s fleeting moments and faithfully records the flow of life. As the flow of the mighty river mingles with the flow of life, the film places events—small and big—in perspective.<br />
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This was Renoir’s first color film, and the first Technicolor film to be shot in India, on location in Bengal. It had art direction by Bansi Chandragupta, who later became famous for his work with Satyajit Ray. Ramananda Sengupta, the cinematographer of Ritwik Ghatak’s first feature film, the classic <i>Nagarik</i> (1952), was the camera operator. During the making of the film, Renoir greatly valued the counsel of Satyajit Ray who was not yet known to the world.<br />
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Based on a somewhat autobiographical 1946 novel of the same name by Rumer Godden (who wrote many such works about life during the British Raj in India—see my posting on <i><a href="http://cinemacorridor.blogspot.com/2009/08/black-narcissus-1947-and-colors-of.html" target="_blank">Black Narcissus</a></i>, 1947), substantially rewritten for the screen, <i>The River</i> intertwines Harriet’s immediate life with the larger life around her—the latter largely shot by Renoir in the form of documentary footage on a riparian lifestyle.</div>
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Harriet and her siblings and their rather proud friend Valerie playing in the lush green garden watched by their Indian nanny; Harriet’s naughty little brother Bogey transfixed by the cobra in the pipal tree, which will sadly be his undoing; Harriet’s father going to and from the jute factory where he works; the pensive Mr. John next door, with his half-Indian half-English daughter, Melanie (played by a young Radha Sri Ram before she became Radha Burnier, the famous theosophist), and their new guest—the young American, Captain John; a rather Christmassy Diwali party hosted at Harriet’s place that is exciting to all the children because Captain John, the dashing war hero with one leg, is attending—the subjectivity of this world is interspersed with the life around that is shaped by the flowing of the river on whose banks people eke out a living. </div>
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Life simmers by the river, and the everyday comes alive under Renoir’s photographic eye: boatmen tug at their oars, with the boats ferrying jute from Chittagong and Burma to the local jute factories, as the workers toil away; bazaars sell colorful wares including papayas, mangoes, jasmine flowers, betel nuts, candies, kites, silk saris, grains, and livestock; fortunetellers and snake charmers jostle with the crowds, while babies with kohl-lined eyes, heavily smudged, look on; children play, buffaloes graze, holy men meditate, and women wash clothes.<br />
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Days come and go, the seasons change, the festivals follow one another—and life goes by as the perennial river does, in one broad, majestic sweep, a relentless force that can neither be paused nor reversed. </div>
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As the earthen idol of Kali becomes earth once again, at the end of the festival, only to come alive the following year, so does the cycle of birth and death—of creation and destruction—form the basis of all life, which plays out without beginning or end. Harriet and Valerie painfully realize that they cannot always remain cocooned in the carefree world of their childhood, and as Valerie comments insightfully, “I didn’t want it to change, and it’s changed.” </div>
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This stoicism seems to come much more naturally to the half-Indian Melanie than to the westerners, all of who, unlike Melanie, have to work hard at accepting the inevitable. Considering that the character of Melanie was not in the book, and was an invention for the screen, one wonders if Renoir, as part of the West’s Orientalist discourse—that Orientals are natural mystics—inevitably equated her Indianness with an innate Eastern wisdom.<br />
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When Melanie’s father worries about the future of his half-caste daughter and tells her that perhaps she “should never have been born,” Melanie, with philosophical confidence, retorts: “But I am born. Someday I shall find where I belong.” In the same vein, she makes Captain John—a man whose disability frustrates him so much that he is always running away from himself—face the truth. When, in denial mode, he distraughtly says, “I am a normal man in any country,” Melanie replies ruthlessly but realistically, “Where will you find a country of one-legged men?” Melanie, in Renoir’s world, represents the unfathomable wisdom of the Orient. </div>
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I have never heard Carnatic music in the context of Bengal, but I must say Renoir’s choice of music is hardly incongruous. Melanie’s Bharatanatyam recital to the song <i>Karunai irukka vendumae</i> in melodious Kambhodhi raagam, and Bogey’s funeral procession to the accompaniment of a song in majestic Kaanada raagam only reiterate the macro-view of life that Renoir paints in all its sublime colors. The music elevates; and, to put it metaphorically, the soul glides off the boughs of the film’s magnificent pipal tree.<br />
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As the narrative reaches its end, the black blotch of Bogey’s untimely death gives way to riotous springtime. It is Holi, and as the postman (who brings Captain John’s letters from faraway America to the eager Valerie, Harriet, and Melanie) is bombarded with the colors of life, there is life and hope yet again in the form of a newborn, Harriet’s latest sibling, an entity now firmly present in the world, but who did not exist awhile back—while the river continues to flow as it has done, uninterrupted, for centuries. <br />
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Image credit: <a href="http://www.criterion.com/films/679-the-river" target="_blank">The Criterion Collection</a></div>
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Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-35515440613733047542010-09-27T00:13:00.000-07:002012-09-23T00:12:32.761-07:00Dev Anand's first film: Hum Ek Hain (1946) and its rhetoric of nation<div><i>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on </i>
<i>September 26, 2010.</i></div><div><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/TKAKIoKrfWI/AAAAAAAABCM/OtHFJmJtgtE/s1600/Hum_Ek_Hain.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="146" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/TKAKIoKrfWI/AAAAAAAABCM/OtHFJmJtgtE/s200/Hum_Ek_Hain.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kamala Kotnis & Dev Anand</td></tr>
</tbody></table>Dev Anand—of the lithe frame and the tilted gait; the impish turn of the head and the quick nod; the doffing of the cap and the dreamy gaze—will be 87 years old this September 26th. When it comes to an Indian film legend who is so deeply rooted in the public imagination as Dev Anand is, and about whom information is galore, I had rather not add to the redundancy of information—information redundancy (or regurgitation) being the bane of today’s Internet world. Instead, I take this occasion to remember his first film.<br />
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<div>Let me hark back to a time when Dev Anand was not yet the wildly popular Dev Anand that he would become from the 1950s onward and cause many female hearts to flutter. In life, a certain finesse or confidence emerges with the passage of time and accumulation of experiences; and it is snapshots in time—such as a photo, or a film, or a piece of writing, or a rendering of a song—that capture these various stages of self-formation so palpably. In 1946, when Dev Anand debuted in Prabhat Film Company Limited’s <i>Hum Ek Hain</i> (We are one) under P. L. Santoshi’s direction—Santoshi wrote the dialogues and song lyrics as well—the Dev Anand mien (as one can call it), is still some distance away, although one gets, in the lanky newcomer, a whiff of that persona to come.</div><div><br />
In <i>Hum Ek Hain</i>, a story of unity in the face of religious and class differences, Dev Anand shared equal screen space with a host of others, including debutants Rehman, Rehana, and Kamala Kotnis, all saplings in the shade of a banyan tree-like figure that is Durga Khote, a mother who looks on dotingly over her brood—biological and otherwise.<br />
<div style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; margin: 0px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: initial; outline-width: 0px; padding-bottom: 15px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></div>A rather detailed synopsis here. (Spoiler alert: This section of my post gives away the story; so if you prefer suspense, you might want to skip the synopsis bit, and go down to my <a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=2218366369477617662&postID=3551544061373304754#critique">critique</a> of the film.) The setting is an Indian village. Times are bad, with famine and starvation taking a toll on the poor farmers. A heartless zamindar (or landlord) called Badebabu (? actor) exploits his farmers’ vulnerability by forcing them to sell their small pieces of land—their only subsistence—in return for meager portions of food. In stark contrast, there is a very noble, kind lady whom the villagers refer to as Zamindari Ma (played by Durga Khote), the widow of the good zamindar who is remembered in death as in life for his generosity and good deeds. Zamindari Ma keeps alive the glorious tradition set by her late husband, and rises magnificently to the occasion by opening her granaries to one and all—not just to the farmers who work under her, but also to all the other farmers in the village, including those who work under Badebabu.</div><div><br />
She also takes under her wing many orphaned children, and adopts three of them—a Muslim, a Christian, and a low-caste girl—as her own. So, Shankar (her biological son), who is a likeness of his noble parents, now has siblings in Yusuf, John, and Durga. The old faithful of the family is Rehman Chachha (? actor), and Zamindari Ma relies on his counsel. And one big happy family it is, affirming the “hum ek hain” motto under the music director-duo of Husnlal Bhagatram. Song 1: “Meri aankhon ke ujiyaarey ho tum”<br />
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As Zamindari Ma spins her charkha, time flies, and the children grow up. Shankar (Dev Anand) looks after the zamindari of his father; Yusuf (Rehman) is a hunting enthusiast; John (? actor) is a doctor; and Durga (? actor) is—well—just all grown up, a lively lass. Zamindari Ma, her heart swelling with pride, says: “Teen ladke, teen tarah ke” (Three sons, of three kinds); she leaves out poor Durga, I guess. Shankar completes the line for her, with Yusuf and John in tow: “… lekin ma, hum ek hain (but mother, we are one).” Durga seconds that, and so does Mithoo the family parrot.</div>Meanwhile, Badebabu’s son, Chhotebabu (also a crook, like his father; played by Ramsing), has come back to the village as a “vakil” or lawyer, and goes around throwing his weight. Both father and son are intent on fixing the latter’s marriage with Vidya (Kamala Kotnis), the daughter of their family friend from town, Shyamacharan (? actor). Father and daughter are visiting the village and staying at Badebabu’s. On an outing, Vidya witnesses Chhotebabu’s haughty behavior, and is not impressed. She instantly falls in love with the upright Shankar who puts his foot down at Chhotebabu’s domineering ways. Shankar reciprocates Vidya’s feelings.<br />
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Yusuf and John also find their ladyloves—Nargis (Rehana) and Dolly (? actor), respectively, and both alliances are fixed. Durga is very excited for her three brothers, but comes to know from the local astrologer that Vidya’s wedding with Chhotebabu is almost finalized. She breaks the news to a dejected Shankar. Meanwhile, an upset Vidya tells her father that she cannot stand Chhotebabu one bit. Shyamacharan is an understanding parent and makes the trip to Zamindari Ma to fix the Shankar-Vidya marriage. Shubh vivaah. Three in one go. Song 2: “Meri aayi hai teen bhabhiyaan”<br />
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After the celebrations, Chhotebabu turns up at Zamindari Ma’s household in a suspiciously cordial mood. In a false show of solidarity, he chimes “hum ek hain,” and says how happy he is for the three brothers. When Shankar leaves for town with his new wife to visit his ailing father-in-law, Chhotebabu visits John at the clinic and tells him that the place is too run-down for practice and that he needs to build a bigger hospital. He prods John to write to Shankar for money, and introduces him to an engineer who will head the construction work.<br />
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Chhotebabu is hand in glove with the unscrupulous engineer, and together they plan to fleece John. Shankar sends the money, and construction begins, and so does the engineer’s menacing demands for more and more money. John hesitates to ask Shankar again for money, but Chhotebabu assures him that he will visit Shankar in town and get the funds.</div><div><br />
Meanwhile, the crop yield is poor that year, and the farmers under Zamindari Ma are unable to pay “lagaan” or taxes. Shankar, who is the family accountant, is informed; and, naturally, he feels reluctant to divert more money to the construction work when there is shortage of funds—and especially so, given the family’s priority of the farmers’ well being. As he discusses this with Vidya, Chhotebabu walks in and notices Shankar’s worried look. When Shankar explains the quandary that he is in, Chhotebabu spews more venom and condemns John for wasting money and urges Shankar to go in person and stop the construction.<br />
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Shankar immediately returns to the village and tells the engineer to stop work. John objects, but Shankar tells him that he will explain it all to him at home. The engineer walks off in a huff, the work stops, and John gets angry with Shankar. Back at home, during mealtime, Zamindari Ma notices that John and Shankar, for the first time in their lives, look sullen. Soon, to everybody’s shock, the two brothers fight openly and John remarks angrily that the most important thing in life is money and that he has just realized it.<br />
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John then takes his wife’s jewelry to Chhotebabu, who, feigning horror, offers to fund the construction work—but on one condition: no one must know that Chhotebabu is financing the project. Having extracted this promise, however, Chhotebabu goes to Shankar and wonders aloud about John’s new source of money—and prophesies that John’s irresponsible spending will only bring Shankar, the eldest brother, a bad name. In a wily way, he also introduces the idea of “batwaara” or splitting of the family property. Shankar is horrified, but nevertheless the seed is sown.<br />
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When Shankar questions John about the source of the money, the latter refuses to tell—followed by a fierce exchange of words. Yusuf intervenes, but the other two only get angrier, and Shankar blurts out that splitting the property is the best option. Pained, Yusuf leaves the house with his wife, followed by John and wife, all in the middle of the night. Zamindari Ma appropriately wakes up from a nightmare of her three sons on a capsizing boat and finds two of her sons gone. She is upset with Shankar and orders him to go bring back his brothers. An irate Shankar refuses and leaves as well with his wife.<br />
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As Zamindari Ma sits staring vacantly at her empty nest, Chhotebabu comes pretending how sad he is—and offers to help with the zamindari work. The grief of seeing a broken home is too much for Zamindari Ma, and she takes to bed.</div><div><br />
Denouement is in the form of a raging fire in Zamindari Ma’s fields. She rushes out concerned for her farmers, who are frantically trying to save the crops, and faints. Hearing the commotion, her three sons arrive—and in the face of calamity, realize their mistake of straying from the family motto of “hum ek hain.” The farmers catch the culprit (Chhotebabu’s henchman, of course). The angry farmers, accompanied by Shankar, Yusuf, and John, arrive at Badebabu’s, who apologizes for his son’s wicked deeds.<br />
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Shankar, Yusuf, and John almost speak in one voice when they realize that this fire is just an extension of the inner fire of brotherly feud started by Chhotebabu. The demand is unanimous: the arsonist should leave the village. The unconscious Zamindari Ma magically springs to life when she hears her three sons declare, with a newfound zeal, the family motto of “hum ek hain.” The lesson of unity firmly in place, the “hum ek hain” song fills the air one last time. Song 3: Version 2 of “Meri aankhon ke ujiyaarey ho tum” that starts as “Hum jaag uthey hain sokar”<br />
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<b><u><a href="http://www.blogger.com/" name="critique">Reflections and a critique</a></u></b>: If Amar, Akbar, and Anthony famously symbolized religious unity on celluloid in 1977 and thereafter, their predecessors on the eve of Indian independence were Shankar, Yusuf, and John. Director P. L. Santoshi’s story on national integration resounded with the volatility of those tension-filled times of 1946: the fear of communal disharmony dividing India is represented in the film by the fallout between the brothers, which threatens to break up the family and endanger the life of the all-straddling matriarch, quite a Mother India figure.<br />
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The Mother India imagery is quite explicit in the film’s publicity material. An advertisement in <i>The Times of India</i> dated 17 August 1946 had an eye-catching silhouette of a partial outline of India’s map, filled with nameless individuals, all children of the same mother, defiantly screaming “Hum Ek Hain.” The ad declared the film, then in its “6th sonorous week at Central [Cinema]” to be a “picture of the moment.” Further, it reproached the colonial policy of sowing disunity amongst the ruled when it emphatically announced: “Turn east—and hear India speak! [This] is today’s tip to the west! …The voices of millions sing in unity—and Prabhat has caught the magic of the words ‘Hum Ek Hain.’”</div><div><br />
In the context of the then emerging nation, the idea of unity is unequivocally tied to the figure of the mother. Disunity—within the family or within the nation—is a threat to the mother, the life-giver. This rhetoric of nation, which is the centrality of the mother in the scheme of things, is, however, based on a very simplistic arrangement: it conveniently dispenses with the father, the absent zamindar of the narrative. And clearly it is a world of mothers and sons—with the mother’s deepest and most meaningful relationship with the son and <i>not<b></b></i> the daughter.<br />
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I end this piece on a lighter, musical note, with a delightful dance by the inimitable Cuckoo as she, the village belle, performs before Chhotebabu and Vidya. The opening credits name Guru Dutt for “dance composition.” Song 4: “Ho nadiya ke paar mora saawarey”<br />
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<b>Acknowledgments</b>: My reading of the film would not have been possible without access to the full film. On my last visit to India, I got the VCD of this film from which I have uploaded four songs onto my YouTube channel. But when I was searching for a better print of the film, I realized that what I have is an identical copy of the VCD available at the <a href="http://exdesi.com/showthread.php?109815-Hum-Ek-Hain-(1946)-VCD_Indian-Cinema_The-Early-Years_Dev-Anand-s-First-Film-DDR" target="new">ExDesi.com</a> Desi Torrents Links and Streams site, where it has been uploaded (and possibly digitized in the first place) by a generous soul who goes by the username of Trinidad. My heartfelt thanks to Trinidad, or the person who made it first available. Just go to the site, or google “Hum Ek Hain 1946,” and you should find it. In there, you can also find screenshots and songs from the film, a profile of Dev Anand, and a description of 1946 in Hindi films.<br />
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Also, members at the <a href="http://www.hamaraforums.com/" target="new">hamaraforums</a> site have uploaded the audio of the songs in MP3 format, with as much song information as is presently known. For song credits, I have entirely relied on them.<br />
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P.S.: If anyone identifies some of the actors/singers here, please help fill in the blanks.<br />
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</span></span></span></div>Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-5762012388603624602010-09-11T13:21:00.000-07:002012-09-23T00:29:10.357-07:00Copycat blogger rouses my righteous indignation<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A screenshot of sunheriyaadein's blog page</td></tr>
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The last one day has been a colossal waste of time for me—courtesy a blogger called sunheriyaadein whom I consider more a copycat than a blogger of any standard. I felt I must record this rather unpleasant experience—that of being plagiarized from, which I accidentally discovered—loudly and clearly with everyone out there. Putting this in writing clearly on my blog, will, I hope, in some measure, deter the copycats prowling on the Internet, who just copy and paste text.<br />
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Yesterday was a laidback Friday, and I happened to be browsing a few blogs on old films when, in the <a href="http://sunheriyaadein.wordpress.com/2010/08/03/my-tribute-to-rafi-saab/" target="window">Bhooli Bisri Sunheri Yaadein</a> blog, I chanced upon a recent write-up (August 3, 2010) on Mohammed Rafi, whose death anniversary it was on July 31. As I glanced through it, this ode to Rafi started to sound and look uncomfortably familiar in places. I realized I was reading my own writing from one year back.<br />
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This blogger (whose real name is a mystery, and who has not listed any email where she can be contacted—I am tired of searching!), had blatantly lifted excerpts, verbatim, from my post on Mohammed Rafi (that I wrote aound his last death anniversary for the <a href="http://passionforcinema.com/remembering-mohammed-rafi/" target="window">passionforcinema</a> blog on July 29, 2009, later republished in my blog <a href="http://cinemacorridor.blogspot.com/2009/07/remembering-mohammed-rafi.html" target="window">here</a> on July 31, 2009) and passed it off nicely as her own! My first reaction was sheer anger and outrage.<br />
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Of course, I could give benefit of doubt and deem this to be inadvertent; however, this is too verbatim a case. Anyway, I quickly ran a trial version of Copyscape through my imitator’s posting, and, sure enough, Copyscape caught four clear instances—the exact ones that I had found. (I have recorded them below.)<br />
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I am more worldly-wise now and have installed Copyscape as a deterrent, and have become more aware of the importance of protecting one’s intellectual property, and this cannot be stressed enough. I left a long comment with links to the plagiarized passages on my imitator’s blog, but that is “awaiting moderation,” and so I won’t be surprised if it never shows up there. So, I am left with no choice but to post all the details here.<br />
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Looking from the other side: I never really imagined someone would find me worth copying from! So it is a compliment, perhaps. Still, although imitation is the best form of flattery, as the saying goes, it is just plain annoying to see someone else stealing one's thoughtfully-crafted paragraphs. Any honest writer will vouch for that.<br />
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For your convenience, I have listed below the shamelessly plagiarized excerpts, including the Copyscape links to them. This is what the plagiarist's blog posting looks like when I write this rant. Here goes:<br />
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<b><u>1. My original:</u></b> So much is written about Rafi (1924-1980) that I don’t quite know where to begin and what new to say really. I am stumped. It should just suffice if I say that Rafi was one of the most versatile singers in the history of Hindi film music. His pan-Indian (and beyond) appeal seems to get only stronger with time. From the doleful Jugnu (1947) to the patriotic Shaheed (1948) to the classical Baiju Bawra (1952) to the effervescent Mr. and Mrs. 55 (1955) to the regal Raj Hath (1956) to the poetic Pyaasa (1957) to the meltingly romantic Barsaat Ki Raat (1960)—phew! the list is endless—Rafi sang it all. And more.<br />
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<b><u>The copy:</u></b> So much is written about Rafi (1924-1980) that I don’t quite know where to begin and what new to say really. Rafi was one of the most versatile singers…From the doleful Jugnu to the patriotic Shaheed to the classical Baiju Bawra to the effervescent Mr. and Mrs. 55 to the regal Raj Hath to the poetic Pyaasa to the meltingly romantic Barsaat Ki Raat - phew! the list is endless—Rafi sang them all. And more. <a href="http://www.copyscape.com/?s=98914592341806&sms_ss=google" target="window">http://www.copyscape.com/?s=98914592341806&sms_ss=google</a><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Screenshot of copied excerpt 1 (highlighted)</td></tr>
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<b><u>2. My original:</u></b> In his earlier years, before he had fully come into his own, Rafi sang for Ghulam Mohammed (Naushad’s protégé) a lovely duet with Lata in Pardes (1950), called “Akhiyaan milaake zara baat karo jee,” a song to which I am very partial for two reasons: Madhubala’s striking beauty, and Rafi’s deep, powerful rendering that is reminiscent of Pankaj Mullick, not to mention a very young Lata’s exquisitely honeyed voice.<br />
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<b><u>The copy:</u></b> In his earlier years, before he had fully come into his own, Rafi sang for Ghulam Mohammed (Naushad’s protégé) a lovely duet with Lata. This one is picturised on Rehman and Madhubala and I love this for lots of reasons: Madhubala’s striking beauty, Rafi’s deep, powerful rendition, peppy music and young and dashing Rehman!<br />
<a href="http://www.copyscape.com/?s=52609318731807&sms_ss=google" target="window">http://www.copyscape.com/?s=52609318731807&sms_ss=google</a><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Screenshot of copied excerpt 2 (highlighted)</td></tr>
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<b><u>3. My original:</u></b> … picturized on Ajit (much before he turned villain for the screen). Bombay—that teeming metropolis, teeming then in the 1950s just as it is teeming today—the land of opportunities—was masterfully captured by lyricist Prem Dhawan to composer Hansraj Behl’s tune that is born for the harmonica.<br />
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<b><u>The copy:</u></b> This is Rafi singing for Ajit. in the good old days before he turned into a villian on screen. Bombay—that teeming metropolis, teeming then in the 1950s just as it is teeming today—the land of opportunities, sapno ka shehar—was masterfully captured by lyricist Prem Dhawan to composer Hansraj Behl’s tune. <a href="http://www.copyscape.com/?s=61913581131803&sms_ss=google" target="window">http://www.copyscape.com/?s=61913581131803&sms_ss=google</a><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Screenshot of copied excerpt 3 (highlighted)</td></tr>
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<b><u>4. My original:</u></b> Equally at home on different turfs, Rafi could convincingly slip under the skin of characters that were poles apart: he sang for the brooding Dilip Kumar in Deedar (1951) with the same ease with which he lent his voice to a frolicking Johnny Walker in C.I.D. (1956). And, truly, it is difficult for the listener to decide where Rafi excels more.<br />
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<b><u>The copy:</u></b> He could convincingly slip under the skin of characters that were poles apart: he sang for the brooding Dilip Kumar in Deedar with the same ease with which he lent his voice to a frolicking Johnny Walker in C.I.D. And it is so difficult for the listener to decide where Rafi excels more and who his voice suits the best! <a href="http://www.copyscape.com/?s=49254971131804&sms_ss=google" target="window">http://www.copyscape.com/?s=49254971131804&sms_ss=google</a><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/TIvtRbUsJkI/AAAAAAAABCE/lAhYCyZk3co/s1600/plagiarism4.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="256" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/TIvtRbUsJkI/AAAAAAAABCE/lAhYCyZk3co/s320/plagiarism4.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Screenshot of copied excerpt 4 (highlighted)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<b>End of everyone’s waste of time. We all have better things to do.</b><br />
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Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-38843918809171439522010-09-02T13:40:00.000-07:002012-10-17T13:10:10.283-07:00Remembering Jairaj and Renuka Devi in Bhabhi (1938)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<em>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on September 1, 2010.</em><br />
<br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/TIAQggGf_DI/AAAAAAAAA-E/h31eEnBJc3U/s1600/bhabhiphoto.jpg"><img alt="Jairaj and Renuka Devi in Bhabhi (1938)" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5512424094460542002" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/TIAQggGf_DI/AAAAAAAAA-E/h31eEnBJc3U/s200/bhabhiphoto.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 152px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 10px; width: 200px;" /></a>In <em>Awara</em> (1951), Raj Kapoor famously tells Nargis that it is not her fault that she initially mistakes him for a vagabond—actually, there is something about his face that makes him look like one: "Is mein tumhara kasoor nahin, meri soorat hi aisi hai." This memorable apology followed by Nargis warming up to Raj is quite the staple of the Raj-Nargis romance.<br />
<br />
More than a decade earlier, in <em>Bhabhi</em> (1938), P. Jairaj (1909-2000) makes the exact same apology about his visage to Renuka Devi (1918-1989), who early on in the film thinks he is a goonda: "Aapka dosh nahin, meri soorat hi aisi hai." <br />
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And that kicks off their tender and subdued onscreen romance in this production from Bombay Talkies Ltd. Watch Jairaj's apology to Renuka Devi and her jittery father (played by V. H. Desai) here:<br />
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<br />
Released on 17th December 1938, at the Roxy Talkies theatre in Bombay, <em>Bhabhi</em>, directed by Franz Osten, was a huge hit.<br />
<br />
A quick synopsis: Based on "Bisher Dhuan" by writer Sardindu Banerjee (1899-1970), who adapted it for Bombay Talkies, <em>Bhabhi</em> is the story of an upright young man named Kishore (Jairaj) who promises his dying friend to take care of the latter's wife, Bimala (Maya Devi), left all alone in the world. Kishore brings Bimala to his house, where they live as brother and sister. Society disapproves, and so does Kishore's father, who disinherits his son. Meanwhile, Renu (Renuka Devi) and her father, Vinay Babu—a funny old man, a bundle of nerves—move in next door. Kishore and Renu fall in love, much to the annoyance of the pompous Anupam (Rama Shukul), who plans to marry the wealthy Renu. Anupam plays villain and creates much heartbreak for the lovers. On a side note, Renu's friend Bela (Meera), who is Anupam's cousin, falls for Kishore. Finally, all misunderstandings are cleared, thanks largely to Deenbandhu (the comforting and rather avuncular P. F. Pithawala), Kishore's former teacher.<br />
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About the film's leading pair: P. Jairaj (born Paidypathy Jairula Naidu) and Renuka Devi (born Khurshid Jahan, later Begum Khurshid Mirza), both hailed from illustrious families and joined films at a time when the profession had a dubious reputation. While Jairaj was born in Karimnagar in the Nizam's state of Hyderabad, and had India's reigning literary empress, Sarojini Naidu, for an aunt (a fact that he kept under wraps), Khurshid Mirza was born in one of Aligarh's most progressive families that founded the Aligarh Women's College. <br />
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Jairaj incurred the displeasure of his family when he ran away to Bombay in 1929, where he started off in silent films. Legend has it that they did not speak to him for nearly twenty-five years. For her part, Khurshid Mirza at least had the support of her immediate family—when she decided to try her luck in films starting in 1937, she was already a wife and a mother. Of course, her extended family and friends back in small town Aligarh were appalled. But the girl from Aligarh was way too determined to bother about other people's opinions, just as the lad from Hyderabad was set in his goal of making something of his life. <br />
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Apparently, Jairaj was all set to go to England to study engineering but it did not materialize, and he was rather dejected: fortuitously a relative put him in touch with a friend who worked for a film company in Bombay. Seizing the chance, Jairaj landed in Bombay, although he never thought of himself as hero material: the move simply meant self-reliance, some odd jobs here and there. <br />
<br />
But, as luck would have it, he was soon offered a role in <em>Sparkling Youth </em>(<em>Jagmagti Jawani</em>) in 1929/1930. (His monthly salary as an actor was 75 rupees.) There was no turning back after that. Altogether, Jairaj acted in 11 silent films. 1931 saw the arrival of the talkie, and Jairaj with his strong command of Urdu (his Hyderabadi roots came in handy) had a distinct advantage. The drawback, though, was that he would have to sing his own songs, and Jairaj was really not much of a singer. He was grateful when playback singing arrived in 1935. <br />
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Certainly, Jairaj was spared the torture of having to sing for himself in <em>Bhabhi</em>—and—what's more—he did not have much lip-synching to do either; interestingly, Jairaj's character sings only in the very end, and that too very briefly. A largely songless hero in a Bombay Talkies production is, perhaps, unusual. Possibly the songs were interwoven with the storyline in such a way that only female vocals were required. Renuka Devi sang for herself, and so did Meera, the supporting actress.<br />
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About Renuka Devi, Baburao Patel of <em>Filmindia</em> magazine declared that "Bombay Talkies have found another Devika [Rani]" and that "her performance has that distinctive grace and poise which can only be associated with a lady of culture and education" (January 1939). This was an accurate assessment of the unconventional Begum Khurshid Mirza, who became Renuka Devi for the screen starting with her first film, Bombay Talkies' <em>Jeevan Prabhat </em>(1937), co-starring Devika Rani and Kishore Sahu. <em>Bhabhi</em> was Renuka Devi's second film. (She moved to Pakistan after partition and later became a successful television personality.)<br />
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If there is one song that Renuka Devi is famous for, it has to be the raag Malhar-based "Jhuki aayi re badariya saawan ki," in <em>Bhabhi</em>, picturized on her and Jairaj, with the latter dutifully accompanying the former, on the piano. Composed by Saraswati Devi, 1912-1980 (the earliest known, if not first, female music director in Hindi cinema), the song captures the beauty of the Indian monsoon and the accompanying exaltation of the human spirit. It is one of the best "saawan" songs in our films—simple and super hummable. Some sources attribute the lyrics to Meerabai though this is not verified. (Does anyone know?) J. S. Casshyap is the lyricist and dialogue writer for the film. "Jhuki aayi re badariya saawan ki":<br />
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My take on the film's theme: Why cannot a young widow live with an unmarried man, as his sister, in peace, without arousing ignoble thoughts in the minds of those around? <em>Bhabhi</em> touches upon the issue of society's narrow mindedness when it comes to man-woman relationships, although in an implicit way. The critique of an ignoble society is not the overarching concern here; in the end, it is more a case of the lovers triumphing rather than society being chastised—the latter is something that the viewer expects rightfully and discovers missing. As Kishore and Renu realize the depth of their love for each other, Bimala's case—and what it stands for—somehow seems to take a backseat. <br />
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That disappointment is, in great measure, offset by the melody of the "Haan qaidi" duet; as Jairaj and Renuka Devi s(w)ing their way to happiness, I wonder why the song is so painfully short. This truncation of beauty seems most unfair—so what do I do? I record the song over and over again on my audiocassette, and listen to it nonstop, and just pretend that it is one long song. "Haan qaidi":<br />
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P.S.: Does anyone know who is singing for Jairaj? In an interview with Bunny Reuben, Jairaj mentioned that he tried to sing for the screen only once—unsuccessfully. This was for a film called <em>Patit Pawan </em>(1933); despite a month's practice, a nervous Jairaj, wanting the song to be done and over with, reeled it all off in one go, totally breathless, without pausing for the orchestra. The song was scrapped, of course; and a mortified Jairaj vowed never to sing again.</div>
Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-8904025841436255982010-03-22T11:38:00.000-07:002012-09-23T19:42:19.688-07:00A page from Indian film history: Karma (1933)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<em>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on March 19, 2010.</em> <br />
<br />
<blockquote>
“… it [Karma] marks a beginning, and a very successful one, to break away from the general run of Indian films and to produce something entitling India to a place in screencraft among other countries in the world.” <br />
-<em>The Times of India</em>, 16 March 1934</blockquote>
<br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/S6fGmZ5oEjI/AAAAAAAAA9s/1C9pHpS2CQ4/s1600-h/karma_2.jpg"><img alt="The kiss of 1933" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5451544237045191218" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/S6fGmZ5oEjI/AAAAAAAAA9s/1C9pHpS2CQ4/s200/karma_2.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 153px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px;" /></a>The husband-wife team of Himansu Rai (1892-1940) and Devika Rani (1908-1994) appeared together only once on the silver screen—in <em>Karma</em> (1933), described as the “first Indian talkie with English dialogue which set all London talking.” In India too, when the film released, there was a lot of talking—tongues wagging, rather. The reason? A kiss between Devika Rani and an unconscious Himansu Rai that is today still as famous as it was shocking then: sure enough, when I start typing in “Devika Rani” on that know-it-all entity called Google, the first suggestion that crops up is “Devika Rani kissing scene,” followed by other keyword combinations—all in search of that kiss from 1933.<br />
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The bilingual <em>Karma</em>, released as <em>Naagan ki raagini</em> in Hindi, was Devika Rani’s first acting role (she sang one song in English, and that was possibly the first English song in Indian cinema), while it was her actor-producer husband’s last. Himansu Rai, from then on, until his early demise seven years hence, concentrated on production, and managing the Bombay Talkies studio that he would found, along with his wife, in 1934. <br />
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In today’s globalized setup, where cross-cultural films, international productions, and foreign premieres are becoming fairly common, it is worth rewinding back to 1933, when such things, perhaps, had more of a novelty factor. <br />
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Himansu Rai, educated in Shantiniketan and London, was a dynamic personality whose aim was to bring Indian cinema of the day on par with the cinemas of Europe and America. Technique wise, Indian cinema—compared to its Western counterparts—was still very much in its infancy. For India to get a grip on the language of cinema, Rai felt it was necessary to initially at least collaborate with Western production houses—that would pave the way, eventually, for a self-sufficient film industry in India. <br />
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<em>Karma</em>, a joint production by Himansu Rai Indo-International Talkies Ltd., Bombay, and Indian & British Productions Ltd., London, and directed by J. L. Freer-Hunt, with music by Ernst Broadhurst and Roy Douglas, premiered in England to great success. (The background musical score evokes the mood of a Douglas Fairbanks film, with a touch of East thrown in.) As the <em>London Star</em> evening newspaper wrote about Devika Rani, “You will never hear a lovelier voice or diction or see a lovelier face.” Judge for yourself. Excerpt 1:<br />
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Given the time period of the film—it was set in contemporary India—it is not surprising that the film held immense appeal for a Western audience. All the ingredients of an exotic colonial drama were in place: a love story set amidst grand palaces, tiger hunts, snake bites, holy men, frenzied natives, miraculous cures, and centered around that curious eastern notion of karma that binds human actions to consequences.<br />
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According to <em>The Times of India</em>, cited earlier, “There was some fear on the part of the producer, Mr. Himansu Rai, that a film in English and designed for the international market might not appeal to the people of this country, since ‘Karma’ is as different from the average Indian film as chalk is from cheese.” The fear was, however, “happily … dispelled” when the film opened favorably, first in Bombay and Delhi, then in “places as widely apart as Madras and Karachi”—although certainly it was a bigger hit in England than in India. <br />
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The fact that the film had received high praise in England created a public curiosity in India; approbation from the West (mixed with the cultural insecurities in the people’s psyche) flattered them enough to pay attention to the showcasing of Oriental India. <br />
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Still, India was not amused by the kiss between the grandniece of Tagore, and her husband. It was long, fairly unrestrained, and an outrageous departure from the mores of the time. But the kiss went past film censorship (it began with the Indian Cinematograph Act of 1918), which was then more wary of nationalist, anti-Raj feelings than it was of demonstrations of human love. <br />
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The film was shot at the Stoll Studios in London and at various outdoor locations in India that included palaces and an ancient Shiva temple. There is attention to detail in capturing the ambience of an Indian princely state of the times—be it lifestyle, apparel, public festivities, or local beliefs. Which is why the opening credits acknowledge “the gracious indulgence of H.H. The Maharawat of Partabgarh” for the film’s depiction of “a pageantry which the jealously guarded traditions of Indian states permit to none but the Ruler himself”; “the exceptional privileges granted by the priests of the temple”; and “the courtesy and guidance of the Central Publicity bureau of the Indian State Railways in placing at our disposal their unrivalled store of information.” <br />
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And thus begins the love story of two Indian royals, at the heart of which is the clash between tradition and modernity, a tension that is heightened during the colonial encounter. <br />
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<em>A note here</em>: I have had to piece together the story from a bunch of scenes, and that too from memory. I hope I have done justice to the logic of the narrative. One more thing: With the prince and the princess addressing each other as “darling” and “beloved” and so on, and with no else calling them by their names, I guess their names remain a mystery. <br />
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The princess of Sitapur (Devika Rani) and the prince of neighboring Jayanagar (Himansu Rai) are deeply in love with each other. The prince’s father (actor Dewan Sharar, who wrote the story) disapproves of the “modernizing” ideas of the princess, which he surmises as her converting “temples into hospitals,” “palaces into schools,” “rice fields into playgrounds”—and as the king’s adviser adds—”peasants into cricketers.” The adviser, a holy man, has a plan to tackle the princess: it is easier to put a stop to her radical ideas by actually letting her marry the prince. As the king’s daughter-in-law, her powers will be undermined.<br />
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The princess, meanwhile, thinks of a way to make the king of Jayanagar agreeable towards her; he is fond of hunting, so she plans to offer him a chance to go tiger hunting in the forests of Sitapur. There is a problem, though. There has never been any hunting in Sitapur and it could offend the people’s sentiments. The prince is concerned for the safety of the princess, but she is confident in her decision and tells him that she will schedule the hunt just after the local festival when the people will be in a good mood. <br />
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The hunt is announced, and the king of Jayanagar accepts the invite although he wants his son to lead it. The people of Sitapur are uneasy. They resent the tiger hunt—and that too by the neighbor, their traditional rival. Moreover, they reason that a marriage between Jayanagar and Sitapur will result in Jayanagar controlling Sitapur. A few angry people conspire to prevent the marriage by getting the prince out of the way. <br />
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On the eve of the hunt, the princess—who has just realized the reason behind the king’s consent of the marriage—“if we marry, your father’s influence will prevent all our plans for progress”—is visibly upset. Soon thereafter, an intruder unsuccessfully tries to kill the prince, and the princess is deeply shaken. She is tempted to call off the hunt, but the prince thinks that would be cowardice. The princess decides that while the hunt is on the next day, she will pray for her beloved’s safety at the Shiva temple. Excerpt 2: <br />
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The prince shoots a tiger the next day, but also, accidentally, shoots a man. So the injured man rides back on the prince’s elephant while the prince decides to walk. On the way back among the tall grasses, a king cobra bites the prince, who is then rushed to the snake charmer’s hut. The princess, who is just leaving the temple, is informed. The words of Jayanagar’s holy man haunt the princess: “Those who follow the torch of progress too swiftly sometimes get their fingers burnt.”<br />
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She rushes to the unconscious prince, and sits with his head on her lap, praying fervently. Now follows the famous lip lock scene in the film. To the background of the snake charmer’s music, we see the princess bending low and desperately kissing her lifeless lover, hoping to wake him up through her touch. “My prayers must be answered,” she pleads. <br />
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The snake charmer tells her about an “old cure” that must happen before sunset: “If Shiva wills it, another snake shall strike the prince again and draw out the poison.” He goes into the forest and brings back another cobra. <br />
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Meanwhile, the king hears the news of his dying son; distraught, he ascribes it all to karma, and blames himself for earning the ill will of the people of Sitapur. He decides to perform some good deeds: “prayers to the gods” and “alms to the people.” <br />
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We hear the snake music one last time, as the cobra glides by the prince and bites out the venom. The prince opens his eyes. “Praise be to Shiva,” “Har har Mahadev,” and “Jai Shiv Shankar” fill the air as an overjoyed princess hugs the prince tight. The end. <br />
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As the belief in karma stands vindicated—spectacle and pageantry aside—the West is left to its reflections on the subject. <br />
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<em>A conclusory thought</em>: Given the political context of the times, of the reality of a rising Indian discontent against the empire (it is worth remembering here that the three Round Table Conferences organized in London between 1930 and 1932 to discuss India’s demand for self-rule were a failure due to the highhandedness of the British), one almost wonders if the film’s depiction of the power of the people’s wrath against the ruler pricked the British conscience in any way. Did the British viewer feel a certain compunction, fear a backlash against the Raj, perhaps? <br />
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Image credit: <a href="http://www.bollyclips.com/photogallery/displayimage.php?album=201&pos=182" target="_blank">www.bollyclips.com</a></div>
Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-46119162339121177022009-12-04T10:39:00.000-08:002012-09-23T19:49:49.384-07:00M. S. Subbulakshmi’s Hindi Meera (1947)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<em>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on December 3, 2009.</em><br />
<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SxlbKsyLmmI/AAAAAAAAA88/RHFqE6qS0Dw/s1600-h/ms30.jpg"><img alt="M. S. Subbulakshmi as Meera" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5411456666640816738" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SxlbKsyLmmI/AAAAAAAAA88/RHFqE6qS0Dw/s320/ms30.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 320px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 199px;" /></a> I have some memories associated with my old VHS tape of the 1947 Hindi version of the 1945 Tamil film <em>Meera</em> that is synonymous with M. S. Subbulakshmi (1916-2004). The year was 1991. Rajiv Gandhi had been assassinated on May 21. Sometime in the next couple of days or so, Doordarshan, in a gesture of magnanimity reserved for such somber occasions, paid homage to the departed soul by screening Chandraprabha Cinetone’s Hindi <em>Meera</em>—which, for some reason, unlike its Tamil original, is not easy to come by.<br />
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As a schoolgirl, for me—as for many others, undoubtedly, in keeping with Shakespeare’s “whining schoolboy … creeping like snail unwillingly to school”—the death of a famous political leader usually meant a sudden holiday, much welcomed especially if it was the postponement of a dreaded test or assignment. Some things never change. (Of course, Rajiv Gandhi’s death occurred during the summer vacation—I had just finished Std. XI—so it was certainly a lost holiday opportunity for whining school goers.) <br />
<br />
The other thing about such deaths was that one could be fairly sure that Doordarshan would be inclined to broadcast vintage devotional or mythological films—essentially, classics that would stir the soul. Likewise, All India Radio would offer quite a musical bonanza, with rare recordings of devotional songs, bhajans, and classical music—which were all certainly not easy to come by on an ordinary day. And, of course, the melodious but sad strains of a shehnai vaadan (usually by Ustad Bismillah Khan) could be heard wafting through the neighborhood TVs and radios that would all be on, in anticipation of any announcements or updates. <br />
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For the avid vintage-films/vintage-music collector in me, this was the time for some serious recording work. Armed with enough blank audio and video tapes, and with both the TV and the radio on side-by-side, I would assume the role of watchdog (and a pugnacious one at that, if anyone interrupted), keeping my eyes and ears open for any vintage treasures that were on the way. And that is how I acquired my precious copy of the Hindi <em>Meera</em>, directed by Ellis R. Dungan (1909-2001), the American from Barton, Ohio, and co-written by Kalki Krishnamurthy, the legendary writer and freedom fighter (1899-1954).<br />
<br />
<em>Meera</em>, with nearly twenty exceptionally melodious songs, all vying with each for best song, is one of those films that one can never have one’s fill of. The music for the Hindi version was inspired by the famous musician-intellectual of the time Dilip Kumar Roy (1897-1980) and composed by S. V. Venkatraman, G. Ramanathan, and Naresh Bhattacharya. (So far I have not been able to find accurate information about the three music directors, which just shows how wanting the documentation is in this area; I did read in a few places though that S. V. Venkatraman was an underrated composer. That is hard to understand, given the melody of the songs here.) <br />
<br />
I really don’t want to sound clichéd, but M. S. Subbulakshmi is, cinematically and musically, quite the personification of Meera. When I think of or read Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Sir Laurence Olivier’s brooding face (from his 1948 film) comes to mind. When I think of Meera or listen to her bhajans, the inner eye, by default, equates Meera with M. S.—although I have seen and listened to other adaptations of the story of this 16th century Rajput princess. M. S.’s interpretation of Meera is one of those rare things that one can rely upon when one is down on one’s luck in the world; it is quite the panacea for life’s wear and tear.<br />
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The film starts with Sarojini Naidu (1879-1949) introducing “Subbulakshmi of the South to the people of the North”—and to the world. It is a spellbinding introduction of a spellbinding artist, from one of modern India’s great literary voices, effortlessly lyrical and heartfelt. Clip 1:<br />
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The film tells the story of Meera’s single-minded devotion to Lord Krishna. A reluctant queen who sings the praises of Krishna, she is loved by the common people who call her Meera Maata, but criticized by the palace bigwigs for her unworldly ways. After many a trial and tribulation, Meera finally attains self-realization at the shrine of her beloved Dwarkanath. <br />
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Legend has it that Meera, as a child, fell in love with an idol of Krishna that was brought to her house by a holy man called Rupa Goswami. In the following scene, Radha Sadasivam (M. S.’s step-daughter) plays little Meera, sitting on the lap of her grandfather, played by Durasiwamy (an actor who specialized in fatherly roles in Tamil and Telugu films, hence playfully referred to as Appan Duraiswamy by my father, who points out to me that Appan Duraiswamy would die usually coughing). Little Meera is entranced by Krishna’s idol, which for a moment turns into a charming Kumari Kamala—the quintessential Krishna of celluloid. Rupa Goswami appears to be Serukalathur Sama, a Carnatic vocalist who acted in many Tamil films, such as <em>Sakunthalai</em> (1940) and Gemini’s <em>Nandanar</em> (1942). Baby Radha and Serukalathur Sama are singing for themselves in this song. Clip 2:<br />
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One day, little Meera sees a marriage procession from her balcony and, when she wonders about it, is told that she will also marry when she grows up. Then and there, she makes up her mind that she will wed only Giridhar Gopal. Baby Radha sings “Nanda bala mora pyaara,” and over the course of the song, she transforms into M. S. in what is now regarded as a sequence unprecedented in Indian cinema. The technicalities are best explained in film historian Randor Guy’s words, which I quote: <br />
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“When the changeover takes place, there is a 45-second, fast-paced musical interlude by the background orchestra as bridge as part of the song. Normally such background musical interludes are recorded along with the song in a recording studio long before the shooting of the film commences. But Dungan did not do so. He shot the scene first and the changeover sequence consisted of a number of shots of the statue of Lord Krishna… lighted candles with flames flickering …flowers on trays… prayer offerings…. Krishna’s flute in the statue…and then a cut to a close-up of MS singing with great feeling and emotion, “Hey! Murali… Mohana…” The shots were static, and also on fast trolley in close-up. (There were no ‘Zoom lenses’ in 1944-1945!) Dungan edited them all by himself into a rapidly cut fast-paced sequence first, and then the sadly underrated but highly talented music composer, S. V. Venkataraman scored the background music, in rhythm with the shots in a recording theatre. The impact was ecstatic and brilliant.” <br />
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(Randor Guy, “Full of technical innovations,” <em>The Hindu</em>, December 17, 2004)<br />
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Clip 3: <br />
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After her marriage to the Rana of Mewar, Meera moves to the capital Chittor, where she leads the life of a householder in the eyes of the world only, for, at heart, she is wedded to Krishna. After fulfilling her daily responsibilities, she retreats into the world of Krishna. Clip 4:<br />
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Here is the only duet in the film, with Meera and the Rana (played by V. Nagaiah, the very versatile Telugu actor-singer-composer, among other things) strolling in the royal gardens, in happy times. It is a moonlit night, replete with fountains, lotus ponds, rose trees, doves, and graceful white swans—quite an enchanting zone. The Rana has just promised her that he will build a grand temple for Krishna, and Meera is overjoyed. Clip 5:<br />
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As Meera spends more and more time at the temple, immersed in the glories of Krishna, she invites the ire of the Rana’s family, who instigate the Rana against her. In one scene, Meera, in a state of spiritual ecstasy with cymbals in hand, takes to the streets of Chittor, with the crowd following her, in her famous “Chaakar raakho ji” song. When the news of Meera singing and wandering on the streets reaches him, the Rana is horrified at his minstrel queen. Clip 6: <br />
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The Rana expresses his displeasure to Meera, who then promises to make amends by being present at court by his side for a ceremonial occasion. The day happens to be a special day at the temple as well, but still Meera agrees to fulfill her queenly duties at the court. The day arrives—but at the last moment, when, as a heavily bejeweled queen, she is all set to leave for the court, she hears “Kaanha ki bansi” (Krishna’s flute) from the temple and, utterly overwhelmed, runs to the temple and bursts into a song. Meanwhile, at court, the Rana is anxiously awaiting Meera. There is a look of sarcasm on the faces of Meera’s chief detractors—namely the Rana’s sister (K. R. Chellam) and his younger brother Jayaman (T. S. Baliah, a popular villain). When the Rana hears about Meera’s lapse, he is furious and stomps into the temple, as the chorus builds up dizzyingly. Clip 7:<br />
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Jayaman, who hates Meera with all his heart, decides to kill her and persuades his trembling sister (who still has a spark of conscience) to give her poison. Meera drinks the prasad (or offering) laced with poison that her sister-in-law brings her. The poison does not affect Meera; instead, the presiding deity at Dwarka turns blue and the doors close, much to the shock of the devotees there. <br />
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Meanwhile, hearing about Meera, people from all over flock to see her. And thereby hangs another tale. Supposedly, Akbar, the Mughal emperor at the time, accompanied by Mansingh, traveled all the way from Delhi to Chittor in disguise to see and listen to Meera, with an offering of a pearl necklace for Krishna’s idol. In this scene, Meera enters the temple with her tanpura and sings the captivating “Main Haricharanan ki daasi”—if I have to choose my favorite song in the film, it is this. Clip 8:<br />
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A suspicious Jayaman accosts the two visitors from Delhi, who, in their hurry to flee, accidentally leave behind an item that bears the stamp of the Mughal empire. Jayaman promptly reports this to the Rana and interprets this as a sign of the Mughals spying on Mewar. The Rana is enraged and, at the goading of his brother, orders the temple to be torn down. A triumphant Jayaman marches with the soldiers to the temple and tells all the Krishna devotees gathered there, including Meera, to leave. They refuse, convinced that Krishna will come to their rescue. <br />
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A mocking Jayaman orders the canon to be fired—at that very moment, in the palace, the Rana’s sister who is convinced of Meera’s devotion, confesses to her brother that she tried to poison Meera, to no avail, and pleads with him to stop Jayaman from destroying the temple. When he hears about the plot to kill Meera, the Rana is shocked. He realizes his mistake and runs to the temple—but it is a little too late. The canon has been fired, and Meera has made up her mind to go her own way in her quest for Krishna. <br />
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Meera, with only her tanpura, sets out on the long, arduous journey to Brindavan, the place where Krishna spent his childhood. She faces many hardships on the way, but steadfastly moves towards her goal. Clip 9: <br />
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She finally reaches Brindavan, and all her tiredness vanishes. And here is another snippet. According to journalist Gowri Ramarayan, Dungan was “terribly worried” about shooting the “Yaad aavey, Brindavan ki mangala leela” song since the scene required a crowd to follow M. S., and the production had not arranged for that. The film’s producer Sadasivam (M. S.’s husband) confidently assured Dungan that the “crowd will turn up.” And, indeed that is what happened with the crowd “materializ[ing]” out of nowhere. (<em>M S Amma: A Shy Girl from Madurai</em>, Documentary directed by Swati Thiyagarajan, 2007) Clip 10:<br />
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When Meera reaches Rupa Goswami’s ashram at Brindavan, his disciples tell her that their teacher does not see women. Meera wonders aloud about this gender discrimination in the realm of Brindavan, in the realm of the all-pervading spirit of Krishna. Goswami hears this and comes out to see Meera, apologizing for his narrow mindedness. He recognizes her as the little girl to whom, long ago, he had given a Krishna idol. <br />
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With Goswami and his disciples, Meera leaves for Dwarka, where the doors of the shrine still remain closed. In the last song of the film, “Suno meri manovyatha,” Meera’s plea to Krishna is answered, as the temple doors unlock and Meera attains salvation. The repentant Rana comes to take Meera back with him—but he is late. Clip 11:<br />
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The film was shot entirely on location, with the cast and crew traveling to all the places associated with Meera, including Jaipur, Chittor, Udaipur, Brindavan and Dwarka. Randor Guy, in the same article I mentioned before, writes that M. S. became a “national celebrity” after the 1947 release of the Hindi version of the film—apparently, even the Mountbattens saw the film before they left India. <br />
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This December 11 will be M. S.’s 5th death anniversary. <br />
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Image credit: <a href="http://www.google.com/imgres?um=1&hl=en&biw=1280&bih=677&tbm=isch&tbnid=9ivR7ruh7F9xOM:&imgrefurl=http://worldstuff.net/m-s-subbulakshmi-biography.html&docid=_HzzC6tvK3OOaM&imgurl=http://worldstuff.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/2-M-S-Subbulakshmi-young.jpg&w=400&h=296&ei=x8hfUNTNNMnviQLKq4H4AQ&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=459&vpy=388&dur=611&hovh=193&hovw=261&tx=132&ty=72&sig=108928959145983915425&page=1&tbnh=151&tbnw=215&start=0&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:14,s:0,i:115" target="_blank">worldstuff.net</a></div>
Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com30tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-1424729201961911052009-10-25T09:07:00.000-07:002018-10-19T16:41:27.112-07:00The music of Kamal Dasgupta<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<em>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on October 24, 2009.</em><br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SuR7wwlmoRI/AAAAAAAAA7Q/iabKGEVtc-Y/s1600-h/kamal+dasgupta+1.jpg"><img alt="Kamal Dasgupta (1912-1974)" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5396574331103256850" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SuR7wwlmoRI/AAAAAAAAA7Q/iabKGEVtc-Y/s320/kamal+dasgupta+1.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 320px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 225px;" /></a>In the Hindi film <em>Jawab</em> (1942), singer-actress Kanan Devi lulls a restless and rather childlike P. C. Barua into sweet sleep. The song is “Ay chand chup na jaana,” and it is great for frayed nerves. Given my own battles with sleep—the activity that consumes nearly a half of our lives—I feel compelled to attest to the wonder of this lullaby by music composer Kamal Prasanna Dasgupta (1912-1974), with lyrics by Pt. Madhur. Here it is: Song 1:<br />
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Considering the extraordinary melody of Kamal Dasgupta’s music (he was also a singer), it is surprising that today very few remember this prolific genius who composed nearly 8000 songs that spanned quite a range—from films (Hindi, Bengali, and—most astonishingly—even Tamil, which I have not yet had the luck of encountering) to non-film categories such as Meera bhajans, Nazrul geet, kirtans, and ghazals, to name just a few.<br />
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Here is a composer who gave Jagmohan and Juthika Roy some of their best songs ever, a composer who shaped the early careers of Talat Mahmood and Hemant Kumar, much before they got a break in films as playback singers. And yet, woefully, it is not easy to find detailed, authoritative information on—as Sarwat Ali puts it, “the first million copy seller of golden discs in [the] Indian music industry.” <br />
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I am guessing that S. M. Shahid’s book (with accompanying CDs) called Kamal Dasgupta: Unforgettable Songs, whose existence I only recently discovered through the Internet, and which I have not seen, should fill the void to some extent. Certainly it is on my buying list now. <br />
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And here comes a pleasant discovery I made from the tracks listed in Shahid’s book/CDs—a piece of information that thrilled me indescribably: for many years now, I have been enthralled by singer Jagmohan (or Jaganmoy Mitra, 1918-2003)—another largely forgotten figure—without knowing that many of his gut-wrenchingly beautiful songs were composed by Dasgupta. <br />
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Although I knew that Dasgupta had composed Jagmohan’s eponymous “O varsha ke pehle baadal mera sandesa le jaana” for the film <em>Meghdoot</em> (1945), I had no idea that it was the same genius composer behind other Jagmohan numbers (largely non film) such as “Dil dekar dard liya” or “Deewana tumhaara kahta hai afsaana.” (By the way, the lyricist for these songs is yet another forgotten figure—Fayyaz Hashmi, 1920-?) <br />
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I wonder why the old HMV audiocassettes of Jagmohan’s songs never ever mentioned the name of the composer. That has been a huge disservice to the legacy of Kamal Dasgupta—and that damage has stayed on: even now, when I look up Jagmohan’s songs, or the more well-known Talat Mahmood’s early songs, on the Internet, usually there is no mention of the music composer. Why does this information have to be so arcane? <strong>Why should one have to burrow one’s way through to know the name of the creator of some of the sweetest melodies?</strong> It is utterly deplorable.<br />
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I will suspend my outrage for a while and return to <em>Jawab</em> (1942), possibly the first Hindi film for which Dasgupta composed music. One of its best-known songs is Kanan Devi’s “Toofan Mail” (in recent times, Lata Mangeshkar sang it for her Shraddhanjali series that celebrated all-time memorable songs), and it certainly ranks as one of the most unforgettable train songs in Indian film music. Lyricist Pt. Madhur sure nailed it when he wrote “Ek hai aata, ek hai jaata, sabhi musaafir, bichhad jaayenge.” Song 2:<br />
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From a soothing lullaby to a sprightly train song—and now to a “dulhaniya” song from Jawab: here is Anima Dasgupta (no relation of Kamal Dasgupta) singing “Dulhaniya chhama chham chhama chham chali” for actress Jamuna, who looks on dotingly at the bashful bride-to-be, a charming Kanan Devi in all her bridal finery. Song 3:<br />
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In keeping with the grand tradition in Indian films of double versions of the same song—happy versus sad, or fast versus slow, or solo versus duet—here is the second, shorter version of the “Ay chand chup na jaana” lullaby that appears towards the end of the film, when love triumphs. It is sung by, I believe, Kamal Dasgupta himself, along with Kanan Devi. Song 4: <br />
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While researching on Dasgupta on the Internet (a very frustrating endeavor), I found a particularly poignant statement by him. An article by Khalid Hasan mentions a line from Dasgupta’s 1971 letter to a friend in Bengali—and I quote the quote: “‘The pictures you see in front, everybody remembers them and praises them. But nobody wants to know the people who work behind the scenes, nor talk about them. That is the nature of the world.’” Guess that sums it up.<br />
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Image credit: <a href="http://stationhollywood.blogspot.com/2009/03/kamal-dasguptas-contribution-in-bengali.html" target="_blank">stationhollywood.blogspot.com</a></div>
Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-50536797112607763712009-09-21T09:34:00.000-07:002012-09-23T20:09:52.917-07:00Of sudden realizations: Menzel’s Closely Watched Trains (1966)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<em>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on September 20, 2009.</em><br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/Srev-F902UI/AAAAAAAAA64/uWstezTB7yU/s1600-h/Trains1.jpg"><img alt="Václav Neckář as Miloš Hrma in Closely Watched Trains (1966)" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383965360832960834" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/Srev-F902UI/AAAAAAAAA64/uWstezTB7yU/s320/Trains1.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 141px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 188px;" /></a><em>TIME</em> magazine described <em>Closely Watched Trains </em>(1966) as one of the 100 best films ever. Set in German-occupied Czechoslovakia during the last days of World War II, the film, directed by Jiří Menzel, powerfully documents a young Czech boy’s aching—and poignant—personal crisis—in this case, a not-so-easy discovery of his manhood. (Spoiler warning: This article gives away the story; if you’d rather watch the film first, stop right here.)<br />
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Based on a story by the novelist Bohumil Hrabal, the film is a stark portrait of life’s crisscrossing aspects and moods. For Miloš Hrma (played by Václav Neckář), who has just found initiation into the working world in the form of a train dispatcher’s assistant, the initiation into life’s sexual aspect—or love, to put it more poetically—is fraught with all sorts of difficulties, from the physiological to the emotional. As Miloš looks around at the world, it strikes him that most people are spared the embarrassing problem that he faces—the problem being his hopeless ineptitude in matters of love and physical fulfillment. Here is something that is so tragic (at least for the subject) that, at some point, it oversteps its boundary and becomes comic and tragic, or comi-tragic.<br />
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The rather sensitive Miloš is consumed by this deeply personal problem, which afflicts him horribly and settles into a vicious circle: he is tormented because he is physically unfulfilled; this lack, in turn, makes him diffident and awkward with people, especially women—which, then, makes the much-sought-after physical fulfillment a spirally elusive goal.<br />
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Miloš’ conflict is played out at a nondescript, although strategically positioned, railway station. Trains carrying ammunitions to the Germans pass through this station. Train dispatcher Hubička, Miloš’ boss, is responsible for the smooth and timely passage of these trains. On the subject of women, Hubička is quite the pro, and his time at work is mostly spent in seducing women, notably the acquiescing telegrapher. The confused Miloš, of course, looks on as his boss effortlessly dabbles in women, and he is constantly reminded—stingingly—of his own inadequacy in the matter. <br />
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After a particularly unsuccessful attempt at adulthood, Miloš checks himself into a room at an inn, where he slashes his wrists. However, self-extinction does not come that easy; he is rescued, and finds himself in the hospital, very much alive, and privy to the same depressing thoughts. He confides to the doctor: in Miloš’ own words, “Everything is so difficult in life, for me. While for others it’s all child’s play.” The doctor advises the novice in Miloš to find wing under an experienced woman, who can successfully initiate him into one of life’s most primordial acts. (In some ways, I was reminded of Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha approaching Kamala for an understanding of certain primeval matters—something that the much-evolved Siddhartha felt was crucial to life’s completeness.)<br />
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So in keeping with the best comi-tragic (or is that tragi-comic?) tradition, Miloš, desperate for an older woman, goes asking for one, quite literally, from door to door. His desperation even drives him to ask the stationmaster, more a bird breeder than otherwise, for the latter’s matronly wife.<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/Sret6Of90zI/AAAAAAAAA6w/w1Ms3RS6fFQ/s1600-h/Trains2.jpg"><img alt="Viktoria Freie" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383963095380906802" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/Sret6Of90zI/AAAAAAAAA6w/w1Ms3RS6fFQ/s320/Trains2.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 141px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 188px;" /></a>One day, finally, Miloš’ life changes—and changes forever. Hubička is the agent of that change. Hubička is part of the Czech resistance against the German Occupation. When the rather enterprising Viktoria Freie, a fellow-member of this group, arrives at the station, ridden with bombs to blow up a train, Hubička introduces her to Miloš, certain that she is the solution to Miloš’ problem. And it works. <br />
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Miloš is euphoric, and his newly discovered personality now overflows with self-confidence and zeal. In this spirit, he takes upon himself the task of planting the explosives on the railway tracks. (His boss, who is supposed to do this deed, is in trouble for his dalliances with the telegrapher.) Miloš achieves the mission but also dies in the process, incidentally—and ironically—achieving a permanent place in the history of the Czech resistance. <br />
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It is almost as though once his physical longing is quenched, life is complete for Miloš, who is transmuted into a hero of sorts. Menzel conveys the underlying parody of the situation, of this incidental heroism, in such an unobtrusive way that it quite slips past the viewer, who suddenly realizes that Miloš’ death quietly subverts the grandeur of martyrdom. On first impression, the personal merges with the political—or does it? Inarguably, this is one of cinema’s most epiphanic moments. <br />
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<em>Closely Watched Trains </em>(the title refers to the close eye that the Nazis kept on trains ferrying ammunitions their way) is the story of a complex human situation in a complex political climate, which is told simply and strikingly. It speaks not just of the brutality of war and death, but of the brutality of life itself, of the everyday, of each one’s peculiar trials.<br />
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Image credit: <a href="http://www.tcm.com/this-month/article/97227%7C0/Closely-Watched-Trains.html" target="_blank">www.tcm.com</a> </div>
Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-24808098121832458152009-08-14T17:21:00.000-07:002012-09-23T20:19:51.094-07:00Black Narcissus (1947) and the colors of chaos, with a touch of E. M. Forster<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<em>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on August 13, 2009.</em><br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYsY6uelwI/AAAAAAAAA54/NCukJw8X4gI/s1600-h/blacknar.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5370028412278576898" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYsY6uelwI/AAAAAAAAA54/NCukJw8X4gI/s320/blacknar.jpg" style="float: left; height: 253px; margin: 10px 10px 10px 0px; width: 320px;" /></a> <br />
No one really knows what exactly happened to Adela Quested inside the Marabar Caves, in E. M. Forster’s novel <em>A Passage to India</em> (1924)—except that she came out of the caves disheveled and nutty, in an accusatory mood, and enveloped in a horrible confusion that was at the heart of this Forsterian narrative. The enigma of the Marabar Caves—and what it can do to hapless westerners, especially women, who end up making spectacles of themselves—is legendary in the annals of colonial literature.<br />
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Something similar is the theme of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s British film <em>Black Narcissus</em>, which released in the U.K. on 26 May 1947, just before the British Raj bid adieu to India. (Interestingly, in the U.S., the film released on 13 August 1947, just two days before India’s independence.) Based on a 1939 novel by Rumer Godden, the accused here is a place called Mopu (not far from Darjeeling), 8000 feet up in the Himalayas, where a palace-turned-convent rests rather precariously—both literally and figuratively. <br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYA7t2r3KI/AAAAAAAAA4Y/zekG457Lh7o/s1600-h/black_narcissus_1.jpg"><img alt="The palace at Mopu" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5369980631607139490" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYA7t2r3KI/AAAAAAAAA4Y/zekG457Lh7o/s200/black_narcissus_1.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 150px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 10px; width: 200px;" /></a> The palace, once a harem of the local Hindu king, is now home to St. Faith, a group of five nuns from Calcutta. At the request of General Toda Rai of Mopu, Sister Clodagh (Deborah Kerr in a subdued role) leads four nuns from the Convent of the Order of the Servants of Mary in their mission, which is to open a dispensary and school for the locals. <br />
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Once in Mopu, the nuns discover that the place is not just dangerously windy—it also has a dangerously volatile effect on their emotions. There is something about the air of Mopu that tests the equanimity (both physical and mental) of the nuns, and casts doubts on their lives of abnegation: it stirs in them long-forgotten thoughts and feelings; it rekindles certain emotions and memories that they have learned to do away with; in short, it disturbs the status quo. <br />
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The colors of life that they have trained themselves, as nuns, to keep at bay, burst upon their lives—and, indeed, upon the screen in spellbinding bluish-rosy-golden hues of Technicolor—as enticing to the nuns as it is to the viewers.<br />
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(A digression here. On the subject of Technicolor, my first impressions are certainly my last impressions: When I first watched <em>Aan</em> (1952), India’s first Technicolor film, I almost wondered if, perhaps, Mehboob Khan had ordered the film reel to be dipped in a bucket of dye. As the screen dripped with color, I felt that Dilip Kumar, Nadira, and Nimmi had come straight out of a book of fairy tales. Later, when I saw Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland in <em>The Adventures of Robin Hood</em> (1938), it only reinforced that association of Technicolor with fairy tales. And now, after many years, when I watch the <em>Black Narcissus</em>, the surfeit of colors evokes that same deliciously unreal world. Perhaps it is a case of childhood associations dying hard.) <br />
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Back to the story: For the nuns, who find themselves flitting in and out of their many reveries, the varied colors of Mopu bring to the fore the now-obscured aspects of life—whether it is the raw enjoyment of nature, the physicality of desire, or the wild human imagination. And all hell breaks loose. In keeping with the empire mindset, the Orient, it seems, has the power to disturb. <br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYBz8SKkxI/AAAAAAAAA4g/Jm4JG3qaWaU/s1600-h/Black+narcissus_4.jpg"><img alt="Sister Ruth and the colors of chaos" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5369981597553169170" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYBz8SKkxI/AAAAAAAAA4g/Jm4JG3qaWaU/s200/Black+narcissus_4.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 133px; margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px; width: 200px;" /></a> While Sister Clodagh is reminded of her first love in Ireland, Sister Philippa (who is in charge of growing vegetables) stares vacantly at the vast expanses before her and takes to growing flowers instead of the more useful vegetables. The worst case, though, is Sister Ruth who lapses into plain hysteria. Sister Clodagh often catches Sister Ruth casting surreptitious glances at the ruggedly handsome Mr. Dean (David Farrar), an Englishman who is the agent of General Toda Rai. <br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYCdbTaC3I/AAAAAAAAA4o/i8RKbxZlfSQ/s1600-h/Black_Narcissus_5.jpg"><img alt="Sister Clodagh, Sister Ruth, and the rugged Mr. Dean" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5369982310254513010" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYCdbTaC3I/AAAAAAAAA4o/i8RKbxZlfSQ/s200/Black_Narcissus_5.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 146px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px;" /></a> In fact, Sister Ruth, with a rush in her blood, is, in some ways, like Forster’s Adela. The Mopu landscape opens up a deep recess within her, and she goes hurtling down; if Adela was madly attracted to Aziz in the Marabar Caves, and invited doomsday for herself, Sister Ruth wallows in her imagined love for the rather attractively irreverent Dean (who queries Sister Clodagh, “Isn’t it your business to save souls?”), although here the repercussion is her violent death. <br />
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Like the Marabar Caves, the palace at Mopu is a maze with its many rooms. It is easy to lose one’s way and lose one’s mind as well. Cinematically speaking, the serenity of the surrounding snowcapped Himalayan peaks provides a perfect foil for the tumult of the mind and the nuns’ inner struggles. This juxtaposition of the inner and the outer worlds in the <em>Black Narcissus</em> is all the more significant because the outer world—the palace of Mopu and the Himalayan peaks—was <em>not</em> really the outer world; it was a creation of the set designer. If cinema is the art of make-believe, it is verily so here. <br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYCwxXXRVI/AAAAAAAAA4w/8Mvr6OkWuvU/s1600-h/black_narcissus_6.jpg"><img alt="The shadow of the crucifix" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5369982642594202962" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYCwxXXRVI/AAAAAAAAA4w/8Mvr6OkWuvU/s200/black_narcissus_6.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 150px; margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px; width: 200px;" /></a> Powell and Pressburger use chiaroscuro—or the interplay of light and shade—to bring out, very effectively, the nuns’ conflicted states of mind. Sister Clodagh’s bright and cheerful past in sunny Ireland, for instance, transposes onto the dark silhouette of her present nun’s attire. In another unforgettable shot, the crucifix casts its shadow on her, pulled as she is in opposite directions. The camera angles and the lighting are very reminiscent of film noir—the addition here being color, which is co-opted to convey the underlying chaos of the narrative. <br />
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The chaos of Mopu is aptly represented by the wind, which “blows seven days a week;” indeed, the wind is such an integral part of the film that it comes across as a character in itself—it becomes a personification of the Orient that defies control. And it, eerily, blends in with the film’s background musical score. It howls and causes terrible echoes—just like the (in)famous echoes in the Marabar Caves that led to Adela’s discomposure. <br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYDH4Pao_I/AAAAAAAAA44/CIB4zAGFVgc/s1600-h/BlackNarcissus_kanchi.jpg"><img alt="The exotic Kanchi" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5369983039576908786" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYDH4Pao_I/AAAAAAAAA44/CIB4zAGFVgc/s200/BlackNarcissus_kanchi.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 210px; margin: 0px 10px 3px 0px; width: 160px;" /></a><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYDVWd4tyI/AAAAAAAAA5A/Lj5KTZbLgVs/s1600-h/Black_Narcissus_8.jpg"><img alt="The bejeweled prince" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5369983271028963106" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYDVWd4tyI/AAAAAAAAA5A/Lj5KTZbLgVs/s200/Black_Narcissus_8.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 134px; margin: 0px 0px 5px 10px; width: 200px;" /></a> <br />
The <em>Black Narcissus</em> has all the staples of the colonial story: there is Kanchi, the exotic-looking local girl; there is high-strung Angu Ayah, the antiquarian caretaker of the palace; then there is the bejeweled and perfumed young prince (the nephew of General Toda Rai), who persuades the nuns to accept him into the children’s classroom because he “want[s] to study a lot of learning”—incidentally the film is named after a perfume (from the army/navy stores in London) that the prince wears. He asks, “Oh, Sister, don’t you think it’s rather common to smell of ourselves?”<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYDn68i5HI/AAAAAAAAA5I/QhS1CXYFO-A/s1600-h/black_narcissus_2.jpg"><img alt="General-turned-sannyasi" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5369983590058878066" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SoYDn68i5HI/AAAAAAAAA5I/QhS1CXYFO-A/s200/black_narcissus_2.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 134px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 10px; width: 200px;" /></a> Finally, there is the holy man—the former General Sir Krishna Rai—now a silent, detached observer of life, always unfazed. The General-turned-sannyasi has a profoundly unsettling effect on Sister Clodagh, who, distracted as she is by the Orient, cannot help but feel spiritually inferior, which only exasperates her more. I am reminded of Professor Godbole in Forster’s book. <br />
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Filled with subterranean passions that bubble over, the <em>Black Narcissus</em> ends with the fiendish Sister Ruth falling to her death and the mission of St. Faith silently retreating out of Mopu. The viewer is left with images of the falling rain and the snow-clad peaks. According to film critic Dave Kehr, given the release date of the film, the <em>Black Narcissus</em> could, perhaps, be seen as the British empire’s swan song (although the book was published in 1939).<br />
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Disclaimer: Images from the Internet have been used for academic/discussion purposes only. </div>
Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-62933595985203207272009-07-31T17:18:00.000-07:002012-09-23T00:16:48.636-07:00Remembering Mohammed Rafi<em>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on July 29, 2009.</em><br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SnOKoGN_MNI/AAAAAAAAA3o/ZTbFLXUGgLs/s1600-h/Rafi_1pic.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5364784002597073106" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_oT6Z2eF9npc/SnOKoGN_MNI/AAAAAAAAA3o/ZTbFLXUGgLs/s320/Rafi_1pic.jpg" style="cursor: hand; height: 320px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 279px;" /></a><br />
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Come July 31, and it is Mohammed Rafi’s death anniversary. So much is written about Rafi (1924-1980) that I don’t quite know where to begin and what new to say really. I am stumped. It should just suffice if I say that Rafi was one of the most versatile singers in the history of Hindi film music. His pan-Indian (and beyond) appeal seems to get only stronger with time. From the doleful <em>Jugnu</em> (1947) to the patriotic <em>Shaheed</em> (1948) to the classical <em>Baiju Bawra </em>(1952) to the effervescent <em>Mr. and Mrs. 55 </em>(1955) to the regal <em>Raj Hat</em>h (1956) to the poetic <em>Pyaasa</em> (1957) to the meltingly romantic <em>Barsaat Ki Ra</em>at (1960)—phew! the list is endless—Rafi sang it all. And more. <br /><br />
Equally at home on different turfs, Rafi could convincingly slip under the skin of characters that were poles apart: he sang for the brooding Dilip Kumar in <em>Deedar</em> (1951) with the same ease with which he lent his voice to a frolicking Johnny Walker in <em>C.I.D.</em> (1956). And, truly, it is difficult for the listener to decide where Rafi excels more. <br />
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In his earlier years, before he had fully come into his own, Rafi sang for Ghulam Mohammed (Naushad’s protégé) a lovely duet with Lata in <em>Pardes</em> (1950), called “Akhiyaan milaake zara baat karo jee,” a song to which I am very partial for two reasons: Madhubala’s striking beauty, and Rafi’s deep, powerful rendering that is reminiscent of Pankaj Mullick, not to mention a very young Lata’s exquisitely honeyed voice. <br />
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In the lines of the second stanza, “Dil ke khazaaney koyi aaya hai lutaney aji din hain suhaney chaley aao naa,” Rafi’s inflection has a strong, decisive tinge of Mullick’s style of singing; it is one of those nuances that just cannot be overlooked. I have not heard such likeness to the Bangla maestro in any of Rafi’s other songs. (Of course, there are many Rafi songs—his earlier ones, especially—that I have not heard; so there might easily be other instances as well.) <br />
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Moreover, for various reasons, some songs are not as well known as they deserve to be (one does not find these in the typical compilations), and this particular Rafi-Lata duet is a prime example. (By the same logic—or lack of—Ghulam Mohammed was one of those vastly—and most unfairly—underrated composers.) Here is the song, on Rahman and Madhubala: Song 1:<br />
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As the decade of the 1950s unfolded, Rafi’s own distinct style—with its almost nonchalant attitude to the vagaries of life—firmly stuck roots. This is the quintessential Rafi, and nowhere is this more apparent than in the “Le chala jidhar ye dil nikal padey” number from <em>Miss Bombay </em>(1957), picturized on Ajit (much before he turned villain for the screen). <br />
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Bombay—that teeming metropolis, teeming then in the 1950s just as it is teeming today—the land of opportunities—was masterfully captured by lyricist Prem Dhawan to composer Hansraj Behl’s tune that is born for the harmonica. (Its more famous precursor that spoke of urban vicissitudes, also tailor-made for the harmonica, is, of course, “Ay dil hai mushkil jeena yahaan” from <em>C.I.D.</em> in 1956.) Here is Rafi in <em>Miss Bombay</em>: Song 2:<br />
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I am going to end this piece with “Dil ki tamanna thi masti mein,” a hit song from <em>Gyaara hazaar ladkiyaan </em>(1962), a film that is, nevertheless, not easy to come by. Rafi and Asha Bhonsle sing for Bharat Bhushan and Mala Sinha, under the music direction of N. Dutta (another underrated composer). On a personal note, this is one of my mother’s favorite songs—it takes her back to her college days, when she and her friends would attend matinee shows, spellbound by their favorite heroes. And, of course, they would also get the latest fashion tips from the reigning screen queens of the day, whose sari styles or hair buns they would imitate. That nostalgia has badly rubbed off on me, too; it just underscores the cross-generational appeal that Rafi’s songs have. So here is going back to another era: Song 3:<br />
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<object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/mgsPCjE5ZpA&hl=en&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/mgsPCjE5ZpA&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-24941709013659057702009-07-17T13:48:00.000-07:002012-09-23T00:17:14.390-07:00The enduring power of certain old Hindi film songs<em>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on July 15, 2009.</em><br />
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<a href="http://www.downmelodylane.com/rcboral_files/rcboral.jpg"><img alt="Raichand Boral" border="0" src="http://www.downmelodylane.com/rcboral_files/rcboral.jpg" style="cursor: hand; height: 239px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 5px; width: 198px;" /></a><br />
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Of all the Raichand Boral (1903-1981) songs I have listened to—not that many, given how rare these songs are—my favorite has to be Binota Roy’s rendering of “Manwa kaahey phir tadpaayey” from Calcutta-based New Theatres’ <em>Wapas</em> (1943). The world of old Hindi films is full of so many beautiful songs that make it very difficult, if not plain impossible, to pick out favorites. Moreover, selecting favorites is purely an exercise in subjectivity and, indeed, self-expression; what appeals to me may not appeal to another. <br />
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To put it in a different way, I have noticed that certain songs have this unfailing power to make me feel completely in tune with myself, irrespective of when and where I listen to them, irrespective of my circumstances in life, irrespective of everything—and “Manwa kaahey phir tadpaayey,” with its charming Bangla intonation, simply has to be one of those songs. Here it is: Song 1:<br />
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<object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/Qx72QqNPHBM&hl=en&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/Qx72QqNPHBM&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br />
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I place these melodies in a category that I call “instant elevation.” My “instant elevation” songs are what I turn to when I feel weary of life, when I feel uninspired and lost, when I desperately need perspective, and even when I am a bit too smug for my own good. And I have never been let down. For this, I am extremely grateful—it is the one comforting thing in a world of here-today-gone-tomorrow. I hope I never lose this capacity to draw joy from this little well of mine. <br />
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The first time I heard this R. C. Boral composition, I was in standard X, feverishly mugging the “21 sets” preparation material (is it still around?) for the Maharashtra State Board exams. After every hour of mugging, I would reward myself with one “instant elevation” song, and then, inspired, return to mugging. Nearly two decades down the line, this literal interspersing of “instant elevation” songs with life’s many duties continues.<br />
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I also remember my habit (I still do it, much to the exasperation of my poor husband) of recording a single song repeatedly onto a whole side of an audiotape, sometimes even both sides, and listening to it non-stop. My one-song tapes would draw an irritated remark from my grandmother, “Why is the same song playing over and over again?” <br />
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Other culprits in the one-song tapes were, to name a few: Lata’s famous “Tum na jaaney kis jahaan mein kho gayey” from <em>Sazaa</em> (1951), composed by S. D. Burman; two Khemchand Prakash ditties from <em>Ziddi</em> (1948)—Lata’s lively “Chanda rey jaa rey jaa rey” and the delightful Lata-Kishore duet, “Yeh kaun aayaa”—the latter sounding very Pankaj Mullickesque; and M. S. Subbulakshmi’s “Main Haricharanan ki daasi” from her Hindi version of <em>Meera</em> (1947), composed by S.V. Venkatraman. (Incidentally, Binota Roy’s “Manwa kaahey phir tadpaayey” reminds me, in some subtle way, of M.S.’s songs in <em>Meera</em>—it could be the style of singing, the orchestration, the heartwrenching melody; I am unable to pinpoint it. It is just one of those things that strike me afresh every time I listen to it.)<br />
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I also have another name for my “instant elevation” songs: instant levelers. They elevate, and, by the same token, they level: during moments of hubris, when I revel in self-importance, nothing is more humbling than the majesty of my favorite music.<br />
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The years come and go, people come and go; even memories fade. As they say, nothing’s forever. But I find I am able to hold on to the beauty of a R. C. Boral song. On that note, I will leave you with (the quite literally not-to-be-forgotten) “Bhool na jaana aaj ki baaten” melody from <em>Wapas</em>, sung by actor-singer Ashit Baran, and Binota Roy. Here goes: Song 2:<br />
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<object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/GP-MKys3-iE&hl=en&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/GP-MKys3-iE&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-3337746609267581122009-07-17T13:26:00.000-07:002012-09-23T00:17:36.674-07:00A page from Indian film history: The Court Dancer (1941)<em>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on June 21, 2009.</em><br />
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1941: World War II was raging on in Europe and, back home in India, Tagore passed away. The year also saw the first trilingual production of an Indian film—Wadia Movietone’s <em>The Court Dancer</em> or <em>Raj Nartaki</em>, directed by Modhu Bose (1900-1969), which was released in English, Hindi, and Bengali. According to the film credits, <em>The Court Dancer</em> was “the first Indian film with dialogue in English to be entirely produced in India with an all-Indian personnel.” <br />
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Once, in the late 1980s, Doordarshan broadcast the English version of <em>The Court Dancer</em> in the late-night slot. (Unfortunately, old classics are typically relegated to the hours of slumber.) After finishing my school homework well in advance, I was up that night with my video recorder to capture this momentous piece of Indian film history. I was very curious to hear the cast speak English, especially given that the film was set in early 19th century Manipur. <br />
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After many years, I recently revisited my videotape of the film, this time to digitize it, to make it last forever. And here, I will have to necessarily digress a bit. In the last few months, I have had to wade through unknown waters. (I am still wading.) <br />
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As someone with zero technical knowledge, I have been faced with many questions: sitting here in America, where the NTSC format prevails, how do I digitize my Indian VHS tapes (PAL format) so that they will work universally? What multi-system VCR must I invest in? What kind of a converter box will I need? How do I go about all this without getting ripped off? After being assailed by umpteen other such doubts, and after long months of research, I finally figured out what exactly I need and, hey, the process of digitization has finally begun. <br />
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Now I have moved on to the next stage: I am immersed in researching the world of media storage! So what is the best way to store these newly digitized films? Should I copy them onto DVDs with their painfully small storage space, in which case, am I to split each film into two or three DVDs, and add to the clutter of my tiny apartment? Or should I copy them onto Western Digital-manufactured passport drives that come in terabytes, where a one-terabyte passport drive can, amazingly, store up to 666 hours of material? Just the other day, I learned about the My Book external hard drive that can even be plugged into the television. <br />
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More than anything else, I am terrified of losing these priceless films, so what about backups? I am still deciphering all this and more. End of digression. <br />
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So, getting back to <em>The Court Dancer </em>(which is still sitting on my computer hard drive while I decide where to store it permanently), the film tells the tale of doomed love between a courtesan and a prince—as such alliances are usually doomed to be. (For starters, think of the unsanctioned love of Anarkali and Prince Salim.) Based on a Bengali play by dramatist Manmath Ray (1899-1988), the film starred the legendary Prithviraj Kapoor (1906-1972), one of the doyens of Indian cinema, as Prince Chandrakirti (Jyoti Prakash replaced Kapoor in the Bengali version); and the accomplished Sadhona Bose (1914-1973), an exponent of both Kathak and Manipuri dance forms, in the role of the court dancer Indrani. (Interestingly, Sadhona Bose, the wife of director Modhu Bose, was the granddaughter of Keshab Chandra Sen, the Brahmo social reformer, 1838-1884. Sadly, in her later years, she was reduced to begging in the streets of Calcutta.)<br />
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Here is a brief write-up of the film, with excerpts.<br />
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In keeping with the Vaishnava tradition of 19th century Manipur, the film opens with a musical celebration of Lord Krishna’s love for Radha, in the court dancer Indrani’s garden. It is the night of the full moon and, to the accompaniment of Timir Baran’s music that sounds appropriately regal, the viewer is introduced to His Highness Prince Chandrakirti as he grandly enters the garden of his beloved. As his eyes eagerly look for Indrani, the camera follows suit and pans to a striking Sadhona Bose. Indrani and Chandrakirti are swathed in their love for each other. Thus begins a story of human love that is intertwined with divine love, in the background of the Raas Leela. Watch the beginning of the film, with an introduction from Doordarshan: <br />
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Soon the strains of “Jai madhava mukunda murari” herald the arrival of the High Priest Kashishwar Goswami and his followers in the grove. Indrani, with sincere devotion, performs the Raas Leela with her group (choreographed by Bose herself), which touches the heart of Kashishwar who tells her, “I have never seen such devotion before, my child”. He is about to offer her “the most valuable treasure of the Vaishnava,” which is the “sacred dust from Lord Chaitanya’s feet,” when Chandrakirti’s father, King Jaisingh, arrives at that critical moment and shouts to Kashishwar that Indrani is a court dancer. Kashishwar recoils in horror. Chandrakirti looks on helplessly as Indrani is reminded of her stigma, her fate—something that will happen over and over again as the story unfolds. Indrani is a courtesan with the proverbial heart of gold—or should we say purity, of selfless love, for her prince as well as for Lord Krishna. But this is not recognized by society: how can a nautch girl have any stake in spiritual matters, let alone dream of marrying a prince? Watch the Raas Leela, and Kashishwar recoiling from the court dancer:<br />
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Later, Indrani is turned away from the royal temple, where she goes to offer worship. And then a melody wafts through the air as these words fill the screen: “The tortured soul of Indrani found solace in a broken temple whose keeper was a singing hermit.” Comforted by the kind hermit, she offers her prayers in this dilapidated, desolate temple on top of a hill and regains her peace. <br />
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King Jaisingh is, meanwhile, busy forming a marriage alliance for his son with the princess of neighboring Tripura. Since Manipur and Tripura are not on good terms, binding the two kingdoms in wedlock seems strategic: as Tripura’s envoy informs King Jaisingh, if this alliance is not finalized soon, Tripura will invade Manipur. “To keep the envoy in good humor,” the king orders Indrani to perform in the court, and this is followed by the envoy’s announcement of the to-be royal wedding. A shining crescent moon, glittering stars, and a flower garland are all momentarily transposed onto Indrani’s fingers during the dance sequence: the imagery has stuck in my mind. Watch the dance sequence and Indrani’s reaction:<br />
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As a dejected Indrani returns to the temple on the hill, Chandrakirti rushes there to vow before the idol that he loves only her and will not marry anyone else. Later, at Indrani’s house, a furious King Jaisingh arrives and orders his son to leave the place at once. Watch the father-son encounter:<br />
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Not caring for the disastrous consequences of breaking a marriage alliance with Tripura, Chandrakirti tells Indrani that he will come at dawn and take her to the faraway Shyamsunder temple where they will get married. Indrani is ecstatic. The disturbed king, sensing trouble from his son, confides in Kashishwar, who, in the interests of Manipur, decides to talk Indrani out of marrying the prince. He finds Indrani in the broken temple; she has gone there, one last time, in the middle of the night, to thank the lord. <br />
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Kashishwar successfully dissuades Indrani from her goal of marrying the prince by painting a picture of doomsday to her: the people will never accept her as the queen, the army will rise in revolt, Tripura will invade, Manipur will be destroyed, and Chandrakirti will certainly perish. He reminds her of her duty to her country, to her religion, and most importantly, to her prince: if she really loves him, she will give him up for his own sake, for his own life. A broken Indrani collapses to the ground. Kashishwar walks away relieved, although sad for Indrani. <br />
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When the prince comes to take away Indrani at dawn, she feigns rudeness. When Chandrakirti tells her that he has given up his right to the throne so that they can live together happily, Indrani spurns his love—a love “without the pomp and grandeur of palaces.” A disbelieving prince concedes, “Oh, a court dancer after all” and stomps out. Indrani is shattered. Watch the Indrani-Chandrakirti encounter:<br />
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The royal wedding is announced for the next day, an auspicious occasion when Kashishwar will distribute the “sacred dust of Lord Chaitanya’s feet” to all devotees. Indrani is ordered to dance on the festive occasion, which she does, but faints towards the end. Considering this an ill omen, the king contemplates postponing the marriage. Meanwhile, the people of Manipur are clamoring for the sacred dust from Kashishwar, who is suddenly not to be found, much to the consternation of the king and the people. <br />
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Touched by Indrani’s selflessness and duty towards her country, Kashishwar has gone to Indrani’s house to give her the sacred dust, which he had once denied her. Meanwhile, the captain of the guards arrives at Indrani’s house to escort Kashishwar back to the palace to distribute the sacred dust. Kashishwar sternly replies that the people must come to Indrani, who will dispense the sacred dust with her own hands. As the horrified captain leaves, Kashishwar gently tells the surprised Indrani that he knows of nobody more deserving of the sacred dust than Indrani herself and begs her to accept it. <br />
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Meanwhile, the captain spreads rumors among the people that Indrani is a witch, for she has even trapped a holy man. As an angry mob marches to Indrani’s house to kill her, a faithful maid runs to the prince to ask him to go save Indrani and tells him of her sacrifice; Kashishwar also confesses to the prince his role in Indrani’s pretence. As the prince rushes to save Indrani from the mob, she spots her finger ring containing poison and quietly swallows the powder. She dies in his arms. Watch the last scenes: <br />
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A conclusory note: <em>The Court Dancer </em>is a simple love story, told simply and effectively. Some may consider the acting to be exaggerated, but that is in keeping with the theatrical style of acting common in those days. After all, many of the early legends of Indian cinema started out in theatre—Prithviraj Kapoor notably. Timir Baran’s music brilliantly recreates royal Manipur and conveys the soulful devotion of the Vaishnava poets. At 80 minutes in duration, <em>The Court Dancer </em>is a short film by Indian film standards.Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-26705429363330126092009-07-17T13:10:00.000-07:002012-09-23T20:31:00.762-07:00David Lean’s Hobson’s Choice (1954)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<em>This post first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on June 10, 2009.</em> <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Laughton as Hobson</td></tr>
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There lived in England, between 1545 and 1631, a man named Hobson who owned a horse-rental business. He was quirky in that in he would rent out horses only according to his choice. It was, quite literally, Hobson’s choice for his customer who could either ride away in the horse that was offered or not ride at all. By the end of the film, David Lean’s Hobson’s Choice (1954) turns out to be exactly that—an instance of Hobson’s choice—for the portly Henry Hobson (played by Charles Laughton, 1899-1962), who has no say anymore, neither at home nor in his business. The film comes a full circle with the authoritarian, although bumbling, Hobson of the early frames firmly cut down to size.<br />
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Hobson, a bootmaker in 1880s Salford, Northern England, has three chief pursuits: bullying his three daughters, bullying his shop employees, and drinking at his favorite Moonrakers inn. The daughters are unmarried and stuck at home because their father is not willing to give them settlements—the settlement being a woman’s passport to a good marriage in Victorian society. The employees in his boot shop are also stuck in their dead-end jobs, given the class system of the times. Hobson unfairly calls his daughters the “rebellious females” of his household, just as he is quick to a peeve when a rich customer praises the bootmaking genius of his star employee, the meek Willie Mossop. Hobson is used to his own supremacy, and his girth dominates the frames, literally.<br />
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Hobson’s eldest daughter, Maggie, however, has a mind of her own and is determined to liberate herself. Maggie is entrepreneurial, ambitious, and has a deadly practicality about her. To her father’s horror, she fixes a marriage-business deal for herself with the socially inferior Willie Mossop. She believes in the combination of her brains and Willie’s hands, and persuades the wide-eyed Willie too. This marriage of business and romance is an astounding success and, as the narrative unfolds, a disbelieving Hobson finds himself eating his own words. The tables turned, a bankrupt Hobson finds himself faced with a bad case of Hobson’s (read Mossop’s) choice. <br />
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Lean tells this tale of reversal in fortunes, based on Harold Brighouse’s play of 1916, in his characteristically British, understated, and imaginative way. Lean’s world here is very Victorian—late Victorian, to be specific—with the “ayes,” the cobblestone streets where marketplaces stir to life every morning, the in-fashion bustles (or “humps” as Hobson calls them mockingly) of women’s dresses, the class system—and yet, like Dickens, the other great chronicler of Victorian England, Lean tells a story that is timeless and universal in appeal.<br />
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The singular thing about this film is the ease with which it straddles different realms, and welds worlds, much like a Dickens novel. The comic and the sublime come together—as in the scene where an inebriated Hobson catches sight of a beautiful full moon in the street puddles and then proceeds to trample over all the puddles, one by one. The comic is treated poetically, and the poetic is treated comically. Each signifies the other, and, temporarily, I am reminded of another portly gentleman—Mr. Pickwick in Dickens, although, of course, Pickwick is a kind and noble soul, quite unlike the boor that is Lean’s Hobson.<br />
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Here is a humorous film (not typical for Lean) whose underlying themes are essentially heavy duty. It is the story of one woman’s determined fight against the gender and class stratification of her times. Maggie is delightfully pragmatic, and not even the sphere of romance is exempt from her pragmatism: in an early scene, an optimistic Maggie assures an awkward Willie, who is too much in awe of his employer’s daughter to see her in a romantic light, that if he cannot bring himself to love her immediately, “then we’ll get along without it”. Lean’s portrait of the romance between Maggie and Willie is at once comic and poignant, and the viewer looks on amused as Lean masterfully captures the changing subtleties of their relationship. By the end of the story, Willie fondly tells his wife, “you are growing on me”. The pragmatic gives way, quite effortlessly, to the poetic, and Lean’s genius for recording the endless variety of life is, it seems, quite inimitable. <br />
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On an aside: Around 1954, the year this film was made, which of Laughton’s contemporaries in Hindi cinema, I wonder, would have fitted the bill for the role of Hobson. Purely wishful thinking on my part, but if I could go back in time, I would cast Gope, that much-forgotten rotund comedian, the “piya” of the famous “Mere piya gaye Rangoon” song from Patanga (1949).<br />
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Image credit: <a href="http://mubi.com/films/hobsons-choice" target="_blank">mubi.com</a></div>
Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2218366369477617662.post-74960379089168061022009-07-17T12:14:00.000-07:002019-04-28T18:17:10.109-07:00Rantings of an old-movies buff<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<em>My very first post, which first appeared in the PassionForCinema blog on June 3, 2009.</em><br />
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I sit in my California apartment, happily surrounded by my old, tottering VHS tapes of Hindi films from the 1930s, 40s, and 50s. Like King Midas with his gold, I proudly survey my precious collection, which is my only tangible link to a world that is far away in both space and in time. Having just embarked on the process of digitizing my film collection, I realize, though, that I will have to fortify myself. Case in point: When my tape of Calcutta New Theatres’ film <em>Wapas</em> (1943) jumps, my heart jumps too—heavily. The pain of seeing that vintage, irreplaceable treasure in that tattered condition is no less than the pain of seeing a dearest person wasting away. In my desperation, I find myself thinking, perhaps irrationally, that I would even trade in all my jewelry just to restore <em>Wapas</em> to its glory. I am just inconsolable. I even go on a hunger strike, convincing myself that if I rebel hard enough, Wapas will somehow regain its celluloid life and come back (“wapas”) to me.<br />
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When I explain this to people, many are puzzled. The typical response goes like this: “Old movies are easily available these days. Just check out this Indian DVD store…. They stock everything. It is not worth wasting your money on all this equipment converting VHS to DVDs when you can just buy them.”<br />
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To which, I enquire eagerly but doubtfully, fervently hoping for an affirmation, hoping against hope, “Oh really, do they have <em>Buzdil</em> (1951), or how about <em>Khazanchi</em> (1941)?” The response comes, somewhat indignantly even, blatantly bypassing my query—“Of course, they have old movies. There is <em>Aradhana</em> (1969), <em>Seeta aur Geeta </em>(1972), those Rajesh Khanna-Mumtaz starrers and those 70s movies.” These are, quite often, the same people who conflate the Burmans—S.D. and R.D. Indeed, much before Kishore Kumar teamed up with R.D., he sang for S.D. the “Dekho dekhojee” duet with Lata in <em>Naujawan</em> (1951), picturized on a dapper Premnath and a chirpy Nalini Jaywant.<br />
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As the years go by, of course, it is understandable that movies from the 1970s should rise in seniority—that is the law of chronology—just as the passage of time has earned me the suffix of Nivedita aunty. (I myself am a product of the mid-70s.) But with “old” becoming increasingly equated with the 60s and 70s, what epithet must one, then, use for movies of the Silent Era, the 30s, 40s, and 50s? For a die-hard vintage-movie buff who unequivocally (and rigidly) considers “old” to be pre-1960, it is disquieting that an <em>Aradhana</em> is more easily available than a <em>Buzdil</em>.<br />
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I remember once catching the tail end of the utterly haunting “Ada se jhoomtey huey,” a Shamshad Begum-Rafi duet from <em>Sindbad the Sailor </em>(1952), on a program called Raymond (later Centura) Sargam Smriti that used to air once a week on Bombay radio in the early 1990s. I still recollect being utterly mesmerized by this Chitragupt composition and kicking myself for not having been ready with my cassette recorder. For awhile, I even went into the Sindbad phase, constantly humming the tune to myself, in a bid to keep it alive within. Much later, I found the audio of that song, but I am still dying to lay hands on the film itself, which was directed by Nanabhai Bhatt and starred Naseem Bano and Ranjan. But at least I have managed to get a glimpse of Naseem and Ranjan, thanks to a kindred spirit who has uploaded the “Ada se jhoomtey huey” song onto Youtube that is fast becoming a haven for people like me in search of old treasures.<br />
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But the question remains: Why are our old films doomed to anonymity, to sheer atrophy in cinematic memory? Why should getting hold of a P.C. Barua film of 1936 (I refer to New Theatres’ <em>Manzil</em> that was co-written by the legendary Saratchandra Chatterjee, with music by two stalwarts, R.C. Boral and Pankaj Mullick) be so difficult, if not downright impossible? Surely the old classics deserve to be better remembered, better documented, and better exhibited.</div>
Nivedita Ramakrishnanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15824244311431900215noreply@blogger.com6