Doris Day, Rock Hudson and Tony Randall acted together in three films: Pillow Talk, Lover Come Back, and Send Me No Flowers. Since I’d already reviewed the other two, I decided it was time to complete the trio with a re-view and a review of Pillow Talk, the first of the Day-Hudson-Randall films.
My sister and I were discussing, with much fondness, my father’s love for classic Hindi cinema. When my parents bought a DVD player, I offered to look out for old films that I could buy for them. “Any particular favourites you’d like me to buy you?” I asked. Papa’s list included Sangdil, Daag, Anari, Ratan, Andaaz, Albela, Sone ki Chidiya and a bunch of other films—all of them selected mainly because they had superb music.
And I am very much my Papa’s daughter. It takes just one good song for me to rent a film (I may not go so far as to buy it, though). I’ve done it with Akashdeep, and I’ve done it again with Bhai Bahen. Here, fortunately, I was a little luckier. Even though the best thing about it is the lovely Saare jahaan se achha, Bhai Bahen is, overall, an interesting and rather offbeat little film.
When I think of I Soliti Ignoti (literally, The Usual Unknown Thieves, though the English title of the film is Big Deal on Madonna Street), this is one of the scenes that comes to mind: one evening, a pawnshop is about to close for the day. A thief’s decided to hold up the pawnshop and steal all the jewellery in the safe. He arrives at the shop with a pistol in his hand, a newspaper draped over it.
When the last customer at the counter has gone, the thief steps up to the counter, points the gun at the man behind the counter and says, “Do you know it?”—indicating the gun.
The man behind the counter reaches over, grabs the gun, and has a quick look at it before saying, “Sure I know it. It’s a small calibre Beretta, in very poor condition. One thousand lira.”
When the thief stands there, gaping, the man adds, impatiently: “Well?!”
The thief snatches his gun back and leaves the pawnshop, too disgruntled to bother holding it up.
Once upon a time, there was a writer.
No: it wasn’t Dharmendra, and it certainly wasn’t Nanda (old Hindi cinema, at least, doesn’t seem to believe women capable of writing anything more complex than a love letter, if that).
This writer was someone quite different, and one day (I’m guessing) decided that it was time to show the world what he was capable of. So, with a producer and a director, the writer went into action, and what resulted was Akashdeep. Looking at the film, I’m assuming this was somewhat of a collaborative effort. A “how about this?” and a “don’t you think it would be a good idea—?” sort of film.
One person who’s figured very consistently on my blog statistics for the past year is the gorgeous Eleanor Parker. Any day, all I need to do is click my blog stats link, and I’ll see that among the top hits for my blog is ‘eleanor parker’ or ‘eleanor parker actress’. So, considering it’s her 88th birthday today, it seemed the perfect time to review a film that starred Ms Parker.
Eleanor Parker was born on June 26th, 1922. The ‘Woman of a Thousand Faces’ (so called because of her amazing versatility), she got three Oscar nominations, but is usually remembered mainly for her role as the beautiful Baroness in The Sound of Music. Ms Parker did, however, act in a host of other films—and in very varying roles, too. This, as the mail order bride of a plantation owner in South America, is just one of them.
Harvey’s recent post on Mr Sampat sparked off a brief discussion on one of Hindi cinema’s finest character actors, Motilal. Since Motilal was known—at least in the 50’s and 60’s—as a character actor, it seemed appropriate to review a film in which he’s the hero. Not that Ek Thi Ladki (‘There was a girl’) really allows much scope for a hero. True to its name, it centres around its heroine, the spunky and vivacious Meena Shorey. But Motilal is a very likeable leading man; I S Johar, in his debut, is a deliciously crooked crook; and one of my favourite vamps—Kuldeep Kaur—is in it too.
9 years before he made the superb suspense thriller Ittefaq, B R Chopra produced and directed this film. It too starred Nanda (though not in as pivotal a role as in Ittefaq). It too didn’t have a single song—though it did have a ballet performance. And, like Ittefaq, it hinged on a murder.
But Kanoon wasn’t by any means a precursor to Ittefaq. Ittefaq is mainstream murder mystery; Kanoon straddles with consummate skill the line between crime detection and social issues. It’s an excellent, unusual and gripping film that merits viewing.
The Chinese wish each other five happinesses: wealth, longevity, good health, virtue, and a peaceful death in old age. The sixth happiness one must decide for oneself.
Richard’s recent post on Dr Kotnis ki Amar Kahani reminded me of this film, because the two films share a lot in common. Like Dr Kotnis ki Amar Kahani, The Inn of the Sixth Happiness is based on a real life story—in this case, that of the Englishwoman Gladys Aylward (1902-70), who in 1930 went off to China to ‘serve’ the people there. Like Dr Kotnis, she too fell in love with a Chinese national, and is even today, 40 years after her death, regarded as something of a national heroine.
The Inn of the Sixth Happiness, while not completely true to the story of Gladys Aylward (artistic license makes films sell!), is accurate enough in the basics. It tells, with sensitivity and feeling, the story of a brave woman’s determination to go halfway across the world—to a land of which she didn’t even know the language—simply in order to follow her dream.
Or Ogni Porikkha, if you want to be phonetically correct.
Over the last twenty-odd years, I’ve heard countless Bengalis rave about Uttam Kumar and Suchitra Sen as the ultimate onscreen romantic couple. I’ve seen both of them act (separately) in a few (admittedly Hindi) films, and have been very impressed.
So, finally: an Uttam Kumar-Suchitra Sen film, and one that was a big hit too. Agni Pariksha: ‘trial by fire’.
One of my biggest failings when it comes to cinema viewing is the naive belief that an actor or actress whom I’ve seen and appreciated for the first time will necessarily be fantastic in all their subsequent films that I watch. Thus, having watched The Sound of Music—and raved over every single element of it, especially Julie Andrews—I began searching out other films that starred Julie Andrews, in the childish hope that they’d all be as fabulous as The Sound of Music.
Alas, no. This one, for instance, made only two years after the von Trapp saga, is nowhere close to as endearing. Julie is superb as the 20’s flapper girl Millie Dillmount, trying her best to be hard-heartedly modern, but the film is a bit of a drag.
Dustedoff 
