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V. Shantaram (1901 – 1990)

V. Shantaram

After Barua’s Devdas set a nationwide trend for apocalyptic despondency, Shantaram felt the need to relay a more positive message to the country’s youth. Consequently, he made his masterpiece Aadmi (’39), where even after the hero loses his girl, he is shown not giving in to gloom but committing himself to his work.

Similarly, a strong strain of social commentary ran through most of V Shantaram’s many classics, each of which had a central theme: Do Ankhen Barah Haath (reintegration of criminals), Aadmi (rehabilitation of prostitutes), Padosi (communal harmony), Dahej (the evils of dowry) and above all Duniya Na Mane, where Shanta Apte plays a fiery adolescent protesting her marriage to an old man by making his life miserable. It seemed, whenever Shantaram wanted to expose the infections afflicting society, he would make another epochal film.

With his penchant for using dialogue as action, Shantaram’s films have been accused of resembling filmed theatre. While this is not entirely untrue, fact remains that he blended both forms to evolve an aesthetic of his own. He showed his fluency over the visual language of cinema too, in the famous opening shot from Amrit Manthan (’34) which was the close-up of Chandramohan’s eye as he searched for a victim to sacrifice.

From his debut in 1920, till his death in 1990, Shantaram was not only present at every important milestone of Indian cinema, he was responsible for a good many landmarks himself.

A stage actor with the Bal Gandharva theatre group, Shantaram joined Baburao Painter’s Maharashtra Film Company in 1920. Working his way up, he played the lead in Saukari Pash (’25), widely accepted as India’s first art film. Shantaram started Prabhat with four partners in 1929 and directed several noteworthy films like A mrit Manthan (’34) and Amar Jyoti (’36), introducing great talents like Chandramohan, Durga Khote and Shanta Apte.

After his classic trilogy: Duniya Na Mane (’37), Aadmi (’39) and Padosi (’41), Shantaram left Prabhat. He started his own Rajkamal Studios with the super hit Shakuntala, whose heroine, Jayshree, became Shantaram’s common law spouse as he remained married to his first wife. They did the biographical superhit Dr Kotnis Ki Amar Kahani (’46), together but their 50s movies were rather disappointing and Shantaram rejuvenated himself by shifting his attention to Sandhya. She contributed towards making the dance epic Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baaje (’55), a huge success, followed by Do Ankhen Barah Haath (’57). Navrang (’59), interestingly showed an artiste who glamorizes his wife in his fantasies to make her his muse. Though critics like Baburao Patel dismissed it as “mental masturbation of a senile soul”, Navrang too was an unqualified hit.

In latter years, he successfully adopted Von Sternberg’s The Blue Angel as Pinjra ( harking back to his visit to Germany in 1933), but age dictated that he decrease his workload.

Multiple wives, several children, a sprawling studio in the heart of Bombay and legendary status! He was one of the lucky few who achieved immortality before death.

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