SUCHITRA SEN - BEAUTY AND TALENT.

Legendary Bengali actress Padmashree Suchitra Sen passed away on Friday the 17^th January 2014 after a brief period of illness. The media had come out with the usual obituary references as well as detailed biographic sketches and tributes for  her contribution  to Indian films in general and Bengali films in particular. A lot was written about her ethereal beauty, her acting talent, her  enigmatic personality and her shunning  all publicity and public appearances to live in reclusion.

Suchitra Sen’s contribution to Bengali films was immense with most memorable films like AGNIPARIKSHA,  SAAT PAAKE BANDHA,SATPATI, SAGARIKA, UTTER PHALGUNI and so on which gave her a place in the hearts of Bengalis equal to that of the great Kanan Devi. Her thirty odd Bengali films opposite the matinee idol Uttam Kumar catapulted her to the heights of popularity till 1978 when she suddenly decided to leave everything behind to lead a lonely life of her own.

Film goers of this part of the country had only limited opportunity to see the Bengali films of Suchitra Sen and our memories of Suchitra Sen’s films  still linger with her seven or eight Hindi films including Bimal Roy’s DEVDAS (1955) in which she made her debut in Hindi cinema. The much acclaimed film with Dilip Kumar donning the role of the tragic hero( the title stuck to him forever) which fetched him the Filmfare Award for the best actor. The film  

 also had Vijayathimala in the lead who gave outstanding performance with Suchitra Sen. It won the National Award for the third best film of the year. What still lingers clearly in my mind is the music of S.D.Burman with Talat’s Mahmood’s  ‘Kisko khabar thi’ and ‘Mitwa laagi yeh kaisi’ and Lata’s  ‘Oj Jane wale ruk jha’ being the best of the lot.

In fact one of the prominent features of Suchitra Sen’s Hindi films was the beautiful melodious songs which are even today a rage among singers and listeners. The most notable is Filmyug Pvt.Ltd.’s  AANDHI(1975) starring Sanjeev Kumar and Suchitra Sen with haunting music by R.D.Burman. A couple of the best ever duets of Lata and Kishore Kumar, viz., ‘Tere bina zindagi se’ and  ‘Tum aa gaye ho noor aa gaya’ besides ‘Is mod se jata hain’  prove the  point.The Director of the film Gulzar  himself had penned the lyrics and the film bagged the Filmfare Awards for the Best film and Best actor.(Sanjeev Kumar).The performance of Suchitra Sen received a lot of critical acclaim but there was also enough controversy surrounding the character played by her for its similarity with the former prime minister Smt.Indira Gandhi.

 

Film AANDHI had followed another highly successful film  Charu Chitra’s MAMTA(1966), a  Dharmendra-Suchitra Sen- Ashok Kumar starrer directed by Asit Sen with music by Roshan. This was a remake of the superhit Bengali film UTTAR PHALGUNI with Suchitra Sen in the lead which won the National Award for best film in 1963. Film Mamta was best remembered for Suchitra sen’s acting and Roshan’s music. Lata’s  ‘Rahena rahen ham’ and ‘Rahte they kabhi’ are still as haunting as ever.The Lata-Hemant Kumar duet ‘Chhupa lo yun dil mein’ is another outstanding number of the film.

Musicwise, probably the best remembered Hindi film of Suchitra Sen is Naya Film’s BOMBAY KA BABU(1960) with Dev Aanand playing the lead opposite her. While the film as such was not a big hit, the songs composed by S.D.BURMAN are among his best compositions ever. The Asha-Rafi duet  ‘Deewana mastana hua dil’sung with great verve and lilt is an all time favourite of listeners. In ‘Saathi na koi manzil’ Rafi is at his melodious best. The Asha Bhosle number ‘Dekhne mein bhola hai’ is even today as sweet and catchy as ever.There is also one of the top songs of Mukesh viz.,the grief filled ‘Chalri sajni ab kya soche’ reminding us of his evergreen ‘Ansu bhari hai yeh jeevan ki(Parwarish), ‘Saranga teri yaad mein(Saranga) and ‘Dil jalta hain to jalne de(Pehli Nazar)  and so on.

In our younger days when cinema was  the main form of entertainment there were several films, film producers, directors, actors and actresses, music directors, singers, lyricists and so on who, with their talent and efforts, had  made our life happy . Eventhough most of them have inevitably left the world, the pleasant memories about them and their contributions, the records and songs and a peep into that glorious past give us many enjoyable hours even now. It is sad that one of the most beautiful and talented personalities of Indian Cinema, Suthitra Sen, has also left us.

Tail piece:- The beautiful face of Suchitra Sen reminds us of two more faces of beauty  in similar mould; one of the past, the Mughal-e-Azam  Madhubala and the still active other, the Yaraana Madhuri Dixit.

ABOUT MALAYALAM FILM 'MELA'

 The Malayalm film MELA (1980) written and directed  by Sri K.G. George, though one of his less celebrated films, but still was a much talked about film when it was released in Kerala. It came  close on the heels  of two of his award winning  and critically acclaimed films. One was the State Award winning  debut film SWAPNADANAM(1975) with Rani Chandra and Dr.Mohandas in the lead. The other ULKKADAL based, on a story in the same name by Sri George Onakkur, had Venu Nagavally and Shobha in the lead .

What made the film SWAPNADANAM  a milestone of Malayalam cinema  was the novelty of the theme brilliantly handled by  director K.G.George and the outstanding portrayal by Rani Chandra and the new comer Mohandas.  The film ULKKADAL  also saw great acting by Shobha and Venunagavally. Music by the maestro, M.B.Srinivasan, was another distinguishing feature of the film with the haunting duet penned by Sri O.N.V.Kurup and rendered by Jayachandran and Selma George,Viz.,’Sharabindu  malardeepa naalam’  proving to be a great hit. Several successful films followed establishing Sri K.G.George as one of the most successful film makers in Malayalam.  KOLANGAL (1980), YAVANIKA(1982), notable again for the performance of  Thilakan  and Gopi, LEKHAYUDE MARANAM ORU FLASHBACK(1983) , ADAMINTE VARIYELLU(1983) and IRAKAL(1986) were all landmarks in the history of Malayalam cinema.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIPW7tUDI6c

Coming back to film MELA, it was unique in several respects apart from the fact that it was the debut film of actor Mammootty, who went on to become a super star and continues to be so even now. The film MELA  was, probably, the first film in Malayalam after NAYAR PIDICHA PULIVAL, to deal with circus and the life of circus artists and Mammootty played the role of a motor cycle stunt jumper . The comedy  interludes in a circus used to be managed by a couple of dwarfs and in MELA  the hero himself was a dwarf played by Raghu. The romantic lead opposite him was played by actress Anjali Naidu. The film had big entertainment value with circus items thrown in between and on the whole it was well received. Memories of seeing the film at Thiruvananthapuram still linger. What I still remember and what impressed me most was the music of M.B.Sreenivasan, especially the song ‘Manasssoru maanthrika kuthirayay payunnu’ , penned by Mullanezhi  and soulfully rendered by Jesudas. In fact M.B.Srinivasan was Sri K.G. George’s favourite music director  doing music for all his successful films except SWAPNADANAM.There was also another beautiful song ‘Neelakkuda choodi vanam’ by Selma George. The song ‘Manassoru maanthrika’ and ‘Sharabindu malaedeeepa naalam’of ULKKADAL are arguably the best songs of MBS in Malayalam films. It is sad that Selma George was not heard much in Malayalam films in later years. The hero of MELA, Raghu could not also achieve what another similarly endowed artiste, Pakru, could achieve in films like ATBHUTHA DWEEP years later.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iom_MdO0is

The song ‘Manassoru’ used to haunt me and my efforts to get a gramophone record of the song could finally succeed recently to my utter delight prompting me to scribble a few lines as above.

FILM ARZOO AND A FEW STRAY THOUGHTS.

The other day while listening to Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation’s  (“Aap ka Purana Dost Radio Ceylon”, as the broadcaster nostalgically introduces themselves) morning Hindi programme, the song ‘Yeh phoolon ki rani, baharon ki mallika, tera muskurana.......’came out crystal clear in all its glory to our utter delight. This happy, melodious  romantic song penned by Hasrat Jaipuri and composed by Shankar Jaikishen  from Sagar Films International’s   ARZOO (Direction: Ramanand Ragar) was a huge hit of those days. In fact for music directors Shankar Jaikishen, who were riding high on popularity charts throughout the decades of the 1950 and the 60, the music of the film was an outstanding success, the film bagging four Filmfare Awards, for best music(SJ), Best Lyrics (Hasrat: Aji ruth karna),best direction and story(Ramanand Sagar)and best actor(Rajinder Kumar). 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sV8tXENi2s

The song ‘Ye phoolon  ki rani’ is rarely heard nowadays  and hearing it suddenly over the radio was a pleasant experience. Mohammed Rafi had made it his own, rendering it as only he could, bringing out  the mood of the song and its nuances pleasingly to the discerning ears! Film ARZOO had a few other outstanding songs in it like ‘Aji ruth karna’(Lata) , Yeh nargise mastana and ‘Chalke teri aankhon mein (both by Rafi) and the haunting ‘Bedardi balma tujh ko (Lata). But for us those days ‘Ai phoolon ki rani’ was closer to the heart as it touched a chord somewhere. What pains today is the feeling that the musical duo, S-J, who had given us innumerable wonderful songs in films from Aag, Barsaat, Chori Chori to Sasural Sangam, Jis desh nein Ganga bahti hai to Be-iman and so on and who were the kings of the music industry, earning a record nine Filmfare Awards, for more than two decades are not getting the deserved prominence nowadays in music related programs and features. Are they being slowly pushed into the oblivion?

While listening to ‘Ae phoolon ki rani’ three songs with a similar tune but entirely different in content , treatment and style flashed through my mind. Two are from film PYASA  with music by S.D.Burman and penned by Sahir Ludhianvi. While the  songs, ‘Jinhen naaz hai Hind par woh kahan hai’ and ‘ Yeh duniya agar mil bhi jayen to kya hain’ rendered by Rafi are intense, grief filled and filmed  on the tragic hero of the film played by Guru Dutt , the song ‘Ae phoolon ki’ is simple, pleasant and romantic.  These songs show Rafi’s range and flexibility in singing songs to the mood of the situation and the theme of the film. The film PYASA  created a sensation when it  was released and it became a milestone in Indian film history and is considered as one of the top romantic films of the world.  Singer Geeta Dutt was at her best in the immortal songs ‘Jane kya tune kahi’and ‘aaj sanam mohe ang lagalo’ as was Hemant Kumar in the song ‘Jane woh kaise log they’, argueably, his best remembered song.
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugvtr3VQ2fI
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSo3KVwrp8M

The third song which came to my memory was a ghazal (Nazm) by Jagjit Singh from film Aaj,viz., Woh kaghaz ki kashti, woh baarish ka paani’ with music by Jagjit Singh and Chitra Singh  for the lyrics penned by Sudarshan Faakir. The similarity of the tune with the earlier mentioned songs are clear. But the content and mood of the song are entirely different . The song takes us nostalgically back to our childhood days with the beautiful lyrics  soulfully rendered by Jagjit Singh. People often wonder why we always long to hear old songs. They are not mere old songs; each song evokes  special memories and feelings in the hearts of listeners, especially those who had heard them  and seen the films when they were released in their local theatres  giving them immense joy and a sense of belonging! The song ‘Kaghaz ki kashti’epitomises all that can be said about the wonderful olden days.  

,http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3Wq4q7Yygg