Raj Kapoor and Vyjayanthimala in Sangam (1964)

Sangam is Raj Kapoor’s first colour film and the first one that he shot abroad. Although other film-makers had gone abroad before, this movie created a trend that grew when colour cinema added to the spectacle, until by the 1990s it became almost mandatory to have scenes shot in Switzerland, however irrelevant to the story.

Sangam’s story is a love triangle, in which two friends, Gopal (Rajendra Kumar) and Sunder (Raj Kapoor), are both in love with the same woman, Radha (Vyjayanthimala). She is really in love with Gopal and finds Sunder’s desire for her unappealing but, when the latter returns as a war hero and declares that he only survived because of his love for her, she feels duty-bound to marry him. He is sure that she and Gopal are having an affair, despite Gopal’s attempts to reassure him otherwise. Finally, Gopal commits suicide as the only way of convincing him of Radha’s innocence.

This is one of many films where the primary relationship is between men rather than between men and women, where friendship (dosti) may be viewed as homosociality (male-bonding) or as homoeroticism. The distinction between the two is always blurred and this ambiguity may be one of the attractions of the theme to certain viewers and audiences.

Raj Kapoor once again plays an irritating, unattractive, immature type of man, as in he did in Andaz. It is unclear if this is to justify Radha’s distaste for him here or whether this is considered to be an acceptable form of masculinity. Looking at some of the roles Shah Rukh Khan has taken in recent films, even though he wins over the audience with his charisma, the latter may be the case. However, here Sunder is ultimately shown to be sensitive, largely revealing this other side of himself through music. The film is also about how women can come to accept and even love their husbands, even if initially they think this is going to be difficult.

The film’s songs have become classics of Hindi cinema. While they are good even outside their filmic context, it is their placement in the film that makes them great. The popular ‘Bol Radha bol’ is enjoyed no doubt for Vyjayanthimala’s appearance in a swimsuit, although Raj Kapoor seems somewhat sleazy. Rajendra Kumar, the woman’s choice, once again plays the sensitive man who has to suffer and die. This aspect of his character is expressed in his songs, such as the evergreen ‘Prempatra’, which is gentle and romantic. The song in which Radha teases Sunder for not giving her any fun (whatever that may imply) on their honeymoon, ‘Budha mil gaya’, is quite shocking, while ‘Dost dost na raha’ remains the song to quoted by Hindi-speaking Indians wishing to complain about the behaviour of friends. The way it is shot in the film, bringing out the characters’ inner feelings, illustrates Raj Kapoor’s total mastery of the medium of the Hindi film – Rachel Dwyer

Cast and Production Credits

Year – 1964, Genre – Drama, Country – India, Language – Hindi, Producer – R.K. Films, Director – Raj Kapoor, Music Director – Shankar Jaikishan, Cast - Raj Kapoor, Vyjayanthimala, Rajendra Kumar, Raj Mehra, Nana Palsikar, Iftekhar, Lalita Pawar, Achla Sachdev

Shammi Kapoor and Saira Bano in Junglee (1961)

Shammi Kapoor yelled ‘Yahoo!’ and became a new kind of hero for the 1960s. Raj Kapoor’s younger brother had shaved off his trademark pencil moustache in the 1950s and created a new Elvis-style image for the Indian hero as he danced to western-style songs in nightclubs and discos. His physical presence dominated the screen, with his height, striking fairness and endless energy as he danced and pulled comic faces while wooing the new style of heroine, leading a whole generation of young men to imitate his style. Raj Kapoor never found a hero’s role for his younger brother in his films, and Shammi was linked with the Filmistan ‘film factory’, with directors such as Subodh Mukherji and Nasir Hussain, as well as Shakti Samanta, who followed their style. Shammi worked with the most glamorous of a new generation of actresses — Asha Parekh, Saira Banu and Sharmila Tagore.

Mohammed Rafi sang Shammi’s songs with a panache and flair suited to the dancing hero, perhaps surprising those who knew the gravitas and dignity he bestowed on romantic heroes, such as Dilip Kumar and Guru Dutt in the 1950s. Few other singers have the range he displayed in this film, from the dance numbers to the ever popular ghazal, ‘Ehsaan tera hoga mujh par’.

Junglee was one of the first of the decade’s light romances to be shot in colour, which it used to great advantage on locations in snowy mountains and on elaborate sets, such as for Suku Suku, which has an MGM-style set of a giant artist’s palette and an unexplained troupe of Russian dancers. Shammi plays the businessman returned from foreign climes, whose mother is intent on keeping the family away from love and laughter and focused instead on the business and accumulating wealth. Shammi’s seriousness is presented as ridiculous and makes him a figure of fun, a ‘stuffed shirt’. When he falls in love with Rajkumari (Saira Banu), his world is turned upside down and, although his realization of love begins with Urdu poetry, the real epiphany occurs when he leaps around the snow yelling ‘Yahoo!’(‘Chahe koi mujhe junglee kahe’). The newly romantic hero resists his mother’s attempts to marry him off to a princess (a rajkumari) by pretending to be mad. Although he will not marry Rajkumari without his mother’s permission, he reveals the princess to be a fraud put forward by her scheming family, before he and his sister, who elopes with her lover, persuade the mother to become more loving and give up her ‘patriarchal’ role. The theme of young lovers obeying their parents, while persuading them that love is the answer, is a regular theme of Hindi films even up to the present.

Cast and Production Credits

Year – 1961, Genre – Drama, Country – India, Language – Hindi, Producer – Subodh Mukherji Production, Director – Subodh Mukerji, Music Director – Shanker Jaikishan, Cast - Helen, Shammi Kapoor, Saira Banu, Shashikala, Anoop Kumar, Azra, Sangeeta, Asit Sen, Rajen Haksar, Shivraj, Lalita Pawar

Kohraa (1964)

Cast: Biswajeet,Waheeda Rehman, Lalita Pawar

Director: Hiren Nag

Music: Hemant Kumar

Lyrics: Kaifi Azmi

Capsule Review: Kohraa featured the ethereal Waheeda Rehman as the mysterious rake Biswajeet’s second wife who’s haunted by his dead wife. The chilling ambience was sublimated by the producer Hemant Kumar’s vintage music. Songs like Lata Mangeshkar’s Jhoom jhoom dhalti raat and O beqaraar dil heightened the feeling of ominous dread in the plot. Montages of the dead woman’s spirit wandering the night were exquisitely expressive. Waheeda Rehman as the Indian version of Rebecca was vulnerable, adamant and very beautiful. This is one of the superior supernatural thrillers of the 1960s where the actors respond to a particular plot rather than peripheral attractions such as songs and romance.