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

Pradeep Kumar and Vyjayanthimala in Nagin (1954) - climactic sequence in lush Gevacolor

Filmistan’s dance-cum-musical romance, “Nagin,” directed by Nandlal Jaswantlal and starring vivacious Vyjayanthimala and Pradeep Kumar in the romantic leads, was premiered in Bombay at the luxurious Liberty Cinema on Friday, December 24th, 1954.

Based on a highly improbable story by Bijou Bhattacharya and scripted by Hamid Butt, with dialogue and lyrics by Rajinder Krishan, “Nagin” has a music score by Hemant Kumar. Dances are the highlights of this film and they have been designed and directed by Sachin Shanker, Hiralal and Yogen Desai.

Superbly mounted, the film has excellent production values throughout its length. Special mention should, however, be made of Fali Mistry (Shyama’s husband) who was responsible for pleasing photo­graphy throughout the film and the exqui­site Gevacolor sequences at the end. Sharing the credits with Fali Mistry for the climactic sequence in lush Gevacolor is Ram Kumar who designed the imaginative sets. Kudos should also go to Sayed Ahmed and G. J. More who are responsible for the black and white decor in the rest of the picture.

In spite of these redeeming factors which were smuggled into the picture with an eye on the box-office, “Nagin” is a deplorable pro­duction from a studio which won acclaim recently with such a thought-provoking film as “Nastik”.

The story is neither fish, flesh, nor good red herring, and defies classification. It has neither habitat nor locale, in spite of the claim by the producers that the two pivotal characters in the film belong to tribes “living in the hilly districts of India”. In fact the film is the crea­tion of wild imagination and Nandlal Jaswant­lal fails to rescue the hackneyed plot from the triteness in spite of this.

The fantastic story revolves round a boy and a girl belonging to rival tribes of snake catchers who deal in the poison extracted from the reptiles. Their love incurs the wrath of the warring tribes and in the ensuing turmoil the Nagin is bitten by a snake sent to kill her lover. She is, however, restored to life by him when he brings the venomous creature to cure her, and they live happily ever after.

Vyjayanthimala in the title role puts over a commendable performance besides looking ravishingly beautiful as the belle of the hills. Her dancing, too, is very graceful, specially in those eye-filling colour sequences and delight­ful ballets towards the finish.

Pradeep Kumar is unimpressive in a role -poorly etched and directed, and Jeevan as the jilted lover thirsting for the blood of the hero is theatrical throughout.

Mubarak, the old-timer, in spite of his out­landish costume and poorly-written role, is res­ponsible for an excellent characterization as the stern but kind-hearted father. The rest of the characters are lost in the scenic trappings.

Hemant Kumar’s musical score is in keep­ing with the theme and the songs have a rare lilt and may prove popular.

As mentioned earlier, the piece-de-resis­tance of the film are the superbly conceived and dexterously designed ballet sequences, a delec­table appendage to a depressingly poor film (Filmfare Magazine, 1955)

Cast and Production Credits

Year – 1954, Genre – Musical/Fantasy, Country – India, Language – Hindi, Producer – Filmistan,  Director – Nandlal Jaswantlal, Music Director –Hemant Kumar, Cast - Pradeep Kumar, Vyjayanthimala, Jeevan, Sulochana, Krishna Kumari, I. S. Johar, Mubarak

Vyjayanthimala

Danseuse extraordinaire, Vyjayanthimala’s greatest legacy to cinema is that today it is de rigeur for every girl who enters the Hindi film industry to be an accomplished dancer.

Yet there was more to light-footed Vyjayanthi than magical moves. True, she became a major star when the crowds repeatedly bought tickets for her Nagin (’54) only to see her sinewy gyrations to the chartbuster ‘Man dole mera tan dole’, before walking out. In film after film, this Terpischore incarnate defied the dull obligations of gravity in performances that established her as the first major dancer-star.

Vyjayanthimala sought, and achieved, histrionic validity too. When director Bimal Roy cast her as the prostitute Paro, in Devdas (’55), he was sneered at by his associates. “Why don’t you take comedian Kishore Kumar as Devdas?”, they argued. But Vyjayanthimala belied these doubts (witness her expression in the scene where Devdas offers her money for her services) and proved her detractors wrong by winning an award. When in 1958 she shone in two title roles, Madhumati and Sadhana, the last vestiges of doubt were removed, as Vyjayanthimala shot to the highest echelons of stardom.

When she played the polymorphous presence singing `Aaja re pardesi’, in Madhumati, Bimal Roy gained his greatest commercial success. Vyjayanthimala’s Ganga Jamuna (’61) and Sangam (’64), broke all previous records for money­spinners. As a matter of course, she also won best actress awards for both films. The manner in which she divested herself of all her south Indian linguistic mannerisms and imbibed the Bhojpuri dialect in Ganga Jamuna won her respect. Even as the glamour doll in Sangam, she was unforgettable, especially in the sequence from ‘O mere Sanam’ where with her right hand raised from the elbow, those evocative eyes beseeched her husband to forget her past, saying ‘Kuch aur nahin insaan hain hum’, (After all we are all only human).

Magic moments like these made her the premier star, but when she launched into an ill-fated romance with the married Raj Kapoor, the heat of her passion burnt all reason in its path. When it ended, it changed her personality. From the extremely religious, vegetarian Vyjayanthi, under the thumb of her grandmother, Yadugiri Devi, she became arrogant and bitter. She switched her affections to Raj Kapoor’s personal physician, Dr Bali, and spent her last years in the industry waiting for his divorce from his first wife to come through. Meanwhile, she fought with Dilip Kumar, left Ram Aur Shyam in high dudgeon and amazed Vijay Anand with her disinterest during Jewel Thief. Dharmendra remembers how he completed Pyar Hi Pyar as her hero without even being introduced to her. After the commercial crash of her personal favourite, the dancing magnum opus Amrapali, a sorely disappointed Vyjayanthi left films. Thereafter she had a son (Suchi) with Dr Bali, dabbled in various businesses like shrimp fishing and was an MP from Madras for a while in the 80s. But most conclusively, she embraced her first love, dancing.

It was dance that had brought her into films with Bahaar, a unique trilingual hit in Hindi, Tamil ( Vazhkai) and Telugu (Jeevitham). And it was dance that had sustained her right from the early years. Vyjayanthi was the product of a broken marriage. There is an apocryphal story about how her father reached the quayside with a prohibitory court order but was too late to prevent his estranged wife from whisking Vyjayanthimala off to Europe. Hence, at the age of four, she won her first accolades dancing before the Pope.

Today, although the whirring camera and the make-up box have long been abandoned, the sound of her ghungroos still echoes on.