Filmi Geek

Kannathil muthamittal (2002)

கன்னத்தில் முத்தமிட்டால்

As highly regarded as Mani Ratnam is, I have often been told that his Tamil movies are better than his Hindi ones. I can believe it. I have been rather hard on those of his Hindi movies that I have seen. Perhaps because they are so often ravingly praised, I have unfair expectations. They have struck me as uneven in tone, unsure what kind of movies they wanted to be, what message they wanted to send.

Kannathil muthamittal ("a peck on the cheek"), in contrast, is nearly flawless. It is a simple story, simply told, unburdened by melodramatic embellishments or unrealistic characters. These clean lines, these relatable characterizations, allow the movie to explore some large, dense themes without tying itself in intractable knots. Dil se obscures its examination of terrorism with Shah Rukh Khan's hammy and under-motivated stalker romance. Yuva is severely compromised by its absurd superman character who takes bullets and falls off bridges without ever wavering in courage or commitment. But Kannathil muthamittal ranges from an adopted child's search for her identity to the vicious horrors of Sri Lanka's internecine conflicts without ever losing its emotional mooring.

Shyam Benegal's movies often probe big, society-shaking themes and events through close studies of the experiences of a small number of people. One does not always need an expansive cast and an epic storyline to examine rangy ideas. Mani Ratnam succeeds with Kannathil muthamittal because it, too, focuses a tight lens on a small family. Thiruchelvan (Madhavan) and Indira (Simran) adopt a baby girl born in a Tamil Nadu refugee camp to M.D. Shyama (Nandita Das), who has fled the fighting in Sri Lanka between Tamil Tiger fighters and the Sri Lankan army.  On her ninth birthday, the girl, Amudha (P.S. Keerthana) learns of her adoptive origins, and demands to meet her mother.  Her parents, burdened by guilt and concern for their headstrong little girl, take her to Sri Lanka in search of Shyama.

It is arguably foolish of this family to walk straight into a war zone as they do, all for the demands of an imperious child. The film seems not to judge them for this bad decision, however.  We see Indira's anguish at Amudha's suffering, her guilt at perpetrating the implied deception of adoption, and her helplessness in the face of Amudha's drive; the little girl runs away from home twice, set on finding her own way to Sri Lanka, so it is hard to blame her parents for taking her there.  And the family seems genuinely unprepared for what they find there, as if the remoteness of the conflict from their comfortable air-conditioned Madras home left them with little awareness of it, no framework in which to form expectations.  They are naive in their bold forays, even while accompanied by a local guide (Prakash Raj).  They find themselves buffeted in the confusion of a flood of refugees, shelled by army artillery even as they flee their village.  They find themselves rubbing elbows with suicide bombers, and caught in the crossfire of rifle and grenade battles.  They even find themselves in the jungle, surrounded by suspicious fighters who point guns to their heads and demand they prove their loyalties.  In the Sri Lanka the family visits, violence is a way of life.

It is perhaps the film's main message that being aware of this conflict, telling its stories, is of crucial importance to the individual lives that are rent by it.  Thiruchelvan is himself a storyteller, a writer; if he had not been hearing and telling the stories of refugees in the camp where Shyama gave birth, he and Indira and Amudha would never have come together to form a family.  And so Kannathil muthamittal tells their story, Amudha's and Shyama's and Thiruchelvan's and Indira's.  It tells those stories, not with a sweeping focus that outlines the grand history of Tamil/Sinhalese conflicts, but with an intimate focus on a child's perspective.  In a child's eye, the violence is not only senseless, but irrelevant.  All that matters is the connections of love, the connections that bind families together. 

Much of Kannathil muthamittal's expression of the love in Amudha's family is told impressionistically during the movie's gorgeous A.R. Rahman songs.  In these stunning picturizations, Amudha dances and cuddles and plays with each of her parents (Indira in the title song, and Thiruchelvan in "Nenjil Jil Jil") across diverse, colorful dreamscapes like those of the songs of Dil se.  These picturizations are paintings in motion, visual poetry singing the family's love.   Another song, "Vidai Kodu," presents the harsh, dirty anguish of a vast train of refugees against the stark beauty of thunderclouds and wilderness.  Red clay soil and the army-green of tank convoys splash the backdrop of this canvas on which the brightly-colored clothes of the refugees are anything but cheerful.

This thematic juxtaposition between the vastness of the civil war and the depth of the family's love is what makes Kannathil muthamittal its own effective and moving story.  It is how the movie can say so much, without trying to do too much. Mani Ratnam's Bombay takes a similar approach, and is equally effective.  It is not for nothing that these are by far the two best I've seen of his movies.  It may also be not for nothing that they are both written and shot in Tamil.

Naya daur (1957)

नया दौर

"Dead machinery must not be pitted against the millions of living machines represented by the villagers scattered in the seven hundred thousand villages of India." So wrote Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, as a title card at the opening of Naya daur ("new era") declares. And so begins a movie that indeed pits milling machine against woodworker, bus against tonga, unthinking mechanized progress for its own sake against the value of human teamwork. It is in no way a fair fight. In the real world, obsolescence of traditional ways of life may be an inexorable consequence of modernization. In the movies, though, the rugged salt of the earth always get their romantic, improbable victories over the sneering, cravat-wearing forces that would cast them aside in the name of greed. And such victories are always satisfying.

Shankar (Dilip Kumar) and Kisna (Ajit) are the best of friends, village boys who grew up together. Shankar makes his living as a tonga driver. Kisna chops lumber for the local mill owner (Nazir Hussain), who treats his workers with tremendous compassion, and reiterates his belief that his money and the workers' labor are in symbiosis, neither superior in value to the other. The mill owner leaves for a pilgrimage, though, and his son Kundan (Jeevan), who takes over operations, doesn't see things the same way - he brings in machines and fires all the woodworkers. Meanwhile, the bond of friendship between Shankar and Kisna is threatened when both fall in love with Rajni (Vijayantimala). Believing that Shankar has tricked him out of his chance with Rajni, Kisna allies with Kundan, who hires a bus to put the tongewale out of business. When the tongewale confont him, Kundan challenges them to a race. If your tonga can beat my bus to the temple, he says, I'll send the bus away and you can have your business back. Shankar accepts the challenge. But first he will have to get all the villagers working together to build a shortcut road for his tonga to outpace the bus. And the fire of Kisna's rage burns brightly enough to threaten not just this ambitious public works project, but Shankar's very life.

My friend @maxqnz described Naya daur as "the Lagaan of its time."  The comparison is not merely apt - Lagaan clearly owes a great debt to Naya daur, and even quotes from it.  For instance, in one scene, a boy asks Kisna to carve a stick and ball for him out of a hunk of lumber.  The scene in which Shankar accepts Kundan's challenge to the race - the incredulity of the other tongewale, and Shankar's speech about the value of taking some action over taking no action, however long the odds - also seems echoed in Lagaan.   Both movies feature the unlikely triumph of a ragtag bunch of villagers against sinister outside forces that senselessly oppress them.  In both movies, the livelihood of the village is at stake.  In both movies, a man is driven by unrequited love to betray the villagers and serve as a double-agent for the enemy, and is later moved to redemption by the magnanimity of the hero.  And in both movies, the heroine does little beyond smile and pout charmingly as the hero brings the villagers together for their victory against the odds. 

So the similarities between Lagaan and Naya daur are much more than superficial.  Lagaan is one of my all-time favorite movies, and as its antecedent, Naya daur matches up very well as an entertaining and inspiring fable about unity and courage.  I have never been a great Dilip Kumar fan - his acting style is often smug and mumbly, and he makes me think too much of Shah Rukh Khan to be of much appeal.  Here, though, he is relatively natural and charming enough.  Shankar's friendship with Kisna is delightfully portrayed, and one's heart breaks for Kisna when a misunderstanding drives them apart.  Indeed, Ajit as Kisna nearly steals the show from Dilip Kumar - he is startlingly handsome, and his expressive face shows tremedous emotional range, from innocent joy to malevolent, jealous rage.

There is some rich symbolism in Kisna's arc.  In his unholy alliance with Kundan, Kisna sabotages a bridge that the villagers have built at a key point along the road that Shankar's tonga will take in its race against Kundan's bus.  After Shankar's sister sets Kisna on his path to redemption, he works feverishly to repair the beams he has removed from the bridge, and ends up supporting the bridge with his own bodily strength as the tonga passes overhead during the race.   Thus the villager's ultimate success rests literally as well as figuratively on Kisna's redemption and the power of his friendship with Shankar.  Without that bond, there is no victory. 

Like Lagaan, Naya daur is punctuated by a number of excellent songs.  While through most of the movie Vijayantimala's charm is as wasted as Gracy Singh's, her magnificent dancing skills are well displayed.

 

The most inspiring sequence in the film comes in the superb song "Saathi haath badhana," in which the villagers - men and women alike - work together to build their literal road to victory.  This song has a terrific modern-sounding refrain combined with a classic midcentury filmi melody, along with lovely visuals.

 

There's lots of pure entertainment too, including a song tailor-made for me, "Reshmi salwaar kurta jaali ka," in which a cross-dressing girl romances another girl. 

 

I've been told that a colorized version of Naya daur was released fairly recently, and that's obviously the version the above clip comes from.  The black and white original of this song does not appear to be available on YouTube, and it's a pity, because the music track is better (it lacks the strange synthesized chords that fill out the sound but don't match the folks tonality of the tune at all), and it also has a couple of shots that are missing from the color version, such as the delighted head-bobbing of this enthusiastic fellow, which pretty well conveys how I felt while watching the song:

Jeevan cuts a fine villainous figure as always, with his outlandishly effete clothing (has anyone ever looked more ridiculous in a pair of Jodhpurs?) and his ever-present riding crop, with all of the attendant phallic symbolism.

What more can you ask of a Hindi movie than charismatic stars, excellent songs, and a rich, unsubtle populist message of unity and the importance of preserving traditional village values in the face of modernization and westernization?  Naya daur begins with the words of Gandhi and ends in Gandhian triumph, offering a full complement of romance, buddy-pyaar, villainy, betrayal, naach-gaana, and a even few Johnny Walker pratfalls in between.  It's about as perfect a midcentury filmi experience as there is. 

Aradhana (1969)

आराधना

There is a subgenre of Hindi movies in which horrible things happen to blameless, flawless women.  Canonical among these is the classic Amar prem, in which Sharmila Tagore plays a saintly prostitute with an apparently limitless capacity to endure pain, and Rajesh Khanna plays her philosophizing patron.  Aradhana ("worship") features the same stars and explores similar thematic space - a woman endures terrible misfortune, yet maintains grace and dignity throughout. Her reward for all this forbearance is the ultimate prize for women in this sort of movie: recognition of her status as a mother.

 Aradhana's first hour is an appealing, uncomplicated romance in a picturesque mountain town. A dashing air force officer, Arun (Rajesh Khanna), falls in love with Vandana (Sharmila Tagore), the charming daughter of a doctor. Not a lot of substance happens, but the courtship is a pleasure to watch, packed with lovely songs and glorious scenery. And I mean glorious scenery even apart from Sharmila Tagore herself, who certainly is good enough to eat, whether being coyly charmed by Arun as he serenades her on a train in "Mere sapnon ki rani kab aayegi tu,"

 

or dancing playfully in the snow in "Gun guna rahe hain bhanware."

 

After a whirlwind courtship of just a few days, Arun and Vandana are caught in a rainstorm, and allow their passion to get the better of them in one of the hottest sequences I have ever seen in any movie, Hindi or otherwise - the superb song "Roop Tera mastana." Go ahead and watch this one. Really. I'll wait. If you've not seen it before, you need to, and if you have, isn't it time you watched it again?

 

This gorgeously erotic single-cut sequence conveys tremendous desire and intensity. The dim firelight, the fine sheen on the actors' skin, the slow deliberation of their movements, their locked gazes - all these elements combine for a sensuous, thrilling several minutes of cinema.  I've said before, I am not a great fan of Rajesh Khanna, but even I have to admit that he's downright spicy here.  Even throughout the rest of the movie he's not that bad - he occasionally flirts with the kind of droopy-lidded, mumbly frogginess that I dislike about him - but in this song he simply fires on all cylinders.  The song isn't lip-synced - Arun doesn't sing it to Vandana, it's just playing as the backdrop for their desire - and this enhances the intensity and realism of the sequence. It's just phenomenal.

It is also very nearly the last happy moment of Aradhana. Arun is killed in action before he and Vandana can be married, but she is carrying his child.  The boy is adopted by a sympathetic man, Saxena (Abhi Bhattacharya), who allows Vandana to serve as the boy's nurse and governess, so that she can stay close to him and help fulfill Arun's dream that the boy grow up to become a fighter pilot.  Soon, Saxena's lecherous brother-in-law tries to have his way with Vandana, and is killed in the resulting scuffle with Vandana and the child Suraj. Vandana takes responsibility for the death, and is thrown in prison for a dozen years.  Now she has no way to watch over Suraj, and no hope that Suraj will ever know that she is his mother.

Vandana's suffering is tempered by the extraordinary kindness shown to her by two men.  The first is Saxena, who allows her to stay close to her child and care for him.  Saxena continues to believe in Vandana after her conviction for murder, saying that he can see in her eyes the purity of her soul and her intentions.  Then, on her release from prison, her jailer (Madan Puri) extends another remarkable kindness, inviting Vandana to join his household, as his "sister", to help look after his daughter Renu (Farida Jalal).  Like Saxena, the jailer perceives and is moved by Vandana's purity and dignity, despite the poor hand she's been dealt.  These phenomenal kindnesses temper the harsh cruelties that Vandana endures.  The universe is not blind to Vandana's goodness, and this fact balances Aradhana's tragic elements and makes the message bearably somber, rather than unbearably sad.  Even though life may take dreadful turns, if you endure them with a pure heart, the karmic balance is restored over the course of a lifetime. 

The tone of Aradhana shifts between realism and melodrama, sometimes abruptly, but the changes are not distracting.  Rather, they make the movie operate on two levels.  In its more delicate, realistic moments, Aradhana is a sad story about a very likeable woman and the losses she endures over her liftime.  The movie also invokes some of the usual improbable filmi tropes, the most notable of which is that Renu's beau is Vandana's lost son, Suraj, now grown into a dashing fighter pilot who is the spitting image of his father (and is of course also played by Rajesh Khanna).   When it becomes more filmi, Aradhana evokes its grander themes of balance, purity, and the dignity of motherhood.  And it works splendidly on both levels, not least because Sharmila Tagore is a skilled actor who shifts effectively between these two storytelling modes.

Just as the mean realities of Vandana's life are tempered by the kindnesses and redemption she experiences, so the tragic second half of the movie is balanced by the frothy, adorable charms of its first half.  Although there is a part of my brain that feels I should not be thoroughly charmed by a movie in which a woman's only joy and ambition is to be recognized as a mother and fulfill her dead husband's egotistical dream of molding his male child in his own image, I just can't get too worked up about that.  After all, it's just one story about one woman, and given everything that she endures, it's not a terrible thing for her to have a relatively simple and sacrificing approach to happiness.  And besides - Sharmila Tagore! 

As if the pleasure of Sharmila Tagore weren't enough, there's a charming appearance by Filmi Geek favorite Ashok Kumar as Arun's commanding officer, who seems mostly to drink scotch, play billiards, and dispense avuncular advice.  This role is delightful, very similar to his hilarious role in Chhoti si baat.

The result is a very satisfying movie with lots to sink one's teeth into, the perfect blend of romance, tragedy, levity, and sexiness, all packaging a thoughtful message and showcasing a whole lot of pretty. 

 

Konchem ishtam konchem kashtam (2009)

కొంచెం ఇష్టం కొంచెం కష్టం

I haven't explored much in the way of Telugu movies, or even any Indian films in languages other than Hindi.  This is not for want of curiosity - it's a matter of self-preservation.  I tend to go for depth - when I decide to learn about something, I become obsessed and compelled to learn as much as I can.  And so the rabbit hole of south Indian cinema beckons me, but I hesitate to jump in. 

A few months ago, though, I stumbled across the lovely song "En kadhal solla," from a Tamil film called Paiyya.  And I was rather taken with its scrumptious star, Tamannah.  So when I had a chance recently (thanks to Beth, from whom I stole the screenshot at the top of this post) to watch Tamannah in an entire film, Konchem ishtam konchem kashtam ("a little sweetness, a little sorrow"), I decided to dip my toe in. What I got was a movie that, as its title promises, is sometimes quite sweet indeed. But - while it thankfully never gets all the way to sorrowful - Konchem ishtam konchem kashtam does reach tedium more than once.  At its weakest, in its plodding and often stupid second half, the movie is part Dilwale dulhaniya le jayenge, part The Parent Trap. And when it ventures into that territory, the movie is just not very interesting.

Geetha Subramanyam (Tamannah) has such a close relationship with her father Subramanyam (Nasser) that she made his name part of her own.  So Geetha is recalcitrant when Subramanyam sends her to Hyderabad to study.  Once there, though, she settles in comfortably, staying with her cousin's family, and developing a close mentoring relationship with a professor, Rajyalaxmi (Ramya Krishna).   And she meets a fellow student, Rajyalaxmi's son Siddhu (Siddharth), a skirt-chasing pleasure-seeker who doesn't impress her much at first.  But soon, she sees a tender side of him, and romance blossoms.  The stern Subramanyam, though, doesn't approve of her choice.  Siddhu's parents are separated, Subramanyam notes, and so Siddhu, with no role model for a successful partnership, would not make a suitable husband.  Siddhu offers Subramanyam a deal - if he reunites Rajyalaxmi with Siddhu's father Prakash (Prakash Raj), then Subramanyam will give his consent to the match between Siddhu and Geetha.  Now Siddhu faces only the small challenge of bringing his estranged parents back together.

This last leg of the story, the conceit of reuniting the estranged Rajyalaxmi and Prakash, is what drags Konchem ishtam konchem kastham into the weeds.   It is just too naïve and unbelievable to be satisfying.   Some movies are, of course, supposed to be fantasies, and one can be sure that an effervescent Telugu romance with impossibly beautiful young principals is not in any way striving for realism.   But the one-two punch of tired, silly plot elements - the girl who won't take a step without her father's approval, and the boy desperate to repair his broken childhood by rekindling romance between people who fell out of love two decades earlier - is just too much for the movie to bear; it bends under the strain, and grows insipid.   One is left wondering why we are made to sit through it - if the plot succeeds, it's facile and childish; and if it doesn't, why did the movie waste so much time on it?

Despite this weak final lap, the movie does show signs of smartness, though these are sometimes frustrating because the payoff is so unsatisfying.   The "rakish gadabout goes to great lengths to win over his girl's father" device is handled better here than in Dilwale dulhaniya le jayenge, where the insufferably arrogant Raj's approach is to lie and cheat the family at every turn.   Here, at least, Siddhu has to make good on his end of the bargain, asinine though it is - when he tries to deceive Subramanyam by hiring actors to play his parents, Geetha vetoes the scheme.  

And there is some unexpected modernness and maturity in the backstory of Rajyalaxmi and Prakash's separation, which was rooted in Rajyalaxmi's dissatisfaction with being left to the duties of housekeeping and childrearing while Prakash, taking her utterly for granted, pursued the challenges of building a business.   Even Subramanyam, as a stern father and leader of a traditional village, shows signs of progressiveness.  After all, Subramanyam insists that Geetha go study in Hyderabad because he wants to set a good example in the village in support of higher education for young women.   And it's not a knee-jerk "divorce is a blot on a family name" sort of reaction that drives his disapproval of Siddhu as a son-in-law, but the considerably more reasoned position regarding Siddhu's inexperience with healthy relationships.  Whether you buy that reasoning or not, at least it is an attempt to get beyond the expected clichés of an old-fashioned patriarch.

These signs of intelligent life aren't quite enough to overcome the eye-rolling tedium of the movie's second half - but fortunately, Konchem ishtam konchem kashtam offers enough other pleasures to make it, on balance, still an enjoyable watch.   It is colorfully and artfully shot, with a bright primary palate like a bowl of Skittles.   Some of the relationships are touchingly handled - Siddhu's relationship with Prakash faithfully represents the awkward chumminess that sometimes characterizes divorced dads trying to negotiate whether to be a parent or a buddy.  Rajyalaxmi is that rare appealing mature woman of substance, not a sort of character one gets to see too frequently in any culture's movies.   And I get a special pleasure from Geetha's attachment to her chosen surname, Subramanyam - she steadfastly refuses to take Siddhu's name on marriage, and in an adorable moment of capitulation Siddhu finally offers to become a Subramanyam himself.  It is always a treat to see a young woman asserting the first and strongest symbol of her identity in this way, and to see young men realizing that it's not a threat to them.

Above all else, though, when Konchem ishtam konchem kashtam works well, it rides the the appeal of its leads, Siddharth and Tamannah.  Key to any romantic story is that the audience get behind the pairing and root for it to succeed.  Konchem ishtam konchem kashtam invokes the mildly annoying trope in which the solid love of an uptight good girl can transform an immature jerk into a nice guy - but there is enough of the genuine in Siddhu's emergent, gentle sweetness to make this forgivable.   Siddhu does beat up a bunch of thugs (as, I am told, any Telugu hero worth his salt must), but he does it out of Geetha's sight, and refreshingly, his fisticuff prowess has no influence on her feelings for him.  On balance, he is a just a cute guy who has a bit of growing up to do, and watching him do it is not an unpleasant way to spend a movie - especially when he cuts loose in the movies stupendous songs, like this one in which he expresses his frustration with Subramanyam.

 

And then there is Tamannah. Oh, my - Tamannah. She is a little younger - okay, significantly younger - than most heroines who make my heart race, and I admit I feel a bit like pervy uncle at times watching her on screen while my brain short-circuits and the only thoughts I can express go something like this: I WANT TO LICK.

 

(Watch past the horrible Black Eyed Peas song in the beginning; it gets better, I promise.)

Apart from being most lickable and blessed with magnificent hips, Tamannah is more than adequate to what her role asks of her - which is really not all that much more than being fetching, whether laughingly scratching the faces of people she dislikes out of photographs, pouting, or tossing her head in uptight indignation.  Tamannah has the art of being fetching down cold, and she's just a delight to watch.

All the songs are terrific, both the slick compositions that are unmistakably Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy, and the colorful, jubilant picturizations.  The songs, in fact, are really where this movie and its adorable leads shine the most brightly.  The story may be artless, the comedy side plots a mixed bag.  (These revolve around Geetha's cricket-obsessed uncle (Brahmanandam) or Siddhu's inexplicably middle-aged chum (Venu Madhav).)   But get Tamannah and Siddharth together on a screen sparkling with gorgeous bursts of vibrant color - preferably with a passel of dancers and one of Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy's springy songs behind them - and you'll quickly forget how laboriously you had to slog through the scenes between.  These sometime sweetnesses really do make the whole worthwhile.

 

Tamannah playing rugby in the rain? Kids doing air guitar? What's not to love?

Aamne saamne (1967)

आमने सामने

I have said this so many times: I love the 1960s. I love thrillers. I love Shashi Kapoor. And I simply adore Sharmila Tagore, who ranks on the list of filmi women who melt my shorts. So when Amrita told me that Aamne saamne ("face to face, opposite") had all that plus Sharmila on waterskis, I knew I had to watch it. And when I sat down to it, my expectations were high. Despite that great potential, though, I have to admit that Aamne saamne comes up a little short. I watched it with Memsaab, and her review fairly thoroughly covers all the half-assed devices and wrong turns the movie takes. But what can I say - I enjoyed myself all the same. I am a sucker for all that pretty - and with "the ShaSha" (thanks, Amrita) rocking magnificent 60s style, there is loads of pretty to go around.

One terrible night, a woman is murdered. Her husband Deepak (Shashi Kapoor) is caught at the scene, and tried for her murder. Deepak is acquitted in court, but he inherits his wife's wealth, and for that reason is convicted in th court of public opinion. He heads to Bombay to start a new life with a new name, Gopal. Gopal whiles away the hours stalking his pretty young neighbor Sapna (Sharmila Tagore), who finds him rightly creepy and annoying at first, but in grand filmi tradition, warms to him in time. Sapna's brother Pran (Madan Puri) wants her to marry her eager suitor Prem (Prem Chopra), and they threaten to kill her if she doesn't comply. So Sapna and Gopal elope to Kashmir, where they frolic happily - and gorgeously - until shades of Gopal's mysterious past begin to cast looming shadows of suspicion.

It is undeniable that Aamne saamne does not have much to offer in the way of substance, and that the plot, such as it is, is loaded with problematic tropes.  For example: there is not a single man in this movie who does not, at some point, threaten to kill Sapna if she refuses to do as he commands.  This is bad enough coming from the film's nominal villains, Pran and Prem; it's downright appalling when even Gopal gets in on the coercive action. 

And Gopal's pursuit of Sapna is creeptastic, a particularly egregious example of filmi stalking.  Which is not to say he doesn't look lovely doing it:

 

Indeed, only Shashi Kapoor could find a way to be adorable and creepy at the same time, as he does during the stalkalicious song "Aaj kal humse roothe".

It's very easy to be blinded by the pretty here and forget that what's really going on is quite twisted and skeezy.  After all, Shashi himself looks good enough to eat - good enough to make me question my sexuality several times over.   And if that's not enough, he's not just perving on Sapna - he's perving on Sapna in a bubble bath.

Good lord, isn't she a delicious frosted cupcake?  Between this and Vidya Balan's bathtub romp in The Dirty Picture, well, I'll be in my bunk.  (If someone can think of a movie with Shabana Azmi in a bubble bath and complete the hat trick for me, I'll die a happy woman.) 

This creepy side of Shashi is rather enjoyable at first.  Typically, only in relatively early films of big stars does one get to enjoy them playing rather unsavory characters.  It's something I love about Amitabh Bachchan's Saudagar - admittedly a very different sort of film from Aamne saamne - in which he plays a truly reprehensible character that one could never imagine him playing just a few years later at the peak of his stardom. Likewise, I took some pleasure in watching Shashi look dark and sinister early in the movie.  But the truth is there is no payoff, no substance behind it.  Gopal is not dark, and not sinister - it's all a big fat red herring, contrivance for the sake of manufactured suspense that is neither particularly effective nor sustained by the story. 

Aamne saamne does have, like many movies of its era, a noisy comedy side plot.  This one features Rajendranath as a rather bumbling Bengali chap who appends himself as a sort of valet to Gopal.   I haven't seen a ton of Rajendranath but I loved him to death in Tere ghar ke samne and even his brief appearance in Chhoti si baat.  So I was ready and delighted for more when I saw his name in the credits.  His turn here, though, is largely a broad Bengali stereotype that falls somewhere between "I don't fully get it" and "it's just not that funny."

And yet despite all that meh - the lackluster plotting, the unfunny comedy, the creepy unromantic romance, the multiple instances of extortion in the name of love - I can't say I had a bad time watching Aamne saamne.  It has some truly outstanding songs - Shashi absolutely kills in his white stove-pipe pants in Rafi's superb "Nain milakar chain churana," a song which also features some epic pouting by Sharmila.

 

As if that's not enough, this song follows an interlude in which Prem Chopra attempts to dance the Mashed Potato.  Later in the film there is also a truly bizarre "African dance" featuring Laxmi Chayya and a bunch of blackfaced men.  The 60s just don't get any better than this, folks.

And then there is "Mere bechain dil ko chain tune diya," ostensibly the reason I watched this movie in the first place:

But Sharmila is just as tasty fully dressed as she is in that swimsuit. 

And as a pair, the ShaSha romp around Kashmir as well as anyone.

What can I say?  When the payoff is this kind of pretty, the movie doesn't have to be all that good to get the job done.   Aamne saamne may not have a ton going on in the substance department, but it earned itself what is likely the most pic-spammy post in Filmi Geek's history.  That's got to be worth something. 

Sachaa jhutha (1970)

सच्चा झूठा

My favorite Manmohan Desai movies, like Amar Akbar Anthony and Parvarish, cloak grand allegorical themes in glorious wackadoodle masala trappings.  Continuing the unorthodox Rajesh Khanna retrospective that I began with Haathi mere saathi, I went into Desai's Sachaa jhutha ("truth and lies") hoping for more of the same.  What I got doesn't quite measure up in substance - but it is nevertheless a satisfying masala meal.

Bhola (Rajesh Khanna) is a simple village guy, a musician who wants nothing more than to see his beloved sister Belu (Kumari Naaz) happily married.  Suitors demand a hefty dowry, though, because Belu is lame, dependent upon crutches for mobility.  So Bhola heads to Mumbai in hopes of making enough money to get Belu settled.  Once there, Bhola is mistaken for an eccentric millionaire, Ranjit (also Rajesh Khanna), for whom he happens to be a dead ringer.  Ranjit happens to moonlight as a serial jewel thief, and he sees an opportunity - he hires Bhola to impersonate him, duping the innocent fellow with a sob story about his mother, so that he can pull off big heists with Bhola supplying his alibi.  Meanwhile, police inspector Pradhan (Vinod Khanna) suspects Ranjit for the larcenies, and sets his colleague Leela (Mumtaz) to go undercover and get close to Ranjit.  But it's Bhola, not Ranjit, that Leela gets to know - and naturally, sparks fly.

Where Haathi mere saathi was all about the elephants, Sachaa jhutha is mostly about Rajesh Khanna and his double role.  And I have to get this out of the way:  I still don't much like Rajesh Khanna.  If I have to watch him, though, Sachaa jhutha is the best way I can think of to do it.  As Ranjit, Khanna's role demands that he be smarmy and repulsive - so my usual response to him suits quite nicely.  And the double role, requiring him to distinguish Bhola from Ranjit, gives him more opportunity for range, for projecting a state other than droopy, froggy, and supercilious.  Bhola is, on the whole, more wide-eyed, ingenuous, and energetic than most Rajesh Khanna characters.  Which is not to say Bhola is entirely consistent - he may be a bit too smooth in his wooing of Leela than his character, otherwise a guileless bumpkin, really should be.  But these are minor critiques of a pair of performances that are fun and more than adequately appealing even to this decided non-fan.

As to the film as a whole, one does have certain expectations of Manmohan Desai masala, and in that I can't fairly say that Sachaa jhutha disappoints.  The movie may lack the grand philosophical scope of some of Desai's more expansive films, but it nevertheless does have - as the title promises - a minor point to make about the triumph of truth and guilelessness over deceite and subterfuge.  The two adorable and hilarious sequences in which love is confessed and blossoms under the influence of a truth serum (really!) underscore this point.

And substance aside, Sachaa jhutha is crammed full of juicy masala morsels.  There are unexplained, inexplicable dopplegangers and ensuing mistaken identities; a hilariously stylish costume party (see this song); a villain's teched-up, tricked-out underground lair.  There is a cute gender-reversed Pygmalion sequence, reminiscent of one in Jab jab phool khile, in which Ranjit's moll Ruby (Faryal) teaches Bhola to behave like a gentleman.  And the climax relies on the mass administration of a stupefaction drug - in a movie that already contains a truth serum.  (Soul-baring and stupefaction? That sounds like the effect certain women have on me...) 

Desai's masala Bombay is a city of magnified coincidence, one in which the same half-dozen people run into one another again and again - or nearly miss doing so, as the story demands.  And that doesn't even reach the village side of the story, which features Belu's smart and loyal dog, as well as Belu and Bhola's cruel, wretched stepmother (Praveen Paul) who gets her just deserts in a magnificent filmi flood.  She goes out in grand, symbolically-charged Desai style, with nothing left as she sinks beneath the surge but a few floating Rupee notes, notes she earlier snatched from Belu's hand and stuffed into her greedy choli. 

Yet with all that going on, Sachaa jhutha is surprisingly taut for 150 minutes of masala.  Rounding out the fun is a terrific appearance by a young, dashing Vinod Khanna as the serious Inspector Pradhan.  This is first class Action Vinod stuff - he provides most of the movie's dishum-dishum, while putting nary a crease in his expensively-tailored suits.  And then there is the delectable Mumtaz, adorable as a cupcake.  She, of course, is at her best in the movie's many fabulous songs.  From her groovy moves in "Pyar karle pyar" to her superfab outfit in "O tum jo kehdo," Mumtaz makes sure there is no shortage of eye-candy. But the hottest song of all is "Yunhi tum mujhse baat karti ho," in which, under the influence of the truth serum, Bhola and Leela confess their love on the deck of a boat in the harbor.

 

Sachaa jhutha is simply great fun to watch, as any masala movie should be.  And, as many good movies do, it just gets better and better in memory - writing this review has made me itch to return to it and revisit the all grooviest, funniest, wackiest, sexiest scenes.  Thanks to Memsaab (from whom I cribbed the screen-grab at the top of this post) I may do just that ...

Delhi-6 (2009)

दिल्ली-६

A recent Outlook India piece by Sunil Menon (one that also happened to mention this blog, I'm delighted to say) lamented the absence of a sense of place in many Hindi films.  Traditionally, Menon argues, geographical realism yields to movie magic, be it in masala films that are "officially headquartered in cloud-cuckoo-land (with branches in Switzerland)," or even in more serious films that make only passing invocation of locale through picture-postcard shots of landmarks. 

But my own experience of Hindi movies of late has been quite different from this.   From Kahaani's vibrant Calcutta, to Chhoti si baat's bustling Bombay, and even Tere ghar ke samne's romantic traipse up and down the spire of Qutub Minar, I have felt exquisitely connected to locale in many movies I have watched in recent months.  Almost certainly this is a lingering effect of my first trip to India, taken earlier this year, which converted many of the colors and locales of the movies from flat scenery to real, swirling, sensual associations in my mind.  One of the most potent experiences I had - one that made India pop off the movie screen and into the rest of my senses - was a bicycle-rickshaw ride and walk through Chandni Chowk on just the second full day of my trip.  Rakeysh Omprasad Mehra's Delhi-6 whirls through those very same churning streets, and watching this excellent movie closes the feedback loop of my experience - watching Hindi movies has made India a fascination for me of limitless depth and life, and seeing India inperson has made Hindi movies breathe with a new vivacity.

Annapurna (Waheeda Rehman) has been living with her son and his family in New York for many years, but her only wish is to return to her home in Delhi and spend the end of her life there.  Her grandson Roshan (Abhishek Bachchan) takes her there, and meets the extended family of relatives and neighbors who welcome Annapurna back into their crowded Chandni Chowk lives.   Roshan is thrilled by the sensory overload of the neighborhood, the brilliant pageantry of the Ram Leela plays, the broad spectrum of people he meets there.  He makes a bumpy adjustment to the realities of life in old Delhi - city streets choked by the holy spectacle of a cow giving birth, the arbitrary exercise of power (and reaping of baksheesh) by the police.  He is caught up, too, in the fear and excitement that grips the city because of seemingly random capers of an enigmatic assailant, Kala Bandar (the black monkey).  As Roshan gets pulled deeper into the mystery of Kala Bandar, he becomes a part of Delhi 6, and Delhi 6 becomes a part of him.

Among the many pleasures of Delhi-6 is Roshan's broad sense of wonder as he greets the tumult of Chandni Chowk for the first time.  As Roshan gazes across the crowd and exclaims "Awesome!", I can't help but share in that wonder and relive it with him.  Roshan is a foreigner, despite his family roots in the community - he grew up in America, speaks Hindi only as well as is expedient for the story, and greets the city and its inhabitants with wide-eyed fascination (and occasional indignation) that is palpably identifiable to a firang like myself. 

The people Roshan meets there provide the texture that brings the location to life.  Central among these is a close family friend, the avuncular Ali Baig (Rishi Kapoor), one of the wealthier inhabitants of the neighborhood, who becomes a father figure and confidant to Roshan.  Rishi Kapoor is delightful in this role, a more natural performance than his scene-chewing in Luck by Chance.  Less loveable but just as compelling is the cranky Madangopal (Om Puri), father of Bittu (Sonam Kapoor), who hides her makeup and navel-piercing from her family and dreams of Bombay and stardom.  Madangopal's ambitious but somewhat stupid brother Jaigopal (Pavan Malhotra) teases the apparent simpleton Gobar (Atul Kulkarni), who of course turns out to be smarter and wiser than anyone gives him credit for.  A sinister money-lender (Prem Chopra) wields his power and influence like the jeweled walking-stick he carries.  The sweet-shop owner Mamdu (Deepak Dobriyal) greets Roshan with overflowing warmth and offers of sweets; he declares, "Bhookh mitane ke liye kutte khate hain - insaan khaate hain jodne ke liye." (Dogs eat to sate hunger - people eat to bond with each other.)

I adore this sort of neighborhood ensemble cast that brings to a movie a vibrancy, an essence, a palpable sense of life in a particular place.  This was something I loved, too, about Shyam Benegal's Welcome to Sajjanpur - and here, as in that movie, Divya Dutta once again utterly fascinates in a very brief but completely riveting role.  She plays Jalebi, a low-caste woman who collects trash and, with a compelling mixture of viciousness and sadness, harrasses neighborhood boys who cringe superstitiously away from her.  And she is a harbinger of the divisive mentality that lurks below Chandni Chowk's affable surface.

The people generate the pulse of Chandni Chowk, all these religiously, ethnically, economically diverse souls cramped together in the narrow galis of the old city.  And they live together in relative harmony, until the tension of Kala Bandar drives wedges between them, splintering the neighborhood.  Roshan, of course, ultimately helps to repair the shattered community.  But he is not so much the prodigal savior, as is Shah Rukh Khan's character in Swades.  Roshan is not a smarmy hero, swooping in with great knowledge from the West to rescue the backward locals.  Instead, he is something of an accidental savior.   After his initial tourist reaction to Delhi 6 subsides - and when internecine tension threatens to set the neighborhood ablaze - his first instinct is to flee back to the comfort of the US.  But finally, moved by love (both for Annapurna and for Bittu), Roshan sees, and takes, an opportunity for self-sacrifice. 

It is a very satisfying character arc, in a very satisfying movie.  Roshan's growth, the superb cast of richly diverse and colorfully sketched characters, the swirling sense of Chandni Chowk, the beautiful array of A.R. Rahman's songs, all combine and resonate with my own memories of Delhi, for a movie I am sure I will return to whenever I want to relive my thrilling afternoon in Delhi 6.

Band baaja baaraat (2010)

बैंड बाजा बारात

It isn't often that a new film makes me wonder how it will be remembered in 30 years.  Even most good movies are looked back on with affectionate nostalgia; only a few attain the status of classics, elevated in memory to a cultural touchstone, something more than a nice way to spend a few hours. Before you decide that I have lost my mind: I am not quite ready to say that Band baaja baaraat ("band, fanfare, wedding procession") is such a movie, though it is delightful and extremely well-wrought.  Yet, just like the business created by its protagonists, Band baaja baaraat is a synergy, more than the sum of its parts -  enough so to make me wonder whether more might be going on here than just the best-made love story of the past few years.

Shruti Kakkad (Anushka Sharma) is a young woman with a plan.  Fresh from college, she has a vision of building the biggest wedding planning business in the country, and is not afraid to work for it.  Her classmate, Bittoo Sharma (Ranveer Singh), talks Shruti into a business partnership, if only to buy some time before his father drags him away from the excitement of Delhi, and back to the family farm.  Shruti and Bittoo take to the work like demons, putting in long hours together and working their way up from small celebrations in dingy chawls to the grand prize of wedding planning - giant, multi-day, estate home affairs.  Their style is unique, colorful, and fun, and their business - Shaadi Mubarak - has arrived.  But the growing attraction between Shruti and Bittoo sours the laddoo; Shruti's rules of business don't leave any room for passion, and Bittoo sees himself too much the gadabout to let love tie him down.  Shaadi Mubarak bends and breaks under the strain, and each of the partners tries, unsuccessfully, to carry on the business alone.  It is going to take near-divine intervention to get Shaadi Mubarak - not to mention Bittoo and Shruti - back on the right track.

Band baaja baaraat is, most importantly, a ton of fun, well-paced and colorful - and cleverly constructed with built-in excuses for multiple wedding songs without turning the movie into Hum aapke hain koun.  It is a cute, shiny entertainer - accessible, charming, and funny, and blessed with lots of terrific music.  Shaadi Mubarak's signature style is described in the movie with the words "chatak" and "dhinchyak" - both rendered in the subtitles as "kitsch" - which lend the whole film a wonderful shimmering color and energy that is exactly what makes this kind of Bollywood movie so immersive and fun.   

But for all of that delicious sparkle, Band baaja baaraat is also a lot richer and more character-driven than most love stories.  It isn't just two hours of stalling to see how the principals find their way to each other; there is a strong character arc for each of them, a process of maturation that is very satisfying to watch.  The movie gives them a few lucky breaks - the one that brings Shaadi Mubarak back together after the rift, in particular, is a little too far on the deus ex machina side of things - but it also never shies away from showing just how much hard work Shruti and Bittoo pour into their business. 

As a modern, independent young heroine, Shruti is even better than Jab We Met's Geet, strong-willed without being reactionary, visionary without being flighty.  She is far from flawless - she has eye rolling down to an art form, and it is clear from the beginning that she will need to develop some flexibility and a sense of humor before movie's end.  But develop she does - her speech to Bittoo in the movie's climax nearly made me stand up and cheer - how refreshing to see a young woman in a movie, after suffering a heartbreak, dust herself off and prepare to get on with her life!  And at the resolution, she accepts him without compromising her strength, noting that "uske tang tod dungi, partership nahin" ("I'll break his legs, but I won't break the partnership").   

The movie's excellent handling of the sexual facet of Bittoo and Shruti's relationship is refreshing, poignant, and thoroughly relatable.  It is not sex itself that throws a wrench in Bittoo and Shruti's works; it is their failure to honestly acknowledge and communicate their feelings about it and about each other.  Band baaja baaraat does not have even the scent of a morality tale, in which young people's ambitions are driven off the rails by sex.  No one's life is ruined by sex - in particular, Shruti's life is not ruined.  The message here is only that one should be as mature and forthright about matters of the heart as one is about matters of business - but in neither sphere is it necessarily a bad thing for a woman to be aggressive about getting what she wants.  

With all that richness in Shruti's character arc, Band baaja baaraat would have been a good movie even if Bittoo were merely a cipher or a foil for her development, but he too gets a satisfying character progression.  He starts the movie as a bit of a feckless loser with more strut than substance, and a capacity for lying under pressure that, one feels, will cause him more trouble than it gets him out of.  But Shruti's steadying influence puts his natural (if rough) charm and fast-talking ability to its best possible use, and there is much delight in watching Bittoo coming to understand how he needs her.  

As such a character-driven movie, Band baaja baaraat asks much more of Ranveer Singh and Anushka Sharma - a newcomer and a near-newcomer - than most light romances demand of their young stars, and part of what makes it so good is that the two of them are more than up to the task.  And that is where I start to think about where Band Baaja baaraat will end up after a few more decades of filmi history.  There is something about its electric young jodi that reminds me of the thrill with which folks remember star-launching romances like Bobby or Qayamat se qayamat tak.  As a work of filmmaking craft, Band baaja baaraat is far better than either of those.  But even as the decorations get taken down and the bleat of horns fades into the distance, the question lingers: are Anushka Sharma and Ranveer Singh a nascent powerhouse jodi? 

And  beyond just the power of the pairing, Band baaja baarat offers a bold, empowering, reflection of the industrious, young population of urban India - it's like Rocket Singh with sex and without the questionable business practices. (It's no small matter that Shruti is explicit in her conviction that Shaadi Mubarak distinguish itself from the prevailing wedding-planning practice of cheating customers.  Band baaja baaraat strives to show an alternative path to success besides beating the establishment at its own game.)  The segment of middle-class society portrayed so positively in Band baaja baaraat is, in no small part, the folks  who get to decide which of today's movies are tomorrow's classics.  So, does this movie capture a watershed moment in the development of the Republic?  That is a grand and heavy load for a light, comedic romance to carry.  If any movie can shoulder that load, though, Band baaja baaraat is it.

 

Tere ghar ke samne (1963)

तेरे घर के सामने

On the long flights back from India, not wanting my trip to be over, I kept my head and heart there by watching a couple of Hindi movies.  Vijay Anand's Tere ghar ke samne ("Opposite your house") turned out to be an excellent choice - its postcard-perfect scenes of Delhi brought me right back to exploring that city on the first days of my trip.  I kept saying, "Hey, I was there!"   And if that weren't enough, I got a delightful movie in the mix - full of belly laughs, excellent songs, and the inimitable charm of Nutan.  What's not to love?

Seth Karamchand (Harindranath Chattopadhyay) and Lala Jagannath (Om Prakash) are bitter rivals after they buy adjacent Delhi plots at a heated auction.  Each is determined to build a house that stands taller and more magnificent than the other's.  To that end, each wants to hire Delhi's most fashionable architect, the young prodigy Rakesh Kumar (Dev Anand).  Rakesh can't say no to either man.  On the one hand, he is in love with Karamchand's lithe, witty daughter Sulekha (Nutan).  On the other, the stern, pious Jagannath is his father!  Rakesh must find a way to please both clients, while keeping them in the dark about his double-engagement.  And keeping secrets from Sulekha is a dangerous game that threatens their budding romance. 

Tere ghar ke samne, for all its levity and comedy, addresses the prime cultural conflicts that make so many of the movies of the 1960s - including Vijay Anand's other films, like Jewel Thief - so fascinating.  The tension between East and West, between tradition and modernity, is made explicit in Rakesh's relationship with his father, Jagganath, who heartily complains that Rakesh has forsaken his values of temperance and piety during his time studying in America. In the end, though, the younger generation bands together to pull a fast one on the grown-ups, forcing them to reconcile their shallow enmities.  The kids in Tere ghar ke samne do not wish to abandon tradition and follow their pleasure regardless of their parents' wishes.  Rather, they are determined to convince the parents to see things their way, acceding to modernity while remaining true to their traditional roots.  It is possibly over-reading to see a post-Partition allegory in this, but several people I spoke to in India comented that it is the younger generations who are beginning to heal the rifts of partition; perhaps Vijay Anand anticipated that phenomenon with this tale.   

Unlike Kahaani or Howrah Bridge, which evoke Calcutta as an additional character in their dramatis personae, Tere ghar ke samne does not offer a strong sense of Delhi as a vibrant city.  Its characters occupy the rarified space of extremely wealthy New Delhi, frequenting cabarets and garden clubs.  The city of Delhi is presented not so much as a living entity, but rather as a parade of famous landmarks in the opening credits, or glimpsed through windows in the background of indoor scenes.  Still, Vijay Anand puts this setting to magnificent use in the sequence shot at Qutub Minar, and especially the wonderful song "Dil ka bhanwar kare pukar".  By the time I got to Qutub Minar, the tower itself had been closed to visitors for 30 years, but I got to vicariously enjoy Rakesh and Sulekha's flirtatious, romantic climb to the top and musical descent. 

And, while I am on the subject of charming romantic songs, the movie's title song is utterly delightful - a lonely, pining Rakesh sings to a shimmering apparition of Sulekha in his glass of whisky.  The attention to detail in this song is simply masterful - in one especially wonderful moment (beginning around 1:10), the image of Sulekha reacts with a chill to an ice cube dropped into her glass.    

In Vijay Anand's Jewel Thief, just a few years later, Dev Anand feels like an aging hero, and is beginning to show a slightly creepy air - as much as I love that movie, there is something of the dirty old man about him.  In Tere ghar ke samne, though, it's clear why he is thought of as one of the most charming leading men of his era.  His Rakesh is jaunty, sweet, and earnest as he romances Sulekha.   And as Sulekha, Nutan is simply delicious.  She doesn't have a lot to do except look beautiful and flirt slyly, but she delivers both perfectly, lighting up the screen with her smile - and she does get a few good zingers in, as Sulekha resists (but not really) Rakesh's wooing banter.  The supporting cast adds a lot of richness as well.  Rajendranath is hilarious as Sulekha's soldier brother Ronny, who is big and loud and preternaturally cheerful.  Om Prakash is an absolute riot; he delivers Jagannath's pious speeches with a squeak, as if they are too much even for his copious breath.  And yet, even in all this comedic bluster, he brings a touch of poignancy to his relationship with Rakesh.  It is remarkable that such a broad performance can be at the same time subtle and moving. 

 

Half Ticket (1962)

I don't think I can give a more fitting synopsis of this adorable madcap comedy than the one on the box of my Ultra DVD, which begins thus:  "Vijay (Kishore Kumar) was born reverse.  Seth Lalchand, a millionaire business magnate of Jubbalpur, who fathered this abnormal addition to mankind, began suffering its chain reactions right from the day Vijay acquired mobility with the postures of a quadruped.  Years later, when Vijay was skipping about rather too vivaciously on his hind legs, his antics and acorabaties (sic) were immeasurably greater than those normally found in the average biped animals."  The movie makes a little more sense than that - only a little - but it matters not at all, as Kishore Kumar's limitless zany energy, Madhubala's irresistible charm, and several absolutely superb songs combine to make Half Ticket a delightful and hysterical ride.

Vijay (Kishore Kumar) is a relentless troublemaker.  His antics get him kicked out of college, and when they embarrass his father (Moni Chatterjee), they get him kicked out his home as well.  Left to fend for himself, he decides to head for Bombay by train.  To con his way into a reduced fare "half ticket," Vijay dresses as a young boy and poses as an arrested development case, and caromes around as a zany man-child.  A jewel thief on the lam from police, Raja (Pran), sneaks a stolen diamond into Vijay's pocket, thinking that Vijay, an apparent mental patient, will be easy to manipulate and recover the diamond from.  Trying to escape from Raja, Vijay meets a performer named Asha (Madhubala), who also goes by Rajni, and charms her into protecting him.  Asha's marriage-obsessed aunt (Manorama) sees a match between Vijay and Asha too good to resist.  But just when Asha begins to fall for this peculiar fellow, Raja and his girlfriend Lily (Shammi), scheming to recover their stolen diamond, interfere to set Asha against Vijay. 

So much for the story, which is light, improbable, and totally beside the point.  The point, rather, is Kishore Kumar horsing around, donning goofy costumes, making silly noises, and just generally being funny.  And he delivers many laughs indeed, both on his own and with the help of the rest of the cast.  Sometimes the shouting-and-slapstick variety of Indian comedy doesn't work on me, but Kishore Kumar brings a transcendent ability to the screen - his wild flailing is utterly manic, yet he performs with perfect physical control.  He really is a riot. It's difficult to choose just a few scenes to highlight, but some of the best include a scene in which Vijay squirms away from Lily's aggressive grab-ass tactics as she tries to pluck the purloined diamond from his rear pocket.  Another comes in the form of a magnificent song, "Aake sidhi lagi," in which Vijay (fleeing from Raja), and Raja (fleeing from police), stumble into a gypsy camp, don costumes, and perform a love song together.  This song really has to be seen to be believed - you have not lived until you have seen Pran and Kishore romancing each other. 

(click for full size awesomness)

Madhubala is good with physical comedy too, and Asha's reactions to Vijay's antics are delightful.  There is something ineffably charming in watching a poised and competent young woman like Half Ticket's Asha (or Nutan in Dilli ka Thug, whose character is also called Asha) slowly and incredulously falling, against her better judgment, for one of Kishore's completely loonytunes characters.  Madhubala is masterful - and delicious - with facial expressions, especially in her two delightful songs with Kishore, like "Aankhon mein tum."  There are not enough superlatives to describe how beautiful Madhubala is in songs like this one.  And speaking of mastery of facial expressions, Half Ticket offers a generous helping of Manorama at her best as well, especially in the film's climax, where she drives a crane from which poor Vijay is dangling. 

On reflection, it occurs to me that Half Ticket offers less in the way of substance than other Kishore comedies I've seen - Chalti ka naam gaadi has a lot more going on, and even Dilli ka thug has a mild social context (the villains are purveyors of tainted medicine).  No matter - Half Ticket is chock full of deliciousness, laughs, and absolutely amazing songs - I can't neglect to mention "Woh ek nigah", which features Helen conspiring to protect Vijay from Raju.  (How can you not love a  movie that has not just one, but two Pran songs?)  Some of the humor is even a little less broad - there is very comical dialogue (including one great scene where Vijay scares away a pandit intent on finding him a bride), and some wonderful sight gags as well - look for the moment in "Woh ek nigah" where Raju pulls off Vijay's fake mustache, and Vijay reaches into his pocket to pull out a fresh one.  With all of this going for it, Half Ticket is naturally an instant favorite.

More screencappy goodness - once again, as always, click to enlarge.

Woh Ek Nigah Kya MiliWoh