heres a taster.......
1.Mughal-e-azam(1960)k.asif's
Cast: Prithviraj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar, Madhubala, Durga Khote, Nigar Sultana,
Ajit Kumar, Murad, Jilloo, Surendra, Vijayalakshmi
Director: K Asif
Script, Dialogue: Aman, Kamal Amrohi
Lyrics: Shakeel Badayuni
Cinematography: R D Mathur
Music:Naushad
One of Hindi cinema's best known films ever.
WHENEVER ONE SPEEKS of grandeur, extravagance and opulence in Hindi movies,
the name that foremost to ones's mind is 'Mughul-E-Azam'.
There's something so imposing about the film even now, that all other costume dramas we can think of simply pale in comparison.
'Mughul-E-Azam' can easily be termed as filmmaker K. Asif's most ambitious venture and his most successful one as well. And look at the man's track record - in his entire career-span,
he made only four films and he is still regarded with more honour and respect than most filmmakers we know.
When K.Asif started work on this magnificent movie, he knew that it was going to be one expensive film. And he was prepared to meet all expenses on his own.
But the time-span was something he was unguarded about.
'Mughul-E-Azam' was in the making for 17 long years. It would just be fair to say that more than half of Asif's career went into the making of this one film.
Based in the closing years of Akbar's reign (1556-1605). So lavish were the sets of the film that people used to come from distant places to just see them.
The film narrates the story of Prince Salim's (later Jahangir 1605-1628) love for Anarkali, a singer. A love his father strongly disapproves of. But so strong is Salim's love for Anarkali that he goes to battle against his father. Akbar defeats Salim in battle and orders him to be executed.
However, according to the royal decree, the Salim can be saved from dying if Anarkali dies in his place. Anarkali, spunky woman that she is, however does her own thing by defying Akbar in his palace. The song 'pyaar kiya to darna kya' went on to become one of the most popular songs ever recorded and the sheesh mahal created for the song was a major attraction for the crowds.
According to legend, Akbar ordered Anarkali to be walled alive, but the film shows that unknown to Salim, Akbar spares her. A melodrama, rather loudly done,
'Mughul-E-Azam' is considered to be one of the most significant movies to be made in this country.
That itself is a momentous homage to a man
who made less than four films in his entire
career.
Karimuddin Asif(1924-1971)
Filmography.
Phool(1944)
Mughal-E-Azam(1960)
Love and God(1986)
Sasta Khoon Mahenga Paani(incompete)
.............................................
22.Mera Naam Joker
(1970)Raj Kapoor's
*Raj Kapoor, Manoj Kumar, Simi, Achala Sachdev, Rishi Kapoor, Dharmendra, Dara Singh, Ms. Kseina Rabinkina of Moscow, Rajendra Kumar, Padmini, Om Prakash, Agha, Rajendra Nath, Sunder, Mukri, Maruti, Bhalla, Polson, Birbal, Sabu Rebello, Mohan Bali, Fazal Khan and Vazid Khan
Credits
Producer, Editor & Director : Raj Kapoor
Music Directors : Shankar Jaikishan
Lyricists : Late Shailendra, Hasrat Jaipuri, Neeraj, Prem Dhawan & Shaily Shailendra
Story, Screenplay & Dialogue Writer : K.A. Abbas
Cinematographer : Radhu Karmakar
Art Director : M.R. Mayekar
Audiographer : Allauddin
Trick Scenes Cinematographer : Babubhai Mistry
Playback Singers : Mukesh, Asha Bhosle
Lyricists : Anand Bakshi, Indrajit Singh Tulsi & Vithalbhai Patel
Story Writer : K.A. Abbas
Screenplay Writers : K.A. Abbas & V.p. Sathe
Dailogue Writer : Jainendra Jain
Art Director : A. Rangaraj
Cinematographer : Radhu Karmakar
Audiographer : Allauddin
Playback Singers : Lata Mangeshkar, Manna Dey, Shailendra Singh & Chanchal
Song recording & Background music : D.O. Bhansaki
Dance Director : Sohanlal
Processing In-charge : Arun Bhatt
Make-up In-charge : Madhav Pai
Date of Censor : September 27, 1973
SIX YEARS IN THE MAKING, 4 hours long in its
final cut,and taxing the resources of the Kapoor family and R.K Studios to their limits, this was the film Raj Kapoor intended to be his epic,the film by which he would be remembered forever.
Story:
The circus came to town and, this time, announced an unusual programme - the last performance of the famous clown, RAJOO, whom everyone believed to have retired.
Three woman came to the circus by special invitation--
Mary, a grey-haired lady teacher with her husband, David,
Marina, a Russian woman, past her youth, but still very beautiful,
Mina, a film star at the age of retirement, accompanied by her former actor producer, Mr. Kumar.
They all sat in the front row - eagerly looking forward to seeing Rajoo who had played a significant role in each of their lives.
In the circus ring, the clown Rajoo stages a strange Act-he is the clown-patient, while the other clowns are doctors and surgeons who operate upon him and take out his "enlarged" heart.
"Keep it safe" says one of the clown-doctors, handingover the heart to Rajoo, "It is getting bigger all the time. One day the whole world would be accommodated in your heart".
And this makes the clown happy-he sings and dances with his heart, sends it up, it comes down and breaks into a thousand fragment-and each fragment of the broken heart reflects the face of Mary-not as she is today-but as she was many years ago when Rajoo first saw her.
The school boy, Rajoo, was infatuated by Mary, the young lady teacher. It was calf love, as she was five years his senior. Mary had a little lamb-and he was the lamb who followed Mary wherever she went.
One day Rajoo saw Mary fall down in a river; emerge from it all wet clothes clinging to her, youthful body changing her clothes in a thicket in the jungle, and the little boy grew up into a man. When she went on a holiday, he gave her a clown doll.
"What is this?"
"It's a clown-a joker-it's me", he replied.
Rajoo knew that his father was a clown too, he could make millions laugh. But one day he fell from a trapeze and was killed. That is why his mother starved and slaved to send him to a good school so that he could rise to the top of the world. She didn't want to let her son suffer the fate of his father.
When Mary returned from holidays, she was already engaged to a young man of her own age. She introduced David to Rajoo, and revealed her intentions of marrying him just as Rajoo was being sent away from school for clowning on the streets to supplement his sick mother's earnings.
"Oh Rajoo, why could you not be five years older", she sighed remorsefully.
Rajoo went to the wedding-rang the Church bells-then as the Best Man, he was invited by David to kiss the Bride. He gave a shy peck, and while parting he received a present-it was the clown-doll, being returned to him.
And as he walked away with the doll in his hand, the words of David rang in his ear-"You will grow up, but this clown-doll will remain as youthful and vivacious as it is today".
Time passes,..... the boy becomes a man, now he is dressed like a clown, beating a Tambourine Showing Janata Bioscope in a carnival, but on his face he has the same laughter, and the same sadness in his eyes. He is followed by a crowd of children, shouting, "Joker ! Joker !!"
When the mother asks him if he has found a job, Rajoo reports that everyone says that "The place for a clown is a circus".
"Circus?" The mother is alarmed, "Never mention that name before me. I don't want to lose my son as I lost his father"
And yet Rajoo step's inevitably take him towards a circus, where there is a big crowd to welcome a group of Soviet Circus Artistes. Because of his fair skin and blue eyes and nondescript clothes, Rajoo is mistaken to be a Russian and find's himself in a lion-tamer's uniform. If he reveals his real identity he loses the Rs.200/- advance that he has received as pocket money.
And he needs the money for the treatment of his sick mother! After many misunderstandings and misadventures, Rajoo al last achieves what he had always desired-he is a clown, a singing clown who must sing and laugh and make others laugh.
His gift of laughter, his genius as a clown, his simple-hearted ways, win the love of Marina, the beautiful trapeze artist from Russia who appears to Rajoo as the embodiment of that very fairy of whom his mother had always dreamed as her daughter-in-law.
Rajoo takes Marina to meet his mother, and the old and sick women is enraptured by the winsome smile of the Russian beauty, though she does not know that she is from another country. "Rajoo. I like her, I approve her, make her my daughter-in-law", she tells her son."Then I can die in peace
But that is the dilemma for Rajoo-and for Marina who has to go back to her people, to her country, to her aged and ailing father.
One night the mother discovers that his son is working as a clown in a circus. She comes there, tottering on her sick legs, and her heart fails when he sees her son falling from a high trapeze-just like her husband had his fatal fall !
The mother is dead, but the clown must not weep, his destiny is to laugh and make others laugh- even if his own heart be breaking! And when he must part from his love, then too there should be no tears in his eyes, he must hide them behind dark glasses.
So when Marina flies away, she requests him to sing the "Awara" song which she had loved since her childhood and which symbolizes to her the spirit of India which is also the spirit of Rajoo, the man she loves.
Once again, Rajoo is walking along the shore of life, the eternal tramp. With his mother dead, he carries his home on his shoulders-in a ruck-sack.
Tired of the clown-doll which keeps returning to him, like his heart, he throws it to drown in the sea. But a dof jumps in, and drags it back and lays it at his feet.
Together these three start a "Footpath Circus" till one day Rajoo discovers that the boy he had befriended is a girl-and that the male attire was a masquerade to protect her honour in the heartless city. Minoo the boy becomes Mina the girl and the sari that Rajoo presents her becomes a wall between them.
But really between them is the consuming ambition of Mina-the ambition of becoming a film star, with fame and fortune and glamour-for which she is willing to sacrifice Moti her faithful dog, to betray the people who had put up money to arrange their Qawalli, and eventually when the famous film hero, Kumar appears on her horizon, she can even sacrifice Rajoo, Rajoo who befriended her when she was friendless, who taught her acting,singing, dancing, transforming an uncouth "boy" into a refined, glamorous actress!
And Rajoo is left, dangling among cob-webs of his memories, like the clown-doll that lies abandoned in a corner of the deserted and haunted hut that was once their love-nest.
Mr. Kumar, the producer-star, introduces his new discovery-Meena-to the press and to the trade at a dazzling press conference.Amidst popping flash-bulbs, Meena smiles, and now it is her face that is reflected in the pieces of the glass heart that broke.
The old singing clown is still performing.
While he picks up the pieces of glass-the broken pieces of his heart-watched by the three women who had played their respective roles in shaping the pattern of his destiny.
But there are three more chairs, empty, besides them, and the singing clown, as he reaches the finale of his song, announces an Interval-of fifteen minutes, or fifteen months.
For, he says, my show has not ended-nor has my story !
"Mera Naam Joker" had all the ingredients
that a movie needs to classified as a good
entertainer.Wonderful songs by a galaxy of
lyricists -shailendra,hasrat jaipuri,neeraj,prem dhawan,shailey shalendra.
A great scor by Shankar-Jaikishan.
A script by K.A. Abbas.An all-star line-up that included Simi,Manoj Kumar,Dharmendra,
Dara singh,Rajendra kumar,Padmini,Om prakash,
the entire Soviet state circus and the
Gemini circus, and of coarse Raj Kapoor
himself.
It even had a chubby young Rishi Kapoor
playing the young raju in the first part,
making his screen debut just as his father
made his own debut at the tender age of 11.
But like most films that set out self-consciously to be epics or masterpieces,
"Mera Naam Joker" bombed at the box-office
and is remembered today as a magnificent
failure.
Inspired by Chaplin's "Limelight",
"Mera Naam Joker" is actually three seperate
films rolled into one.
Even today,you can see the three distinct
parts.
The firstpart depicts the young hero,Raju, the son of a trapeze artiste who becomes infatuated with his schoolteacher and dreams
of becoming a famous clown.
The second part shows grown-up Raju joining
a Russian circus, falling in love with the trapeze star Marina and ends with him forced to continue performing even after his mother collapses.
The third part is about his romance with a young poster artiste who is actually a woman masquerading as a man who wants to become a
filmstar.
...The climax links all three films together
as well as the three different women in Raju's life,coming together to witness his final performance as a clown.
With the movie crashing at the boxoffice
it put rest to any plans of Raj Kapoor making
a sequel,where he was to die in the end.
But today As Rishi Kapoor and R.K Productions
are having great problems in finding which
script and story to use as their next film.
The script happens to be there right in front
of them.......
Yes the sequel to "Mera Naam Joker" with
Rishi Kapoor in the role of the ageing Joker!
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