5 Favorite Filmi Fathers

PAPA kehte hain...
The gruffest greatest papa

1. Satyendra Kapoor - By far my favorite in any film, he's always the cautious but loving dad, a bit gruff as the ppc club notes in Mard. But I think one of his star performances as a nice bapu was in Manzil with Amitabh Bachan and Moushumi Chatterji, he played surprisingly a bourgeoisie father, he was great in this role as a yet again cautious father wary against Amitabh's wheeler dealer. His chemistry with Amitabh is electric and this film shows it with his funny facial expressions, when he suspects Amitabh's lack of paisa in one scene, his eyebrow lift just sums it up for the audience, and in another he strokes his wise invisible beard as he finds Amitabh's lighter on the floor. Another great papa role is when Satyendra starred in Deewar, what an effortless performance that was, his reactions to his friends labeling him a traitor was just soo sad, and made me cry also. His masala papa roles that I love is Coolie, what a nice papa he was, he gifted Waheeda Rehman such a nice chuni, then a few scenes later he proves his worth as an everyman by working on a bridge. This was a really cute performance, and when him and Amitabh were reunited, I jumped up and rejoiced like they did!
The Strictest bauji ever

2. Amrish Puri - the bad ass dad of all filmi papa's, the strict authoritarian that changes his mind every time at the end! His most memorable is of course Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, who can top an angry dad like that, his role was great because though its a Yash Raj picture, he manages to make the father seem real, caught between two worlds. My favorite scene was when he brought home a letter from India and screamed "Its from India, smell it" and boy he sniffed the helll out of that letter. Another bad ass papa role was when he played the awful papa in Pardes also a terrible xenophobic movie by Subhash Ghai which I endured again. But this papa was nice to his foreign bred son and nasty to his adopted son of India Shah Rukh Khan, I was happy with this role because at the end, when he beats the living shit out of SRK, he realizes how evil his American bred bachha is and hits him around and utters "You go back to Amrica with your filth" and proceeds to hug SRK and ask for forgiveness. I loved it because he gave SRK such a hard time!

3- Manmohan Krishna - a wonderfully cute papa, his most memorable father role for me was in the 1960-something Waqt by Yash Chopra. He was father to Sadhana in this film and was a bourgoisie father, living in luxury but he made the character very real again despite being a Yash film. When he introduces Raaj Kumar to Sadhana, he seems so genuine and fatherly standing there awkwardly while Raaj flirts with her! So cute!
The sweet bapu
4- Alok Nath - By far the sweetest and loving baap here, I absolutely loved him in Kabzaa, a revenge flick with Sanjay Dutt when he was a weedy kid. Alok is always best at playing foster fathers for bad boy, and this film was the epitome of this. He played a Muslim clerk that wants some land to build an orphanage, awww. He was sooo sweet to Sanjay even when he threw his furniture at him and outside his house, as Sanjay is a ruffian who hits old people. Eventually Alok mentors Sanjay to be a kid, he was so loving and cared for Sanjay soo much! Another great baap role for Alok, was in Taal, what a resounding slap he gave that nasty aunty! And he was great with his head jigging and hand gesticualting dances for his musical father!
The real and everyman papa
5- Balraj Sahni - A realistic and sad baap, Balraj is such a brilliant and method actor, my favorite film of his is Do Bigha Zameen, ohh I wasn't prepared for such sadness in his performance, but he made me cry so hard. He is the common middle class father, and then his land was taken, and he forced to become a rickshaw walla. Ohhh Balraj, he was soo earnest and wonderful in this role, and Nirupa Roy complemented him perfectly as his wife. A bit trivia Balraj went to Kolkatta and drove a rickshaw to prepare for his role! Another lovely baap is the equally earnest and sad, is Balraj's performance in Yash Chopra's Waqt, he was so justified in strangling Jeevan's neck, which i would do in that movie? Who are your favorite filmi bauji's?

Saudagar-When Grandpas Attack

Don't look at the camera Dilip!

I hated this movie, I don't know why but the way Subhash Ghai presented the two veterans of film Dilip Kumar and Raaj Kumar, was just shoddy. I usually like anything Subhash does even his backwass like Yaadein or even his utter backwass of Kisna. Thats how dedicated I am, but in this Romeo and Juliet movie, he hyped the pairing of these two great men too much and then he focused far too much on the Romeo and Juliet

• Starts off with a haggard looking Anupam Kher playing the Friar character he has been wandering the hills of Himanchal Pradesh, searching for peace, he also lives in a cave furnished with a coffee machine! Nomads eh?
• He tells us the story of two sabse pyare dosts Veeru(Dilip Kumar) and Raju(Raaj Kumar) who are devoted to eachother, they sing songs with Anupam in a younger avatar with different actors, they sing a nice song called 'Imli Ka Boota' about a cherry and berry and tamarind tree? But when they grow up, Veeru disgraces Raju's sister by garlanding his sister when her groom ditches the ceremony. And then this subtitle manages the rest of the filler:

• They start a civil war with each other, yes a civil war with armies! They have lovely grandchildren Vasu(Vivek Mushran) Dilip's very easy on the eyes grandson and Raaj's granddaughter Manisha Koirala, through a series of misfortunes for the audience and them they fall in love. The two newcomers really had no chemistry at all and seem very brother and sister like as the only time they romance is a few songs that were very tame, and they were in rain how tame can you get?
• Anupam finds them in a tame shot of making out, and rejoices as this is the only way Veeru and Raju will become friends, as previously in the movie Raju slices the painting above to show his pure hate. A bit more filler later and the two loves are in the different households Vasu becomes Raju's favorite confidante, and Manisha sings another version of Imli Ka Boota which displeases Dilip completely with this expressive face

We grandpa's hate this song!

• Rightly so they hate this song, Raju hears this song and transported back to the above screencap when he denounced the friendship, a bit filler about scandal of an unclaimed baby that belongs to Raju's other grandson, this is a great scene because the two of Kumar's have a wicked faceoff, that made me say "OHH no he di-nt!" but yes he did! Another lovely insult when Dilip shouts "What about this baby" and Raaj says in his wonderful laconic voice "You keep it, I am Rajeshwar Singh!" ahhhhh I could listen to Raaj Kumar all day long, but alas we go back to the stupid lovers who are found out and sing "Mohabbat KI kI" with very sharp head turns to the camera!
• A surviving highlight of this movie is of course eternal villain Amrish Puri as Raju's brother in law who sent him to jail, 14 years back. in this cool getup Amrish dons a flapper wig from the 1920's and buck teeth from a rabbit and snarls his dialogues with a funny voice coz the teeth are just so powerful! He also has the tic of a villain because he twirl his flapper hair in any tense moment, and he always foreshadows a face-off with being in a temple and playing flamencos, actual flamencos!
• The end is near and Amrish storyline includes selling Raju's fort, he obviously is that rich! With this lame plot point the two warring former dosts patch it up and play Holi together and sing a cute older version of Imli Ka Boota. The end happens and its power packed with both Kumar's shouting some nice dialogues, but my only qualm is that Dilip is forced in some many scenes to screech his lines out, unnecessary as he ends up half coughing in one scene.
  

Saudgar a boring movie, with the two giants of the screen, and I hope readers that our "sun of friendship" doesn't dwindle away!

MAA-Elephant Exploitation

Animals have maa's too

Warning: if you have joined PETA and any other wildlife causes, don't watch MAA, but if you want to see a bhanged up elephant than do watch!
When I found this at a video store it looked enticing because Dharmendra was on the cover holding the Forever Maa Nirupa Roy in his hands, i did not expect however to scream and shield my eyes when Dharmendra instead went hunting for animals to take away from their maa's. The movie starts off with an introduction to Vijay(Dharmendra) a huntsman, his opening scene shows him on a chair stuck on a van while he screams come here you to various tigers. I screamed in this scene because the pooor tigers were mercilessly roped by Vijay, to show the audience what a hard job he does, I couldn't post that screencap as it looked to violent and sad to show all of you. Suffice to say he ropes 3 tigers and captures a lion cub, and then the above title comes on! Then we enter Vijay's house which he rides in this cool staircase or if it is one
The stairs of a hunter
He drives his car out for another chase where he now sits on his chair and shouts "I'm gonna get you" in that characteristic Dharam way of saying English dialogues. This was even more brutal than the other as Dharam runs after a leopard and in a funny scene an extra fall out the back, gets mauled, and Dharam leaves him behind and utters "Only idiots lose their lives to jungle cats, I am the jungle king, I never lose!" After this he packs away the leopard and leopard cub away from his maa, and you just now with shots of leopard and tiger maa's with glycerin in their eyes that Vijay will get his comeuppance. After his hunt he runs into to be fed by his own maa and have her lecture him in separating maa from her bacche.
It's only the circus maa!

Meanwhile in the Badlands of Jungle King's town is the villain Ranjeet, he is a fraudulent animal collector with his associate Padma Khanna they trick many businessmen into purchasing animals they don't have. The next day Ranjeet visits Vijay to bribe him, Vijay a good huntsman refuses, his only customer is Gopaldas (Om Prakash in a wonderfully funny role), Ranjeet is unhappy as the businessmen all want their money back.
I am deliciously sleazy!

He needed a screencap because he is soo bad-ass and he wears a wonderful white suit with ghungroos on the jacket, this bad man makes Padma act as Gopaldas' daughter Nimmi who has been sent to film the animals. I don't know why she would, they are so badly treated, anyway the real Nimmi(Hema Malini) turns up in the jungle running from a leopard, why the leopards? Jungle King comes to resuce her but mistakes her for a thief trying to take his jungle animals! The two of them have great lovable chemistry with eachother but Hema takes to very ugly butch cowboy shirt clothes that don't highligh her well. All is lovey dovey in Jungledom, even Gopaldas comes to arrange their marriage in a hilarious scene where Om Prakash says at every "Vhaat Nunsense" its hilarious and when he greets Vijay he screams "Jungle King, Oye Jungle king"
But the comeuppance must happen soon enough, and Vijay is off to sell a poor elephant baby, on this hunt he makes a hole for it to fall in, it is truly one of the worst scenes in Bollywood, the poor thing tramples down, and its soo sad, the maa is there also crying with. I almost thought this would turn into dumbo, but no Vijay's mum must run to him and tell to repent, Nirupa is then stamped on by the elephant, and in her last wishes she wants Vijay to give up this terrible job, and Dharam screams to high heavens but he must know the true sacrifice of a maa taken. In a very DrStrangelove montage of explosions we see Vijay lighting his maa's funeral pyre with the song "Maa, Mujhe Dhoonde Kahan" a sad song that has bang with a frying pan symbolism of Dharmendra in a cage, in a cute scene he opens all the cages and lets all the animals out, and he even has a pair of hedgehogs, i don't know what they need them at the circus for?
The rest is a bit of filler, Ranjeet angry wants tons of animals and in another horrific scene he demands a bear cub, a moustachioed hench man goes to the jungle and plucks one up by the head and you can see the poor baby is in pain as it wails and pats its head, ahhhh!
BHANGED UP ELEPHANTS YAAAY!
My favorite scene, Dharmendra is looking for baby elephants and Dumbo visits the temple and drinks the swami-ji's bhang and in the craziest scene ever it flaps its ears about and walks backwards and forwards while the music is a sexy sounding saxophone, absolutely wiccked!
Apesh*t elephants
Blah blah dumbo is reunited with maa, and Vijay learns that animals have feelings after all, but I did enjoy this movie only for the crazy bhanged Dumbo, Om Prakash with nunsensse, and happiness that Ranjeet was a pure villain not raping anyone! Hope you can stomach this kind of a film coz it made me scream and cry and forward such moments!

Sitting on Shashi!

I have sat on the Shashi's lap! It was a shocking realization I found out today, I was looking through my storeroom in my apartment and found a very beautiful axe - no not a real one but it was a Punjabi made fabric one, I took it down and asked my mother about this. She smiled and told me "This is what Shashi Kapoor gave me when I went to dinner with him!"
I was shocked to say the least, it turns out that my next door neighbour had worked for Merchant Ivory as a production helper and when they had finished In Custody, Shashi came next door and treated the whole team to a great dinner at Chor Bazaar in London, my mum was invited and when she was there, he happened to have this axe and gifted it to her.
After this encounter, Shashi came another day to my neighbour Rita's house to have a dinner, I cannot remember this at all but I was three years old and was outside Rita's garden and according to my mum we got on famously and I sat on his lap the whole evening, she has a picture but alas it is in London! Ohhhh a memory I wish I could remember

Aur Rum

Hello everyone! Rum the crazy commenter has finally made her own blog, and i am very excited to start and review some movies! I have loved Bollywood since I was 2 years old and it clearly shows now as an 17 year old whose favorite topic is the height of Sadhana's beehive, or how ripped Dharmendra looks in any movies. The first movie, I had ever watched was 1942:A Love Story that has been indoctrinated into my mind, ohhhh i am that ek ladki that Anil sings for. Anyway the blog, I hope I can keep everyone laughing with the vast and silly movies I own, especially the backwass movies of Amitabh in his angry old man movies of the late 80's, I have a special love for Anil Kapoor and many other men especially if they have moustaches on, I don't know why i like them. But then again my first bollywood image was of Anil jumping out of bed? I am more of an old schooler and love the older movies such as Waqt, Kaagaz Ke Phool, Pyaasa, and many more, I think my favorite era was the complete escapism of the 1960's, the fashions, eyeliner, and the beehives that have remained with me all through my high school life, as i was known as the eyeliner girl, because I copy my eyeliner from Saira Banu. Tomorrow I'll start off with a silly review of Maa from 1976 a hilarious elephant and Dharmendra movie. Please be prepared for a few unpro screencaps as the laptop has busted.