Welcome to a seven-part series on the History Of Hindi Cinema. Through individual films and the larger oeuvres of some Hindi filmmakers, we’ll explore the highlights of 70 years of cinema, starting with 1950, just three years after India won its independence from British rule, and ending in the 2010s.
In the 1960s, socially conscious filmmaking began to wane in India, and commercial masala films began to rise. By 1969, Technicolor was the norm and films made in black and white often didn’t succeed at the box office, so thrilled were audiences to finally see their heroes and heroines in full, glorious color. Simultaneously, now that India was approaching 20 years since independence, leftist writers’ and directors’ hopes for a better India, conveyed through their films, began to decline. By the time the 1970s rolled around, socialist principles and neorealist filmmaking had been replaced by full-throated anger and violence in Hindi cinema. Nonetheless, the 1960s is considered part of the industry’s Golden Age for a reason. The films below are largely why.
Bimal Roy’s masterpiece: Bandini (1963)
The Hindi word “bandini” is a noun. Its gender is female. The word means “one who is trapped, bound.” The Bandini in question is Kalyani (Nutan Behl). “Kalyan” means welfare. A “kalyani” is one who performs the welfare of others. Kalyani does just this, in the prison where she is an inmate in the early 1930s. A fellow inmate is suffering from tuberculosis and needs around-the-clock care. Kalyani volunteers to nurse her. Hospital doctor Devendra (Dharmendra) is impressed by her selflessness, given the infectious nature of the disease, and accepts her help. He falls in love with Kalyani and seeks to marry her—she might be freed soon for good behavior—but Kalyani declines, saying she doesn’t want her sinful past to blemish his good name. The sin in question is murder. No one in the prison seems to know much about her case’s specifics. All Kalyani says is that she is guilty.
When kind jailer Mahesh Chandra (Tarun Bose), who believes in rehabilitation, asks why she is declining Dr. Devendra’s proposal, Kalyani describes the death of her mother when she was a child, and the death of her loving older brother, of whom their father was very proud for organizing a group that traveled around improving the material conditions of the poor. While assisting villagers in the aftermath of a flood, her brother died. Before she can continue, Kalyani collapses into heaving sobs. Mahesh doesn’t push the matter; instead he asks her to write down the rest.
In the average Hindi film that uses an extended flashback as a narrative device, the remembrance starts from anywhere between the 10 and 25-minute mark. Bimal Roy and his ace cinematographer Kamal Bose wait until 51 minutes in to tell the first half of Kalyani’s life story. The daughter of a postmaster (Raja Paranjpe), she spent her days reading and walking with her friends. The absence of her brother is palpable, and in passing Kalyani’s father says that his son abandoned him for the welfare of others. The arrival of Bikash Ghosh (Ashok Kumar), a freedom fighter held as a prisoner by the government, has people fearing for their lives. For a woman who leads a simple, repressed life where no one gets to process pain or express joy, Kalyani is immediately attracted to Bikash’s laugh, for he laughs with abandon, with an openness she does not know.
Kalyani’s innocent flirtation with Bikash is portrayed by two songs steeped in Hindu symbolism. The first, “Jogi Jabse Tu Aaya” (“Since you arrived, o wanderer”), written by Shailendra, introduces the motif that Bikash is Lord Krishna, a famously handsome and mischievous god, and Kalyani is Radha, his eternal love:
The second continues this theme, but is preceded by an excerpt of Vaishnav poetry in which Radha sneaks out in the middle of the night to visit Krishna. But her fair face was still visible. She called out to the gods, praying that they take her fairness and give her the color of Shyam (another name for Krishna, who is said to have had blue skin that was almost black), so that she may conceal herself in the night. “Mora Gora Ang Lai Le” (“Take away my fair skin”), sung with transcendent beauty by Lata Mangeshkar and scored by Sachin Dev Burman, is the first ever-contribution to Hindi songs by legendary poet, lyricist, director, and screenwriter Gulzar.
The song’s production history adds to its treasured place in Hindi cinema. Gulzar, who was already working on Bandini as an assistant director, did not wish to write Hindi film songs, but was talked into the job by Burman. Then, a debate broke out over the song’s picturization. Roy believed the song should be set indoors, but Burman held that a girl like Kalyani would never voice such thoughts inside where her father could hear. The two fought, with Gulzar simply sitting behind them, waiting for his instructions. Roy stormed out, insisting that the poet set the song indoors. Once he was gone, Burman turned and said, “Set it outside.”
Bikash spends the night at Kalyani’s home while suffering from a fever. The next morning, angry cops accuse him of licentious behavior. Bikash says he won’t tolerate his wife being spoken about this way. There is, after all, no other way out of this if Kalyani’s honor is to be protected. Stunned, but assured by Bikash that his intentions toward his daughter are noble, the postmaster thinks it over, and allows Kalyani to be betrothed to Bikash. Again, her choices are taken away from her
Bikash leaves, promising to write but doesn’t. To protect her father from harassment by villagers, she finds work as a servant in a nursing home. She is assigned to be the personal servant to an angry, manic, and abusive woman. Kalyani is never rude in return. But she learns of her father’s death on the same day that she learns of her patient’s identity. She snaps. The scene in which she poisons her patient’s tea is a cacophonous symphony of industrial sound: As Kalyani walks toward the poison, construction workers in the background, welding and hammering, create a visual and audio illustration of her brain short-circuiting. Sparks pour from their tools, a high-pitched tone pierces the night, a hammer slams incessantly. Nutan’s expressions, ranging from dry-eyed numbness upon seeing her father’s corpse, to burning rage as she prepares the poisoned tea, to shocked madness as she realizes what she has done, are terrifying. Ingmar Bergman and Sven Nykvist could not have done better.
No film on this list is more important than Bandini. Every song is a classic. Every performance is a career-best turn. It’s edited with military precision, not a single frame is superfluous. Its scene composition achieves a deliberate symmetry that Hindi film directors haven’t bothered with in well over 30 years. Every shot is clearly planned in advance: every line, every shadow falling perfectly in place. Throughout the film Kalyani is shown with shadows from bars falling across her face and body. She doesn’t need a prison to feel confined; her very mind is jailed. The wide shots of Kalyani and other prisoners position them as lone figures, enormous walls dividing them from the world at large. Even when a prisoner sings of the coming spring, she admires a bird and a flowering tree through the bars of her window.
The song, “O Panchhi Pyare” (“O dear bird”), written by Shailendra, reflects a prisoner’s longing for freedom, but also Dr. Devendra’s attraction to Kalyani, and the impossibility of their union. “Mai to panchhi / pinjare ki myna / pankh mere bekaar / Beech hamaare / saath re saagar / Kaise chalun us paar,” which means “I am a bird / a caged starling / my wings useless / Between us / are seven oceans / how can I travel to the other side?” It’s also one of the earliest songs that blends in the daily sounds of the prisoners’ lives, their flour grinders and threshers providing happy thumps that echo throughout:
It’s impossible to fully explain the impact of classical Hindi music on film songs, but “Ab Ke Baras Bhej” (“This year send my brother”) is a good starting point. Written in Raga Pilu—ragas are a musical framework with different moods, certain specific notes, and rhythms, but invite improvisation, quite like keys in jazz—the song is traditionally meant to invoke the loneliness of a newly married woman, longing for her childhood home. The lonely bride begs her parents to send her brother, so he may accompany her home for a visit. Shailendra’s genius weaves in Kalyani’s story too: “Bairan jawani ne chine khilone / Aur meri gudiya churaayi / Babul thi main tere nazon ki paali / Phir kyon hui main paraayi,” which, heartbreakingly, means “Youth, my enemy, snatched my toys / and stole my doll / Father, I was raised with love by you / then why have I become a stranger.”
Bandini raises many questions. Which of our decisions are truly our own? What is the purpose of prison aside from further dehumanization? What do we unleash when we react to each other with judgment and hate, instead of empathy and respect? The film’s most significant debate is the nature of selfishness and selflessness, exemplified by the freedom fighter imprisoned in the men’s prison near Kalyani’s. As he is escorted to the noose, his mother and a small child silently weep at the gates of the prison. But the prisoner isn’t crying. He smiles, and sings:
Written by Shailendra, the song is one of the finest in Indian (not just Hindi) film history, because its context—fighting British colonists—transcends the nation’s many differences. Kicking out the English was something everything had in common, even if they ate different foods and spoke different languages. It is an anthem to fighting oppression, for happily giving your life to a cause bigger than yourself, for the betterment of all.
The joyful revolutionary is not wrong; his motherland does indeed have many sons, and daughters, who gave their lives for the sovereignty of their country. But the crying woman at the jail gates only has one son, and he is about to die. Is it selfish of him to leave behind his family in service of fighting colonial oppression, or is it selfless to place the freedom of his people over the needs of his family? Was Kalyani’s brother selfish or selfless? Can any of Kalyani’s decisions be her own? Do we have the right to judge her, given how, at each turn, her rights have been ripped from her?
Bandini doesn’t offer any answers, staying with you long after the end titles roll, tormenting you, calling to you.
The blockbuster that changed everything: Waqt (Time) (1965)
Director Yash Chopra’s monster hit Waqt isn’t on this list because it’s a great, or even good, movie. Waqt is here because the formula it introduced is the dominant mode of Hindi language filmmaking even today. And because this formula has been in use for so long, it is now stale, and almost never invites reinvention. Perhaps Chopra shouldn’t be held responsible for the laziness of the writers and directors who came after him. But it’s not as though Waqt has a particularly new or unique plot to begin with, and the credit for the film’s writing belongs to “B.R. Films Story Department.”
Lala Kedarnath Prasanta (Balraj Sahni) is a prosperous merchant, blissfully in love with his wife Laxmi (Achala Sachdev), and proud father to three boys. An astrologer warns Kedarnath to not plan too proudly for the future, as time is unpredictable. Kedarnath is reliably unheeding of the warning. Pride goeth before a fall; in this case, the ceilings and walls of the family home cave in during an earthquake, which separates the family. Oldest son Raju winds up in an abusive orphanage, middle son Ravi is adopted by wealthy strangers who find him alone, and the youngest, Vijay, an infant, manages to stay with his mother. Kedarnath is alone.
Many years later, Raju is now renamed Raja (Raaj Kumar), working as a full-time criminal for his adoptive father Chinnoy (Rehman). Ravi (Sunil Dutt) is a barrister and in love with Meena (Sadhana), whose father (Manmohan Krishna) is a business associate of Chinnoy. Ravi’s foster sister Renu (Sharmila Tagore) is in love with Chinnoy’s driver Vijay (Shashi Kapoor), who, despite being an accomplished college graduate, can’t find work but must pay his ailing mother Laxmi’s medical bills. Kedarnath wanders the streets of Mumbai, orbiting his family but never meeting them, working menial jobs for little money. Got all that?
This type of filmmaking is popular and makes boatloads of cash, but reduces everything to a soap opera. That’s something Hindi cinema needs less of. At least Dutt enjoys hamming it up as a happy-go-lucky solicitor-in-training, cracking jokes a mile a minute, quite a reprieve from his usual dramatic work. Kumar gets in a few famous one-liners (speaking to a henchman colleague, he snarls, “This [a switchblade] isn’t for children. If it touches you, it bleeds you”). Oh, and his character is also in love with Meena. Raja is about to murder his romantic rival when he realizes, due to a childhood photo on the nightstand, that he and Ravi are brothers, and decides to reform (most of) his ways.
A family torn asunder that finds each other again is a stalwart concept in Hindi films; part of its success is due to the inclusion of religion as a plot point. That is, if you are truly good, and pray sincerely to the almighty, god/the screenwriter will allow you to reunite with your long-lost family. (At least a dozen other films in the 1960s and 1970s follow this exact narrative roadmap.) Another idea pioneered to scale by Waqt includes its ensemble cast. The film’s immense success suggested that a cast of stars would fill the seats, story be damned. Willful suspension of disbelief, a common requirement to watch Hindi cinema dating back to the origins of the industry, became more solidified as part a film’s resolution when Raaj tells an emotional Kedarnath, who has just reunited with Laxmi and Vijay in court, that he and Ravi, conveniently standing right next to them, are his other missing sons. No documents or proof needed; a long-suffering father will just take a complete stranger’s word for it.
Is it so bad to long for such a fantasy? Maybe not. Maybe moderate doses of escapism are good, even healthy. But there was nothing moderate about the audience’s response to Waqt, nor filmmakers’ eagerness to replicate this formula. It won five Filmfare Awards; its fashion trends were noted and copied; its impact has outlasted far better films. It has led directly to the homogenization of Hindi cinema, and while that is an important quality to note, it has hampered far more interesting films from getting the same attention.
Guru Dutt and Meena Kumari’s masterpiece: Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam (The Master, The Wife, And The Slave) (1962)
Hindu gods and goddesses have multiple names. Some are nicknames used by their lovers in mythological stories, others are bestowed by their divine parents, and some are even phrases. Bhootnath is an alternate name for Lord Shiva; it means “lord of phantoms.” No nickname is more apt for Guru Dutt’s character in Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam, adapted by Bimal Mitra from his novel of the same name. As an archaeologist working at the site of a ruined haveli (mansion), a home he knows well, Bhootnath, in the opening scenes of the film, is haunted, digging through the debris of his past employers’ lives. He climbs the decrepit stairs to a chamber now open to the sky and remembers.
A young, naïve arrival from the village, Bhootnath finds lodging in Kolkata with, and employment through, a relative who works at the palatial home of the zamindar (landlord) Choudhury brothers, who live in lavish comfort. The brothers—Chhote Babu (Little Sir, played by Rehman) and Majhle Babu (Middle Sir, played by D.K. Sapru)—pay little attention to their business, which runs due to the diligence of various accountants and managers, and instead spend their daylight hours asleep, while patronizing courtesans and drinking by night. The only person struggling within this system is Chhoti Bahu (Little Daughter-in-Law, Meena Kumari), who comes from a poor family that taught her what many girls are taught even today: the sole responsibility of a woman is to be a slave to her husband’s needs and wants. Not only does Chhoti Bahu fervently believe in this maxim, she desperately wants to live it but cannot; her husband is barely aware of her existence. When she hears that Bhootnath works in the office of the Mohini Sindoor Company—makers of the vermilion powder with which married Hindu women mark the part of their hair—Chhoti Bahu summons him to her chamber to request a jar, hoping beyond the hope that the advertising copy of the sindoor, which promises to entrance men, will work on her husband too.
The scene in which Chhoti Bahu’s face is revealed is pure movie magic. At first all we see are her feet, because we share Bhootnath’s nervous gaze; it’s clear from her voice that she is kind, warm, and lonely. When he meets her eyes, he is stunned. So are we. Of all the actresses on this list, a select few are goddesses, and Meena Kumari is one. Her perfect oval face contains countless emotions, but as Chhoti Bahu she, at first, reveals little, masking her inner pain and isolation with an immaculate smile. When she bites her lip, the camera itself trembles, registering the repressed desires of a woman who, by the very act of confiding in an unrelated male, is committing a serious transgression. Still, she trusts Bhootnath’s discretion, and the two begin something resembling a friendship.
Complicating Bhootnath’s life is the presence of another woman, his boss’ daughter Jabba (Waheeda Rehman), who, unlike all the other women in the film, is educated. She helps her father run his business, doesn’t define herself in relation to men, and is comfortable speaking her mind. The film very pointedly makes her father a part of a progressive Hindu sect called the Brahmo Samaj, in order to explain Subinay’s treatment of his daughter not as a fragile doll to be dispensed with via marriage, but as a human being in her own right. She and Bhootnath share a tense dynamic, mostly because the latter has never met a woman like her, and she is annoyed by his lack of self-possession. Dutt and Rehman carried on a real-life affair for years which adds dimension to their interactions; their onscreen romance burns slowly but steadily, until both realize just how much the other means to them.
Of course, Chhoti Bahu’s sindoor doesn’t work, and in profound anguish she begs for the chance to serve her husband. Chhote Babu laughs, saying that service to him would include singing (not prayers, but songs “soaked in merriment”), dancing, and drinking. Chhoti Bahu is shocked. This request is in direct violation of everything she holds dear. But if she cannot please her husband, then what is her life worth? The only person she can ask for a bottle of liquor is Bhootnath, whose initial horror melts when Chhoti Bahu begs.
She begins to drink, and never stops. A particularly powerful scene mirrors the fight above, but this time the genders are reversed: a drunk Chhoti Bahu confronts her husband. She became an addict just to keep his attention, but he still has the gall to leave and enjoy brothels. “What am I supposed to do?” she asks. Her husband, an unempathetic troglodyte of the highest order, says, “What all the other wealthy wives do. Have jewelry made and take naps.” The laugh that erupts from Kumari’s throat is not of this earth. It is almost a guttural shriek, rich in indignation. A shared addiction has made Chhoti Bahu realize the futility of her sincere efforts. “How can you compare me to other wives? I am different from the others. Has any other wife ever made such a sacrifice? Has anyone ever been the daughter-in-law of a grand family and drunk alcohol? …Do I have what they have? Do I have someone to call me mother?” Chhote Babu calls her mad, and she collapses to the floor, wailing, her heart in smithereens.
Kaagaz Ke Phool deftly illustrated the impossibility of Dutt’s relationship with his co-star Rehman, and predicted Dutt’s future and that of the film industry; Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam explores with stinging detail what alcoholism was likely doing to Kumari offscreen. This, combined with the fact that she experienced domestic violence in her marriage to producer-director Kamal Amrohi, gives Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam more than a passing resemblance to her own life. Dutt himself struggled with substance abuse; one must wonder what it was like to shoot a scene in which one alcoholic begs another not to drink. Dutt took his own life at 39, and Kumari died of liver cirrhosis at 37.
Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam engages with a multitude of themes common to the films in this list: the nature of time (a servant frequently issues loud declarations about how nothing lasts forever); the fight for independence against British colonists (the film’s flashback is set in the late 19th century, and Bhootnath’s relative aids freedom fighters in secret); the shameless, limitless decadence of the zamindar class that orchestrated its own downfall. But perhaps its most interesting theme is its examination of the Indian woman. Three forms are represented in the film: the poor uneducated girl who marries into wealth and is expected to produce children, but has no real rights; the outspoken educated daughter of a progressive middle-class father, unafraid to make her own choices; and the courtesan who possesses freedom, but is presumably frowned upon and shunned by everyone who isn’t a patron.
There are repeated visual representations of the differences between the women: Jabba’s hair often flows freely; her adornment is limited to lace trimmed, full-sleeve sari blouses and cameo brooches; she gleefully composes a cheeky song about a foolish bumblebee, clearly referencing Bhootnath, who is listening in silent anger; she is almost always shown in airy environments, with easy access to the outdoors, natural light, and living space she appears to have decorated for herself. Chhoti Bahu, although bedecked in rich saris made of raw silk and draped in precious gems, is never seen outside the walls of the haveli. Her chambers are dark, the oily wood furniture almost dwarfing her, with no visible windows, heavy tapestries further accenting the emotional claustrophobia. As time goes on and her addiction worsens, so does her careful appearance. Femininity exists in a binary in the world of the zamindars. There’s the kind that’s hidden and isn’t celebrated, is barely even important, but still present, and the other that’s a beacon for male minds dulled by marriage. Both are subject to leering gazes.
After the catastrophic financial and critical failure of Kaagaz Ke Phool, Dutt never officially directed a film again, limiting himself to acting and producing. That didn’t stop audiences and critics from wondering whether Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam, which bears all the Dutt hallmarks of a socially aware tragedy, may have been ghost-directed by him. According to the film’s director Abrar Alvi, however, Dutt directed only the movie’s songs, and never tried to take credit away from Alvi.
Like any project Dutt was involved with, though, the intricate writing of Sahib Bibi Aur Gulam serves as a larger metaphor for the state of Indian society. Jabba’s femininity, the film proposes, is the way forward, while the influence of zamindars in social life was bound to die out. But lyricist Shakeel Badayuni gets the last word, during “Sakhiya Aaj Mujhe Neend Nahin,” which hints at the unsustainable inhumanity of unlimited wealth and unbridled patriarchal cruelty:
“Kiski duniya yahan tabaha nahi / kaun hai jiske labh par aah nahi” which means “Whose world here is not destroyed? / Who here does not have pain on their lips?”
The proto-horror of Bees Saal Baad (20 Years Later) (1962)
Director Biren Nag only made two films before he died in 1964. But what informed his filmmaking was his career as an art director; he served in the role on some of the best films of the 1960s, including Chaudhvin Ka Chand and Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam. Given the richness of his previous work, it comes as a surprise that Bees Saal Baad is one of the most minimalist Hindi films ever made, taking place almost entirely in the dark.
Inside what looks like a rural haveli, a dead body is dragged offscreen by someone wearing two-tone patent leather shoes. Twenty years later, Kumar (Biswajeet, in his debut performance), the grandson of the family, returns to the same mansion, but we never really learn why. It was his grandfather who was murdered in the first scene, after developing a reputation for raping girls from the local village. Now, it is alleged that the vengeful spirit of the lecherous grandfather’s final victim, who jumped off a cliff after being raped, sings a beautiful melody in the middle of the night, to lure men into quicksand. Kumar doesn’t believe in ghosts, and decides to get to the bottom of things. He’s got extra incentive for sticking around; he’s recently met Radha (Waheeda Rehman), the niece of the village’s kindly medicine man Ramlal (Manmohan Krishna), and the two flirt, accompanied by some truly melodious music.
Rather than any Indian film precedent, Bees Saal Baad borrows its onscreen language from Alfred Hitchcock. Almost nothing is visible inside the haveli; most of it is falling apart, only seen because someone lights a few candles. Much of the film takes place at night, in a bog. There are tall reeds, bushes, rustling wetland grasses as far as the eye can see, trees that loom so densely that even the break of dawn barely penetrates their canopy. A woman’s jingling anklets gently pierce the night, and then a lovely, haunting song careens over the anxious dark:
Nag and his DP Marshall Braganza trust the audience, and wait. The tension they create with simple, elegant camerawork and foreboding lighting provides more of an emotional thrill ride than any cheap jumpscares. There are practically no clues in Kumar’s search across the bog, but the anklets jingle and the reeds rustle all the same. Everything seems futile and yet tantalizingly within reach. Halfway through the film, Radha walks into her darkened hut, searching for her uncle. The camera sees her at the hut door; she walks in, searching for her uncle, doesn’t see him, turns around, finally spots him, asks why he’s sitting in the dark, turns, brings the oil lamp to where he’s seated, and lights it. Very few Hindi films practice this sort of patience today, and Bees Saal Baad is better for it.
Rehman’s role isn’t as meaty as she was likely used to at the time; still, her performance is delightful. Radha is distrustful of the new man from the city, but as soon as Kumar turns and walks away, she looks upon his receding figure with longing. Her face wordlessly conveys eroticism, curiosity, and even a little surprise at the depth of her own attraction.
There are a few surprises on this mysterious journey, which, far ahead of its time aesthetically, impacted the burgeoning Hindi horror genre. There’s very little blood, certainly no gore, and—in a weird way, for a film about murder—Bees Saal Baad is oddly charming. What is quaint, however, can often conceal evil beneath.
The one-room, one-actor, no-songs experiment: Yaadein (Memories) (1964)
A camera glides through an upper-middle-class flat in a big city. Children’s toys are abandoned on their beds. There’s no one in the kitchen. The drawing room is empty. The windows are open and chiffon curtains billow in the breeze. As the camera pulls back to the flat’s front door, it opens, and Anil (Sunil Dutt) walks in. “Is anyone home?” He quickly discovers that the answer is no. It even appears as though his wife and children are gone for good. Anil takes a few other calls, including one from a friend insisting the wife and kids must be out at a park, which helps Anil feel better, and one from his mistress, whom he immediately scolds for calling him at home.
So begins Yaadein, a film directed by and starring Dutt—and no one else. Over the course of the night, confronted with the loss of those most important to him, Anil looks back on meeting his wife, their passionate romance, their married life and birth of their children, and how he threw it all away.
The flashbacks feature other characters, but as cartoons painted on walls or caricatured faces painted on balloons. They’re voiced by real people, but the only faces we see are stylish 1960s caricatures. In order to break up the monotony, Dutt speaks into the camera, as though his dinner date or coworker is sitting behind it. This is how he met his wife Priya (voiced by Nargis, Dutt’s real spouse) at a jazz club—Vasant Desai’s score is delightfully mod, full of husky horns and booming bass notes—but there were red flags from the start. Priya’s brother, a military man, reacts negatively to Anil’s attention toward his sister, and Anil admits he wanted revenge by becoming the man’s brother-in-law.
But Anil’s selfishness seeped in, slowly but surely. The film’s production design is indicative of how Anil treats people: they’re cartoons and balloons, nothing more than supporting character doodles, while he is the hero of his own story.
A few technically fascinating shots are also painful to watch. The camera is under the glass dining table, which has spilled milk cascading over it, looking up at a thunderous Anil. He is screaming at Priya, she screams back, and then he assaults her by pushing her and grabbing her throat, i.e. striding up the camera and placing his arms around the camera’s “neck.” Priya and the children begin to cry, and he storms out. It’s a pleasure to watch unconventional film techniques in Hindi cinema, but never easy to watch domestic violence.
This is where Dutt loses his nerve. Dutt’s acting gets a lot hammier as he weeps over his children’s toys and his wife’s clothing, still hanging in her closet. The thunderstorm outsides begins to rage, his sobbing intensifies, and he decides to commit suicide. This would be a perfectly fine way to end the story, except that Priya comes home, gets him down, and promptly apologizes, saying it was all her fault.
Yaadein tanked at the box office, likely because its style and story were too bold and avant-garde for the time. (It even got a rare “A” for Adult rating from the Film Certification Board.) Dutt wasn’t even set to be the director. He said the director never turned up, so he decided to direct himself. But despite its flaws, it’s one of the most unique Hindi films ever made, and its laundry list of heavy themes—infidelity, child neglect, partner abuse, anger, workaholism—are notable for existing at all.
Of mothers and fathers: Kabuliwala (The Man From Kabul) (1961), Mamta (A Mother’s Love) (1966), Aradhana (Worship) (1969)
What is the worst thing you would subject yourself to for the sake of your child?
In Kabuliwalla, adapted from a short story by Rabindranath Tagore, Abdul Rehman Khan (Balraj Sahni), struggling with loans he took out to pay for his daughter’s medical treatment but unable to find work in his home of Kabul, makes the difficult decision to leave for India. Unable to bear his daughter’s tears, Khan leaves before she wakes. He doesn’t own a camera, so he carries with him two impressions of her hands on a piece of paper.
Upon arriving in Kolkata—not yet the overcrowded metropolis of today, but a quieter, almost suburban city—Khan begins selling various goods on the street and meets Mini (Sonu), a five-year-old who matches his daughter in age and appearance. They strike up a friendship; he’s the only adult in her world who pays her any attention, and for a short while each day, Khan gets to pretend he’s near his daughter.
Of course, the ugliness of people can always be counted on to ruin a wholesome bond. While Mini’s father sees no harm in his daughter’s friendship with the kindly Kabuliwallah, Mini’s mother is terrified of the traveling merchant. Her fears are compounded by a panicky servant, who is convinced that he intends to kidnap Mini.
One day, Mini gets caught in a thunderstorm and cannot be found. A search party is sent out but Khan finds her first, and brings her home. Onlookers immediately blame and beat him for kidnapping her. Later, he attempts to collect a debt from someone who promised to pay him for a shawl. The man refuses, and a second set of onlookers accuse Khan of harassing “decent people.” After the ensuing fight, Khan is arrested and sent to prison for many years. Upon his release, his first stop is Mini’s house. But she is no longer a child—she appears to be in her late teens or early 20s, and it happens to be her wedding day—and no longer remembers him. Khan has a devastating realization: his own daughter must also be grown. Has she forgotten him too?
It would be heartrending enough to make a film with terrific actors who accurately portray the seismic pain of involuntarily leaving behind a home and a child. But once you’ve cast Balraj Sahni, hired Salil Chowdhury to write the music, and hired Gulzar and Prem Dhawan to write lyrics, you can also create a richer, more forlorn context—that of leaving behind your country, and having to exist each day without it.
“Aye Mere Pyaare Watan” (“O my beloved country”) is one of the most pain-filled Hindi songs ever written. A group of migrant Afghan workers, living in a crowded boardinghouse, listen to a friend sing about missing the country of their birth. Their memories flit through a parade of much-missed markers of home: a beloved daughter; the rocky, cacti-dotted landscape; the camels who conveyed these migrants across the terrain.
The camera makes its rounds, but when it lands on Sahni’s face, something shifts. His large eyes glimmer with unshed tears; there is anxiety in the taut muscles of his face; unable to bear the pain of the song, he closes his eyes and bows his head. Sahni hams it up when he blusters as the heavily accented Afghan migrant, but in quiet, contemplative moments, he reveals the true breadth of his talent. He needn’t speak. It’s all on his face.
Kabuliwala is imperfect. Its pace lags, its characterization is unsteady. What makes it unique, though, is a delightfully odd dream sequence towards the end. Khan is sent to prison; Mini doesn’t know this, but she did witness his arrest. Her subconscious is plagued by the uncertainty of his whereabouts. As she sleeps, she wanders through a magical dreamland, visiting different fairy tale characters, and asks each where Kabuliwalla is. Mini finds her friend, trapped in a room with thorny branches running up and down the windows. They run off together, inviting all her friends to sing and dance with them. There’s a giant bird, an elephant, trees, and flowers—it’s a refreshingly joyful take on a child’s imagination, and, more importantly, a respectful rendering of a child’s intelligence. Though she forgets him by the time they meet again, Mini is able to attain closure and bid him a peaceful, happy farewell. There are far sadder ways to say goodbye.
At first glance, Mamta seems decidedly anti-feminist. A woman is repeatedly wronged by the men in her life, forced to become a courtesan in order to hide from her abusive husband, gives up care of her daughter to protect her from him, and eventually gives her up too, worried that she’ll hinder her child’s chances in this world. Later, when the mother is accused of murdering her ex, her own estranged daughter, not knowing who her lawyer guardian’s client is, blames the defendant, calling her a fallen woman who has made her own bed.
But the film isn’t judgmental. It’s a character study of various people doing their best in an impossible situation. And given their circumstances, the way in which they were raised, the patriarchal conventions and customs under which they must lead life, they couldn’t have done much differently. Panna Bai (Suchitra Sen, reprising her role from the original 1963 Bengali film Utter Falguni), a famous courtesan whose daily life is being disrupted by blackmailer Rakhal (Kalipada Chakraborty, also reprising his role from the original), is trying to convince the Mother Superior (Pratima Devi) of a Catholic boarding school to admit her daughter Suparna. The grim headmistress isn’t moved by the recommendation written by a family friend, so in desperation, Panna Bai decides to share her life story.
Once upon a time, a woman named Devyani was in love with Manish (Ashok Kumar). She was poor and he was rich, and as he left for England to pursue higher studies, he promised he would return to marry her. But Devyani’s father is in debt to Rakhal, and sells off his daughter in lieu of payment. The mortified Devyani reaches out to Manish’s widowed mother for help and is dismissed by the old woman as a gold digger. Her marriage to Rakhal is immediately abusive; he attempts to pimp her out to his friends, and she flees. Her suicide attempt on a train is stopped by Meena Bai (Chhaya Devi), a kindly courtesan, who takes Devyani in and trains her to sing, dance, and dress. Now Panna Bai, she and her daughter Suparna are on the run.
The Mother Superior, moved, admits Suparna to the school. Panna Bai vows to never contact her daughter again, hoping that this will help Suparna lead a dignified life. Panna Bai’s relief is cut short by running into Manish, who never married. To the profound credit of both actors and the screenplay, this reunion is not melodramatic. The two resume a friendship that is genuinely moving, mutually respectful, built on a foundation of love and trust.
Upon Panna Bai’s request, Manish becomes Suparna’s guardian. The little girl grows up to be a confident, educated young woman (Sen in a double role), and like Manish, becomes a barrister, educated abroad, in full possession of her life, her desires. This crucial difference, between her upbringing, and that of her mother’s, is illustrated by two songs. The first, sung by Devyani to Manish before he left for England, “Rahen Na Rahen Hum” (“Whether or not I live”) is gorgeous, a Hindi film classic, with a lovely tinkling melody, and mournful lyrics, describing how a woman wants to be remembered once she is dead. It’s as though Devyani foresaw her spiritual demise:
But Suparna’s song defies both her mother’s sorrow and the limitations placed on women by society. Its structure is common: The male lover is advising his lady love to not wander about unaccompanied, for the wanton spring may hinder her. Suparna confidently argues that the spring is trying to mimic her beauty, that they are fans of her form and she relishes their admiration.
Suparna’s classism and internalized sexism also comes into play, when Panna Bai murders Rakhal. He demanded too great a sum from her, threatening to reveal her identity to Suparna, who has always been told her mother is dead. The case against Panna Bai is airtight, and Manish is visibly despondent about his client’s chances. Suparna doesn’t understand why her beloved uncle is losing sleep over this. The prosecutor and judge both ask that, if it’s true that Panna Bai committed this crime to protect her daughter, where is this daughter? Can she be produced in court? But the defendant has already extracted a promise from her lawyer, to never allow Suparna to see her mother.
Suparna rails against this unknown client, arguing that this fallen, soulless woman made a choice to murder her husband and should be punished for it. Manish’s horror knows no bounds, as he cannot reveal that she is decrying her own mother. Manish has only one choice: take Suparna to court.
As mortifying as Suparna’s stance is at first, it makes far more sense in the context of female misogynists in Hindi pop culture. Just tune into the average Hindi soap opera. Female soap characters have historically been upholders of the patriarchy. The mothers-in-law, trained by their own mothers and in-laws, sweep away any defiance from their daughters-in-law; wronged wives are advised by their mothers, aunts, grandmothers to keep the peace, no matter the transgression.
Panna Bai’s decision, in this context, becomes a fascinating problem: Had she kept Suparna with her, the little girl could have grown up to have more empathy for her mother. But she would’ve also witnessed regular visits from her abusive father, been vulnerable to his clutches, condemned to become a courtesan too (in this film, the profession is a decided negative in the eyes of society). Sending Suparna away protected her from Rakhal, but changed her class status, which in turn bred a dismissive, elitist attitude toward women like her mother. In a lose-lose situation, Panna Bai made the choice to help Suparna win.
The all-sacrificing mother is a common trope throughout Indian cinema. What was, at least in the 1960s, a less common trope, was premarital sex. Both are present in Shakti Samanta’s 1969 classic romantic drama Aradhana, starring box office dynamite pair Rajesh Khanna and Sharmila Tagore. The film is among Khanna’s 17 consecutive hits between 1969 and 1971. Boasting a smash hit score by S.D. Burman, and a conventional but sufficiently intriguing screenplay by Sachin Bhowmick (copied from the Hollywood film To Each His Own), Aradhana sold 89 million tickets worldwide, half just in the Soviet Union.
Riding home on a train to her mountain town, Vandana Tripathi (Tagore) catches the eye of Indian Air Force officer Arun Verma (Khanna), who is riding alongside in his jeep. Inspired by her beauty, he sings one of the most famous songs in Hindi film history: “Mere Sapno Ki Rani” (“When will you come, the queen of my dreams”).
Vandana blushes, equally smitten with the dashing officer. In no time, they’ve fallen in love, gained the approval of Vandana’s father, and “wed” in secret. The marriage isn’t official, but this doesn’t stop them, on a rainy day, stuck inside a cabin, from consummating their union. Arun reassures the frightened Vandana that they have already committed to one another in the eyes of the gods, and promises he will return to marry her in front of family and friends.
Unfortunately, Arun dies just as Vandana discovers she is pregnant. Branded a gold digger, and losing her father, Vandana is completely alone, allowing a childless couple to adopt her son, Suraj. She agrees to stay in the household as a servant, never revealing to her son who she is.
Tragedy strikes again: her boss’s brother-in-law tries to rape her, but a teenage Suraj kills his uncle. Vandana takes the blame and is sent to prison. Years later, the warden brings Vandana home, upon her release, to be a companion to his young daughter Renu (Farida Jalal in an early role). And who might Renu be in love with? Suraj (Khanna, playing a younger man), of course, who is now a dashing Air Force captain himself!
The Khanna and Tagore pairing is responsible for some of the best mainstream Hindi films ever produced. Pauline Kael referred to Tagore as “perfect,” and her serene beauty was the perfect foil for Khanna’s over-the-top romantic antics. Neither was very good at dancing, but it didn’t matter. You could watch her eyes tremble and his half-smile, half-smirk, and feel pretty good about the world. Even though Aradhana centers a punitive, patriarchal morality on its central female character, Vandana is the focus of the film, longer than either Arun or Suraj. Like all good Indian women, Vandana takes it on the chin, willing to suffer to preserve her true love’s good name, to grant her son stability and safety. And despite how masochistic this may seem now, Samanta knew how to give it just enough zip, especially with the steamy seduction number “Roop Tera Mastana,” (“Your intoxicating beauty”).
The Dev Anand empire: Guide (1965), Jewel Thief (1967)
Like the profound differences between Truman Capote’s Breakfast At Tiffany’s and Blake Edwards’ film adaptation, Vijay Anand’s Guide feels worlds away from R.K. Narayan’s novel. But the altered narrative structure and themes helped Anand solidify his brother Dev Anand as a Hindi film star forever.
Raju (Anand) is released from prison and, instead of returning to the city where he was prosecuted, decides to wander. He joins a group of wandering sadhus (holy men), who take shelter in the shade of a remote village’s temple. As a sadhu leaves, he drapes his saffron shawl, commonly associated with wandering mystics, over a sleeping Raju. Upon waking, Raju has a philosophical conversation with farmer Bhola (Gajanan Jagirdar), who interprets Raju’s shawl, and therefore his word, as proof of the man’s wisdom—especially once Raju successfully advises his stubborn sister to marry. Impressed and grateful, Bhola tells the entire village about this new arrival, and soon Raju is mobbed by people begging for advice.
For a time, Guide engages in the same cynicism as the book: by turns amused and bemused by the growing crowd of devotees around him, Raju continues the charade as it keeps him fed, watered, adored. Meanwhile, two women arrive at the prison to wait for his release; both are told he left months ago. Rosie (Waheeda Rehman) is clearly famous. The other, Raju’s mother (Leela Chitnis), wants nothing to do with her. Rosie begs to speak in private: She was never the villain everyone imagined her to be.
So begins the flashback that takes up the bulk of the film. Rosie’s mother was a courtesan who, wanting a better future for her daughter, arranges her marriage to Marco (Kishore Sahu), a cold archaeologist. Rosie is a skilled dancer and singer, but her new husband forbids her from practicing either. His mental, verbal, and physical abuse degrades her mental health. During a visit to a mountain town, where Marco hires local guide Raju to lead him to ancient caves filled with stone carvings, Rosie attempts suicide. Marco briefly expresses concern, then goes back to his cave. Raju and Rosie begin a relationship; they’re in love, yes, but they are also each other’s ways into a different life.
The best parts of Guide belong to Rehman; Rosie’s newfound independence and confidence result in some of her best-ever work. She began her career as a classically trained dancer, and there is a decided difference in the acting prowess of actresses who were trained first in nonverbal communication (i.e., dance), and began to act later. In what might be Guide’s best scene, Rosie lets loose when she comes across a snake dancer, and joins her. It’s clear Rosie is talented, but what’s even more evident is her repressed anger and sexual frustration. There are no lyrics and even without sound, the scene lands like a bomb:
Unfortunately, Rosie and Raju are still in a village, and the patriarchy comes calling: every man wants to spy on Rosie as she rehearses, and women shame Raju’s mother for allowing a tart to live inside her home. Raju dresses like an important cultural minister and convinces local school officials to let Rosie perform at a variety show. The song she sings, which I once described, as a universe of light and energy, is one of finest sequences in Hindi cinema. Burman’s music is cosmopolitan, invoking Western classical melodies in transitions, but prizing classical Indian music during the verses. Filmed over the span of many festivals to show Rosie’s growing fame and Raju’s growing profits, it’s a showcase for Lata Mangheskar’s angelic, soaring voice, and Rehman’s prowess at just about any school of dance you throw at her:
Eventually, Raju’s greed surpasses his love for Rosie. There isn’t much daylight between him and Marco; where the latter was indifferent, Raju is obsessive, overbooking Rosie so he can make more money, which he promptly gambles away. The two stop sharing a room, and Rosie rejects his drunken advances. When Raju is arrested for forging his signature on bank documents, Rosie sings the ultimate song of a lover’s disgust: “Saiyyan Beimaan” (“The dishonest lover”). Each flick of the wrist, each glance, each curl of the leg and hips, radiates undiluted disappointment and rage:
Raju then has the nerve to sing (an admittedly good) song calling her dishonest. The song’s picturization is experimental, filmed on the same set as “Saiyyan Beimaan,” with the same backup dancers, as Rosie appears in the distance, gradually getting further and further away from Raju:
In the present, Raju’s fame has increased, and the ultimate test of his holy man persona emerges: a drought. Without rain, children are dying and crops aren’t growing. A flippant comment is interpreted by a villager to mean that Raju will neither eat nor drink for 12 days in order to end the drought. Trapped, Raju must follow through.
This is the greatest divide between the book and the film. The former makes it clear Raju doesn’t really want to do this; even to the last page he never fully believes in the idea. The film instead opts for a campy, perfunctory dream sequence in which Raju argues with himself about the path he has chosen, question marks blinking behind him.
As you might imagine, it does rain, and Raju dies. Guide ends with a self-satisfied Raju claiming to have attained nirvana. The book’s ending is delightfully ambiguous, only saying that it begins to rain, and Raju’s steps falter. This ambiguity could have created a different conversation about the merits of faith and the nature of the male ego. But this is a popular Hindi film, with an easily definable ending. Narayan made his disapproval known, writing an essay titled “The Misguided Guide.” Still, it’s a blockbuster, and Rehman alone makes it all worthwhile.
There might not be a film more of its time than Jewel Thief. Its production design, music, and plot changed Hindi cinema’s thriller benchmarks forever. Inspired by James Bond and mid-century modern aesthetics, the film is a raucous memento of the 1960s.
It begins with a promise. A frustrated police commissioner (Nazir Hussain) is hot on the trail of a jewel thief. Though he has neither a description or photo of the culprit, the commissioner vows to capture the thief by January 26th (an Indian national holiday, commemorating adoption of India’s constitution).
Enter Vinay (Dev Anand). He’s hired by Vishambhar Nath (Sapru), a wealthy merchant, to perform quality control and prevent thefts in his jewelry store. Vinay fits expectations for a master thief. His knowledge of gems outpaces that of his employer and all his colleagues, he’s dashing, suave, always ready with a quip. This suspicion is amplified when, at a party thrown by Nath’s daughter Anjali (Tanuja in a career-defining role), with whom Vinay has begun a casual flirtation, Vinay is pounced upon by Arjun (Ashok Kumar) and Shalini (Vyjanthimala). They accuse him of being Shalini’s fiance, of abandoning her, and of denying his identity in front of strangers. Vinay doesn’t have much trouble proving he is who he says he is, but he’s worried someone is out to frame him. Who would do this, and why?
Jewel Thief is great, but it attains texture and dimension through its score. R.D. Burman, son of legendary composer S.D., had been assisting his father since he was five. The latter was a master of his craft, but R.D. was a genius. Though S.D. is credited as the film’s official music director, R.D. is listed as his assistant, and his imprint is everywhere, including and especially the song “Baithe Hai Kya Uske Paas” (“Why are you sitting next to her?”). Helen, playing a character named the same, is a dancer in a club and, supposedly, Amar’s wife. She lights up when Vinay walks in—so she thinks he’s Amar too!—during a jazzy number that borrows its hook from “I Wonder Why” by Dion and the Belmonts:
The feathers, sequins, beaded tassels, jazzy choreography, sustained horns, castanets, the backup singer in a tight white halter gown—not to mention Asha Bhosle’s exquisite, charming vocals, doubled here to create layers—there’s a reason this song stands out from the horde. Yes, it was achieved via a bit of plagiarism, but R.D. took kernels from other songs and made them his own.
There are two more songs that, in addition to being classics of Hindi cinema, are potent as short films on their own. One is deeply sorrowful, another quite tense. The first, written by Shailendra, is a song about disappointment and grief, sung by Shalini as she rows across a river, Vinay following her on his own canoe. The lyrics are ambiguous enough that we don’t know if she’s crying about the mysterious Amar leaving her high and dry, or some other grave loss, but the story behind the song is perhaps even sadder.
Shailendra was a renowned poet, considered by many to be the greatest lyricist India ever produced. He spent years, and almost all his money, trying to get Teesri Kasam (The Third Vow) made, and while the 1966 film was critically acclaimed, it failed at the box office. The poor public response and financial loss broke Shailendra’s heart. His songs for Guide were such a smashing success, however, that Vijay Anand hired him to write songs for Jewel Thief. Shailendra took so long to submit a draft that Dev Anand parked an employee outside the lyricist’s home, instructing him to not leave until he had the lyrics in hand. Shailendra was able to finish the draft, and died not long after of a heart attack, requiring Vijay Anand to hire Majrooh Sultanpuri for the rest of the film’s songs. The Jewel Thief song “Rulaake Gaya Sapna Mera” (“My dream left me in tears”) is about this heartache.
The second did for Vyjanthimala’s career what “Piya Tose Naina Lage Re” did for Waheeda Rehman:
Contrasted with Shalini’s delicate, traditional femininity—she sticks to saris—is Anjali’s carefree, sexually liberated abandon. She wears Western attire, including tight mod dresses and long swinging earrings, drinks beer at picnics, has a cocktail bar in her living space (a riot of colored lighting, blues, yellows, reds, and pinks flowing through chiffon curtains), dances to jazzy music, and flirts openly with Vinay. In one especially saucy scene, she is lying on Vinay’s bed when he gets home. He’s exasperated. “What do you want in exchange for getting off the bed?” he asks. “Will you give it to me?” she grins.
Jewel Thief subverts expectations at every turn. The costumes blend Indian attire with Western wear, including a jaunty checkered cap for Anand. The production design goes all-in on 1960s inventions like swiveling panels revealing in-home bars, walls painted in bright colors and patterned with eccentric shapes. Jewel Thief borrows many of these elements from Dr. No and much of Hitchcock’s 1960s output. Even the score, largely Western in style, is guitar-heavy and reminiscent of the Bond theme; lighter sequences feature Henry Mancini-inspired melodies. It’s a sparkling cocktail of a film.
Two by Hrishikesh Mukherjee: Anupama (Incomparable) (1964) and Satyakam (Honest Works) (1968)
Of the directors Sharmila Tagore has worked with in her 60-year career, only two have known how to use her eyes. The first was Satyajit Ray; in Devi, her eyes trigger the film’s plot, causing her father-in-law to hallucinate that she is an earthly manifestation of a goddess.
The second was Hrishikesh Mukherjee, whose Anupama grants very little dialogue to Uma (Tagore). She acts almost exclusively with her eyes, conveying terror, sorrow, joy, and finally, hope. Uma’s father Mohan (Tarun Bose) married late in life, and is besotted by his wife. But when she dies giving birth to Uma, Mohan cannot bring himself to speak to or look at his child, handing her care over to Sarla (Dulari), the family’s trusted maid. Only in a drunken stupor can Mohan express affection for Uma, bringing her toys and balloons, kissing her hair as she cowers, unable to understand his polarized behavior. Sarla watches this dynamic nightly, weeping in silence, powerless to help.
Uma grows up to be almost mute, petrified of speaking to anyone, and never saying a word to her father. Yet we always know what she’s thinking—her big lined eyes project fear when she’s around her father, doe-like innocence and trepidation around strangers. But she is not without personality. When Tagore arrived on set to shoot Anupama, she had done up her hair in a fashionable bouffant, with a traditional long braid hanging down her back. Mukherjee, who never actually bothered with hair/makeup/costume staff, said Uma was a simple girl, who’d never have trendy hair. Tagore refused to change her hair, and the director relented.
In interviews conducted decades later, Tagore expressed remorse for fighting with a director, but she was right. Uma’s emotionally abused existence doesn’t mean she’s a nun. She reads, she thinks, she has a vibrant inner life—relayed beautifully through song, sung only when she’s alone. Why should her horrible home life mean she has no thoughts about hair or fashion? Granted, Uma’s exterior is old-fashioned: the young women around her dress in tight salwar-kameezes, very much en vogue, while Uma wears saris draped traditionally with blouses trimmed in lace. Let her have fun hair!
Uma’s life changes when she meets Ashok (Dharmendra), a socialist novelist. Smitten but emotionally intelligent enough to realize it’ll take her time to warm up to him, Ashok gently pursues her, and even writes a novel, Anupama, featuring a woman very like her, in which her awakening is a central theme. He is distressed to learn of her father’s abuse, and even confronts Mohan. Slowly, his non-condescending encouragement of Uma inspires her to take action—to make a decision for the first time.
It’s one of the most complex portraits of father-daughter relationships in Hindi cinema, shot in lovely natural light by Jaywant Pathare, whose work won the Filmfare Award for Best Cinematography.
There are many films on this list that boast intricate plots and dense writing. Anupama is not one of them, and is better for it. A girl is suffering. People around her see it, and help her change it. Her traumatized father learns to put aside his own rigidity for his daughter’s future. Notably, Uma’s blossoming relationship with Ashok isn’t why Mohan is letting her go. He realizes that for Uma to exist in the world—to experience joy, grow, partake in the human parade of experiences—it will have to be without him.
Hrishikesh Mukherjee came of age in a hopeful time. He was 29 when he began assisting Bimal Roy in 1951; the years immediately preceding and following India’s independence were a heady time for anyone, especially artists. But by 1968, it had become clear that freedom from Great Britain was not a silver bullet for India’s problems. Set in the mid-1940s, Satyakam debates the nature of morality and truth in an increasingly immoral and dishonest world.
Satyapriya Acharya, whose first name means “one who holds honesty dear,” played with aching sincerity and forthrightness by Dharmendra, is a man of principles. Raised by devout Hindu scholar Satyasharan Acharya, Satyakam is a civil engineering student about to graduate, and brims with hope about the India that will soon take birth: a sovereign nation, truthful and just. His classmates Peter (legendary comedic actor Asrani) and Narendra ‘Naren’ Sharma (soon-to-be-legendary actor Sanjeev Kumar, in a moving early role) are, while not dishonest, slightly more laid back. As they begin their working lives, best friends Satyapriya and Naren enter a rapidly industrializing India. During the former’s first assignment, he meets a dissolute local prince, Kunwar Vikram Singh (Manmohan), who spends his daylight hours leering at Ranjana (Sharmila Tagore), a woman condemned because her well-off mother ran away with her driver at age 14. The same driver, Ranjana’s father Rustom (David), is now her pimp, willing to sell her for the right price.
From the moment Ranjana falls in love with Satyapriya, he is forced to confront not only his hypocrisy, but the limits of his principles. Yes, he finds her situation appalling, and yes, he believes a good man from an honorable household could and would marry her. Rustom, with a glint in his eye, asks Satyapriya if he’d marry her. He does not answer. His reluctance leaves Ranjana vulnerable, and the prince rapes her. Unable to bear the guilt of his actions, Satyapriya marries Ranjana, but their marriage is stilted, awkward, overshadowed by her trauma and his inadvertent part in it. The sexual assault results in a son to whom Satyapriya is outwardly loving, but the marriage struggles.
Satyapriya goes from job to job, refusing to sign off on blueprints he did not design, declining bribes, refusing better treatment in exchange for favors. He even works for Naren, whom he refuses to acknowledge as a friend on the job, referring to him as sir. This frustrates Ranjana, whose attempts at normalizing their home life fall victim to her husband’s increasing rigidity. Satyapriya reports a colleague for accepting bribes. The man is fired, and his sorrowful wife arrives at Satyapriya and Ranjana’s home with her feverish child; the couple doesn’t have money for medication or food. The poor woman admits her husband has done something he shouldn’t have, but is it not just as unjust that her child is suffering? Satyapriya admits that it is, but that if someone sins, they should pay the price. Then he turns, leaving the room in agony.
Satyapriya’s thinking is difficult to contend with. Satyakam only briefly considers the circumstances that cause someone to accept a bribe to begin with: poverty, desperation, medical emergencies. There is no mention of how the true, honest way can be a privilege for those not endangered by the consequences. Satyapriya’s perpetual disgust with the dishonest also ignores that perhaps no one would have to accept bribes if workers were unionized and paid living wages. There are hints of Objectivism in Satyapriya’s thinking, and his beliefs overlap a bit with The Fountainhead’s Howard Roark, but the Ayn Rand novel, like Satyakam, makes no mention of the intrusive nature of politics and economics on the lives of workers.
Regardless of any association with one of the most vile public figures to ever disgrace the face of the Earth, Satyakam is a great film. The way it unfolds is truly moving and surprising, but it is understandable why it was a financial failure. Imagine an audience full of workers, many of whom accept and give bribes—which, to this day, is the only way anything gets done in India—watching Satyapriya decline to be dishonest in his dealings with the builder. No one wants to pay to feel like a louse. Hrishikesh Mukherjee was reportedly heartbroken about the film’s box office failure. There’s likely some overlap between him and his lead character. Both were disillusioned, and Mukherjee, for his part, changed tack, making “middle of the road” cinema that was neither masala nor arthouse film. He was wildly successful (his films will appear again in our 1970s entry), but he never again tried to change his fellow citizens.
Advanced studies:
There are far more wonderful Hindi films from the 1960s than can be included here, so here are others worth checking out:
Parakh (Test) (1960): Can a newly independent India live honorably? A breezy social satire set in a humble village, by far the lightest of Bimal Roy’s films.
Woh Kaun Thi? (Who Was She?) (1964) and Mera Saaya (My Shadow) (1966): Parts one and two of a very good trilogy starring Sadhana as a spooky, beautiful woman. (Part three is a rubbish ripoff of Vertigo, do not bother.)
Mughal-E-Azam (The Great Mughal) (1960): The epic to end all epics, about forbidden love between a slave girl and a Mughal prince, featuring one of Hindi cinema’s best songs, not to mention extravagant yet detailed set design that has influenced every epic that came after, chaste yet kinky love scenes, Dilip Kumar’s glowering brow and Madhubala’s angelic beauty/emotional devastation. Watch in black-and-white so the colorized songs land with more impact.
Aman (Peace) (1967): A flawed but stirring anti-nuclear war film, starring Balraj Sahni and Manoj Kumar, featuring a cameo by none other than Bertrand Russell! Like many 1960s films (especially those starring Shammi Kapoor), it also serves as tourism marketing for Japan.
Teesri Manzil (The Third Floor) (1966): Shammi Kapoor was an integral part of 1960s cinema, but he’s never been in a good movie. Teesri Manzil has an exquisite soundtrack and its songs boast peerless choreography, but its story is lacking; plus, a full cut of the film has never been released digitally or on VCD/DVD. The film had at least 30 minutes cut out in the 1980s when VCD was becoming the norm.
Ittefaq (Coincidence) (1969): Yash Chopra’s sole ‘60s gem takes place in a single room, over the course of one night; no songs, no romance, all mystery. Come for the surprisingly sexy lighting and Rajesh Khanna playing a fugitive, stay for the tense writing and direction.
Shaheed (Martyr) (1965) and Haqeeqat (Reality) (1964): Two very different takes on patriotism. The former is the triumphant true story of Bhagat Singh, a freedom fighter who happily went to the noose after assassinating a British officer. Try to watch it without crying during “Mera Rang De Basanti Chola.” Haqeeqat, on the other hand, is a dramatic retelling of the Battle of Rezang La in Ladakh during the Sino-Indian War of 1962. It’s a searing depiction of the chaos and terror of war, and how far removed soldiers can feel from a country barely aware of their sacrifice. When Satyajit Ray told director Chetan Anand that his film, although beautiful, had no story, Anand replied, “It’s not a story. It’s a mosaic.”
Devar (The Brother-in-law) (1966): To say anything about the film would be to give it away. Deeply dark, with actors usually seen in genial comedic roles playing low-down villains, (this was likely the reason for its box office failure), the central goal of Devar is shocking ambiguity—a rare and daring premise for a family drama.
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