Ten of my favourite filmi qawwalis

I have been meaning to write this post for a long time now—I love qawwalis—but I’ve kept putting it off, because I’ve always thought that it would be impossible to create a list of just ten filmi qawwalis that are my favourites. (Barsaat ki Raat itself features at least three qawwalis that completely bowl me over).

But. I’ve finally decided to take up the challenge, and do it. These are ten fabulous qawwalis from pre-70s films that I’ve seen (though I must confess that I like the qawwalis of some 70s films—especially Rishi Kapoor ones). To make this post a little more challenging, I decided not to include more than one qawwali per film.

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Pyaar Kiye Jaa (1966)

I’d planned to watch (and review) something quite different this week, but when Beth announced Shashi Fest, I couldn’t resist the temptation to participate. That resolve was strengthened when I realised that in a year and a half of blogging about cinema, I’ve never once reviewed a Shashi Kapoor starrer. For shame! This, therefore: a farcical and fun film that never lets itself slip into seriousness. It features some of Hindi comedy’s greatest stalwarts, has superb music, and—of course—stars Shashi Kapoor, showing how good he is at comedy.

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Dil Bhi Tera, Hum Bhi Tere (1960)

I was initially undecided about whether I should expend any energy on writing a review for this film. It wasn’t great—not even good, really. On the other hand, it wasn’t a pain to sit through and offered no unintentional hilarity of the Leader brand. Instead, it was a meandering, sometimes pointless film with little development of characters and indifferent screenplay.
Why then this review? Simply because this was the first film of a charmingly gawkish youth who went on to become one of Hindi cinema’s biggest stars—and one of my favourite actors.

Dharmendra in Dil Bhi Tera, Hum Bhi Tere

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