It is now 50 years since Yash Chopra's directorial debut, Dhool Ka Phool, was released in December 1959. Dinesh Raheja acknowledges the still-feisty filmmaker's significant contributions to the Hindi film industry
It is now 50 years since Yash Chopra's directorial debut, Dhool Ka Phool, was released in December 1959. Dinesh Raheja acknowledges the still-feisty filmmaker's significant contributions to the Hindi film industry
BACHHE najayaz nahee hote, vakil saab, najayaz hote hain maa baap." (The child is not illegitimate; it is the parents, who give birth to children out of wedlock, who are illegitimate)u00a0 this somewhat timeworn but pithy pronouncement was made by actor Manmohan Krishna in Dhool Ka Phool, the film that announced the arrival of director Yash Chopra. He was 27 then. Dhool Ka Phool's date of release was December 11, 1959.u00a0u00a0u00a0
50 years later, Yash Chopra is the one and only director from that generation who has remained relevant. Consistently rated as one of the most powerful men in Bollywood today, Chopra helmed a hit just five years ago (Veer Zaara), and has a flourishing production house and a state-of-the-art film studio.
Importantly, Chopra has valued relationships with friends and associates. I have a hazy memory of attending a party to celebrate 20 years of Yash Raj Films, in which Yash had honoured all his leading ladies of yore; and Waheeda Rehman, Mala Sinha, Sadhana et al walked the stage. There seem to be no 50 year celebrations of his directorial debut so I think it will be worthwhile to explore how this man came about to be an empire builder.
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Yash Chopra's name has become synonymous with high gloss and soft-focus; but what attracts me to Chopra's cinema is his intermittent willingness to explore the unconventional as in Lamhe (a complex web of relationships in which a girl falls for a man who was in love with her mother), Kaala Patthar (a Conradian tale about the redemption of the leading man who loses his nerve and abandons a passenger ship even though he is the captain) and Darr (about the protagonist's obsession for another man's wife).u00a0u00a0u00a0
Yash began in films as an assistant director to director-comedian I S Johar and later graduated to assisting his elder brother BR Chopra. The senior-by-18-years BR Chopra doted on his kid brother Yash, and once he had established his banner, gave him an opportunity to direct a black-and-white message meldorama, Dhool Ka Phool. The film starred Rajendra Kumar as the cad who impregnates Mala Sinha but goes on to marry Nanda. Mala hitches up with Ashok Kumar and then both couples want the child.
The film had terrific music by N Dutta ('Tere pyar ka aasra chahta hoon', 'Dhadakne lage dil ke taron ki duniya' and 'Tu Hindu banega na Musalman banega'), Mala Sinha suffering from a distinct Meena Kumari hangover, and Manmohan Krishna in an award-winning performance as the Samaritan who raises the child. But it didn't bear Yash's latter-day signature of gloss and grandeur.
BR had an aptitude for filming socially relevant issues whereas Yash had a flair for relationships. BR believed in austere filmmaking, Yash loved lavishing money. BR's films were made largely in the studios; courtroom sets were a staple in most of his films, Yash was drawn to the outdoorsu00a0Nainital, Switzerland, Amsterdam.u00a0 BR wanted to make a difference to the society; Yash seemed more inclined towards those who were chafing at the constraints imposed by society.
As long as Yash was under the BR umbrella, he made films that had a message such as Dharamputra (communal harmony), Waqt (Man should not be arrogant because it is time which is omnipotent) and Aadmi Aur Insaan (the pre-eminence of morality).
Yet, Waqt (1965) also saw the efflorescence of the Yash Chopra style high gloss drama about the concerns of a rich north Indian family. A huge blockbuster in its day, Waqt had an abundance of all the Senior Chopra films a unique theme, dulcet numbers composed by Ravi, a courtroom climax but there was more! Yash Chopra limned each frame with the colour of money.
The films starred top-notchers like Sunil Dutt, Raaj Kumar, Sadhana, Sharmila Tagore, Balraj Sahni. Yash dazzled the viewers by presenting a lifestyle that the viewers had either read or dreamt about wall-to-wall carpeted bungalows overlooking lakes and dales, dashingly-attired heroes racing red and yellow sports cars, pastel-clad, sartorially-splendid heroines (yes, also in diaphanous sarees) listening to long-playing records, swimming in 5-star hotels, or enjoying a game of badminton on their neatly manicured lawns. This was the film that established the quintessential Yash Chopra style.
Paradoxically, Yash had an affinity for grit as well as gloss Ittefaq (1969) proved that. This essentially two-actor, indoor film was a director's litmus test. It revolved around Nanda, a seductress and a murderer, who tries to engage a fugitive, Rajesh Khanna, in conversation, so that she can pin the blame for her husband's murder onto him. Some of the two-character scenes in the film seemed like stage-acting classes, and Yash laid excessive emphasis on sheen and stylish treatment.
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But, abetted by cameraman Kay Gee, he also adventurously indulged in a lot of technical bravura. A low-angle camera offers us a view of an anxiety-ridden Rajesh as he is being walked to his cell by policemen, while a handheld camera staggers ahead of him to show us the reactions of the crowd assembled at his home after his wife is murdered.u00a0
u00a0Aadmi Aur Insaan (1970), which prompted the making of the quickie Ittefaq because it was taking long in the making, was a drab, long-drawn morality play about a righteous engineer, Dharmendra and his friend turned foe, Feroz Khan, a construction magnate with flexible morals. Just one thing from the film left an impact on meu00a0Mumtaz looking gorgeous in the eternal torch song, 'Zindagi ittefaq hai'.u00a0
Enthused by the fact that he had the biggest star of the time, Rajesh Khanna, on his side, Yash branched off and started Yash Raj productions with Daag (1973). A small office at Rajkamal Studios became his working den. BR Chopra was said to be quite shaken when Yash branched off to form his own concern.
Daag daringly ended in a controversial mu00e9nage a trois featuring two Bengali tigresses, Sharmila and Raakhee, and then superstar Rajesh Khanna. The romantic scenes between Khanna and Sharmila in Daag had an erotic charge. The chartbuster, 'Ab chaahe maa roothe ya baba, yara maine to haan kar li' seemed to echo Yash's sentiments. An adventurous filmmaker was on the road to the big-time.
However, the Kaka-Chopra association broke abruptly once Yash embarked on his association with Amitabh, that quickly yielded three emotion-saturated blockbustersu00a0 Deewaar ('75), Kabhi Kabhie ('76) and Trishul ('78).
Chopra refused to be circumscribed to the image of a romantic filmmaker. The Salim-Javed scripted Deewaar proved that he could also grapple with a hard-edged action film, albeit laced with emotions.
I liked the way Chopra balanced the heavy emotions with the laconic dryness of Amitabh's character, and also the way he handled Parveen's cameo. Parveen flaunted her drink openly and indulged in premarital sex with her lover, Amitabh. The poignancy that reverberated when her dream of wearing sindoor ended in a blood-soaked wedding sari, that also crushed Amitabh's dreams, made her death one of cinema's most memorable scenes.
The visually extravagant romance Kabhi Kabhie mirrored Chopra's evolution and presented some refined sensibilities husband Shashi Kapoor accepts his wife's past with new age grace.
Interestingly, Chopra's love for lyrics and lyricism thrived in the action-packed 1970s. And not just in Kabhi Kabhie which boasts iridescent gems such as 'Main pal do pal ka shayar hoon' and 'Kabhi kabhie mere dil mein khayal aata hai'. If the shayar par excellence Sahir Ludhianvi was still a force to reckon with in the 1970s it was largely thanks to the implicit faith the Chopra brothers invested in him.
For Kabhi Kabhie, Yash retrieved Khayyam from a decade-long spell of oblivion. Maestros Shiv (Shiv Kumar Sharma) Hari (Hariprasad Chaurasia) worked exclusively for Yash Chopra films from Silsila through Chandni to Darr. For Dil To Pagal Hai, Chopra mined the best out of Uttam Singh and for Veer Zaara he pulled off the unprecedented and moulded a posthumous score by Madan Mohan!
Save for the music, the 1980s were a nightmare for Chopra. He couldn't hold on to his nerve consistently when tackling a bold subject like extramarital affairs in Silsila, he floundered in Mashaal (despite the memorable scene in which Dilip Kumar tries to arrange help for his dying wife), failed to launch the career of Mahendra Kapoor's son, Rohan, with Faasle, and drew a blank with Vijay despite re-teaming with Rajesh Khanna.u00a0
Chopra's career finally slipped out of the shadows and hit a luminous patch with Chandni (1989). He refused to be consigned to history like his peers. Whenever I met him he has always been more interested in talking about the film on hand rather than his past laurels. I recall going on the Chandni sets and shooting pictures of Sridevi in the Chopra-special mouldu00a0 glares, chiffon saris et al. Sridevi was tremendously excited about the film, in which she played a woman shunned by her wheelchair-bound fiance, Rishi Kapoor, and wooed by her boss, Vinod Khanna.
Chandni injected fresh life into the 60-plus Yash. He attempted a daring cross-generational love affair between a salt-n-pepper Anil Kapoor and the infatuated-with-her-mother's-lover Sridevi in Lamhe; and dared to take an almost sympathetic look at an obsessed lover, Shah Rukh Khan, in Darr.
Thereafter, Yash has slowed down and seems to have passed on the baton to son Aditya. In the next 16 years, he directed only two placid romancesu00a0 Dil To Pagal Hai and Veer Zaara. Both starred Shah Rukh. Yash Chopra has exhibited a vivid ability to keep in step with the times.u00a0
To commemorate his 50 years as a director, here is wishing more yash to Yash. He is still charged I see him at every Film Festival and the audience is still curious to know what he will make next. How many 77-year-old directors can you say that about?u00a0
