Trendsetter Movies Of Indian Cinema
The Indian cinema has recently completed 100 glorious of success in the field of entertainment. When the Father of Indian Cinema, Shri Dadasaheb Phalke, has made the first film Raja Harishchandra, he has not even realized that this entertainment medium would sway for the next hundred years by holding the millions. In spite of diverse cultures and their differences in India, the Indian cinema has withstood strongly and has today become as the largest film industry in the world. The cinema has emerged through various phases from black and white to 3D movies, but it has retained the basic sense of Indian cinema. A review of the past 99 years of Indian cinema reminds us that Indian cinema has conquered many peaks of success. In this period, many memorable films are made which still continues to rule the audience. These movies gave direction to Indian cinema.
Let us have a look on some such movies which has proved the milestones of Indian cinema:
Devdas
Devdas released in 1955 proved to be the trendsetter of novel based movies. The film directed by Bimal Roy, is based on Sharadchandra Chatterjee’s novel, Devdas. Maximum films are made on this novel. The recently made Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Devdas was included in the list of ten best historical movies of the world.
The film had Dilip Kumar in the lead role and Vaijayantimala played the role of Chandramukhi. Suchitra Sen made her debut with the role of Parvati. Vaijayantimala refused to accept the Filmfare award for best supporting actress for the film.
Mother India
Mother India, released in 1957, was a trendsetter of woman oriented films. The film was directed by Mehboob Khan and was a remake of his earlier film Aurat. Nargis, Sunil Dutt and Raj Kumar played the lead roles in the film. Nargis was the first choice for the film. She portrayed the young single mother of two sons merely at the age of 26. Dilip Kumar was interested in the film for the role of Birju. But Nargis felt that people will not accept their pair as mother and son and hence Sunil Dutt was selected for the role. The most famous fire scene was performed by Sunil Dutt and Nargis without any duplicates.
It was the first Bollywood movie to have the Hollywood style classical music in the film. It was the India’s first submission to the Oscars but has lost the award from the film Night’s of Carabia by one vote. The film is described as the all time blockbuster. Since the female lead of the film represents India as the nation after independence, Mehboob Khan wanted to release the film on 15th August but it was released two months later in October.
Mughal-E-Azam
This movie was released in 1960 and was a trendsetter of poetic movies in Bollywood. Each and every scene of this film was widely discussed. The film was directed by K. Asif and took 12 years for completion. Near about 1.50 crores were invested in the movie and on completion it became the most expensive Indian movie. It was a classic movie which held the box office records for 15 years.
Dilip Kumar played the role of Prince Salim in the film. He faced a great difficulty while filming in Rajasthan due to heat and the heavy armor on his body. The role of Anarkali was previously offered to Suraiya but was later bagged by Madhubala. She suffered a lot of health problems during the shooting. She is said to be fainted on the sets due to her congenital heart disease. The fetter which were put on Madhubala during the prison sequence, were real and this made her suffer from skin abrasions. Madhubala’s father didn’t like her closeness with Dilip Kumar during the film and hence he used to remain on the sets throughout the shooting.
The soldiers used in the film were the real soldiers of the Jaipur regiment of the Indian military. The replica of Sheesh Mahal made for the song Jab Pyar Kiya To Darna Kiya cost nearly 10 lakh rupees. The size of the Mahal was so large that the lighting was done by using headlights of 500 trucks and nearly eight hours was taken to light a single shot.
Pakeezah
The 1972 movie, Pakeezah is treated as the trendsetter of Mujra in the bollywood movies. The film will always remain memorable for its sets, costumes and music. The film was directed by Kamal Amrohi and took 14 years to complete due to following reasons:
1) The relationship changes between Meena Kumari and Kamal Amrohi.
2) Rajkumar replaced Ashok Kumar for the role of Salim.
3) To make the role more suitable for Raj Kumar, the character was changed from a businessman to forest ranger.
4) The film’s composer and cinematographer died during the period.
In most of the scenes, Meena Kumari was seen lying down. This was because she was very ill and was suffering from alcohol addiction. The director has not shown her face in the song Chalo Dildar Chalein because she was drunk for most of the time. She died some weeks of the film released and the film which was a flop initially became a huge success.
In spite of the melodious music, the film did not receive any Filmfare award in the music category. This made the veteran actor Pran so angry that he refused to accept his Filmfare award for Beiman and felt that the award should be given posthumously to Ghulam Mohammad, the composer of the Pakeezah.
Bobby
This 1973 movie was a trend setter of teenage love story. Raj Kapoor, who directed the movie showed the courage to make such film in the days when Bollywood had the trend of showing love stories of matured actors. This was the first film which showed the love story of a 17 year old boy and a sixteen year old girl with the rich and poor clash as the background.
Dimple Kapadia made her debut with Bobby and the film also launched Raj Kapoor’s son Rishi Kapoor in the leading role. Premnath, who played the role of Dimple’s father, was portraying the character of fisherman. To make the role more powerful and successful, he spent one month with the fishermen. The film was a blockbuster and many movies were inspired by this trend.
Sholay
Sholay was the trendsetter of action and adventurous movies. This 1975 movie was directed by Ramesh Sippy. This was the first movie which showed fighting scenes that included dacoits, horses, guns and murder. The film is among the greatest films of the Indian cinema. On release, the film was unsuccessful at the box office but soon it became a hit and ran in the theatres for more than five years. It was the only movie which celebrated silver jubilee by running for 25 consecutive weeks in more than 100 theatres. The film also had the record of 60 golden jubilees across India. The original film Sholay was made of 204 minutes but it was released with the length of 188 minutes.
The film starred Dharmendra, Hema Malini, Amitabh Bacchan and Jaya Bhaduri in the lead roles. Sanjeev Kumar and Amjad Khan portrayed the strong characters of Thakur and Gabbar Singh. The film was completed in two and half years. The song “Yeh Dosti” was picturised in 21 days. The scene in which Jaya Bhaduri is lighting the lamp was completed in 20 days. The Scene in which Gabbar Singh kills Imam’s son was shot in 19 days and the train robbery sequence took more than 7 weeks to complete.
Shatrughna Sinha was the first choice of Ramesh Sippy for the role of Jai but Amitabh Bacchan took great efforts and banged the role. Danny Denzgopa was thought for the role of Gabbar, but he was busy with other film and hence Amjad Khan was offered the role. He prepared himself for the role by reading the book Abar Abhishapta Chambal, written by Taroon Kumar Bhaduri, father of Jaya Bhaduri.
The film was entangled in problems when the four leads became romantically involved in real life. The shooting has to be postponed because Jaya Bhaduri was pregnant with her first child. Dharmendra use to create several retakes in his scenes with Hema Malini by spoiling the shots. He was initially interested in the role of Thakur but let it down for the sake that Sanjeev Kumar will play the romantic lead opposite Hema Malini.
Mr. India
Mr. India was the trendsetter of the fantasy superhero movies. The film was released in 1987. It was the first film which showed the Indian superhero of children for the first time on the silver screen. The film was directed by Shekhar Kapoor and starred Anil Kapoor and Sridevi in the lead roles. The specialty of this film was that the people appreciated the villain of this film more than the hero. The character of Mogambo proved to be one of the best villains in the history of Bollywood. It was also one of the most memorable roles played by Amrish Puri. The quote, “Mogambo khush hua” also became very popular.
This was the last film written by Salim-Javed together. The duo split up after this film. Shekhar Kapoor has written the character of Mr. India for Amitabh Bacchan but since he refused to do the role, it was then offered to Anil Kapoor. The film was also remade in Tamil with the title En Rathathin Rathme.
Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge
The film was a trendsetter of soft and romantic love story. The film was released in 1995 and was the directorial debut of Aditya Chopra. It was the longest running film in the history of Indian cinema. The film starred Shahrukh Khan and Kajol in the lead role. The film’s title was suggested to Aditya Chopra by Kiran Kher, wife of Anupam kher.
Aditya Chopra was initially planning to make the movie as an Indo-American love story and wished Tom Cruise to play the role of Raj. But Yash Chopra rejected this plan and then the role of Raj was offered to Saif Ali Khan. But finally Shahrukh Khan was the last choice. The film has won 10 Filmfare awards and National award for the most popular film.
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