Doyen of middle of road cinema. Review on Basu Chatterjee

During the 70’s and 80’s in Bollywood, movies were divided into 3 distinct categories- on the one hand you had the typical commercial glossy movies with larger than life characters and settings, the big blockbusters with big stars but many a time not possessing a sensible storyline. Manmohan Desai, Subash Ghai, Prakash Mehra, Shakti Samanta, Ramesh Sippy were some of the big ticket commercial directors. At the other end you had the parallel or the art movie genre, which were completely songless, shot on a shoestring budget and were in complete contrast to the regular masala movies. Shyam Benegal, Mani Kaul, Govind Nihalani, Mrinal Sen, Kumar Shahani, Saeed Mirza were some of the leading lights of this genre. Now while the big budget blockbusters did have a lot of gloss, 90% of them didn’t have the vital content or what we call a script, most of them were meaningless masala. On the other side while the art film movement boasted of some excellent stories, they simply could not touch most of the people, who found them too abstract and too high brow. The fact is there was a large section of audience who were repulsed by the clichéd stuff of the masala movies, but at the same time the art house cinema was just over the heads. And this is where we had the middle of the road cinema coming into picture. Gulzar, Hrishikesh Mukherjee and Basu Chaterjee were the reigning troika of this genre. While most of their movies had very strong scripts and characters, at the same time they did not eschew the completely commercial aspects like songs or comedy. These stories were simple to understand for the lay man and one did not need to be endowed with an IQ of 170+ to appreciate these movies.

While Gulzar, Hrishida and Basu Chaterjee were the Trimurti of the middle of the road genre, each had their own way. Hrishida would concentrate mostly on the emotional intensity of the characters, while Gulzar would explore the complexities inherent in the relationship of human beings. In contrast most of Basu da’s movies were pretty simple, feel good stuff, with a comic undertone, but at the same time they had a subtlety and sensitivity, avoiding the crassness of the regular masala stuff. Ok before I venture into this about Basu da, one simple question What is common to Basu da and Bal Thackeray? Well both were cartoonists.. Yes before coming into movies Basu da was a cartoonist for Blitz for 19 years and his exposure to the film society movement in India as secretary of film forum, ensured that he was exposed to the European neo realist movies. It was this exposure that made him direct his first movie in 1969 , Sara Akash which was a typical art house movie. The movie was about the story of a newly married couple and the repression they suffered in a joint family in small town India.

Basu da, took the same theme and made an albeit lighter and more endearing version in the 1971 flick Piya Ka Ghar. Starring Anil Dhawan and Jaya Bhaduri as the newly married couple it showcased the problems faced by a young bride coming from a smaller town and adjusting to life with her husband in the crowded chawls of Mumbai. But unlike the standard Hindi movies, this was not about the beautiful village vs the big bad city. In the end, the heroine decides to accept the life in the city as it is and moves on with living, which is how it is in real life. Piya Ka Ghar was one of the few Hindi movies which took a realistic look at city life, unlike most Bollywood movies. The spirit of the movie is summed up in Kishore’s superb song “Yeh Jeevan Hai”. 1974 saw Basu da come up with another winner in Rajnigandha which has to be one of the most sensitive romances I have ever watched. Basu da wonderfully captures the dilemma of the heroine Deepa(Vidya Sinha) who has to decide between two diametrically opposite men her current love Sanjay( Amol Palekar) who is pretty much the easy going carefree type and her ex flame Navin( Dinesh Thakur) the exact opposite of Sanjay. Basu da’s strength lies in the characterization, and the 3 characters are wonderfully etched in this movie. And of course great songs by Salil Choudhury Lata’s title track and Mukesh’s “Kahin Baar Yuhin Dekha Hai”.

1975 sees Basu da come up with one of the best comedies Choti Si Baat with Amol Palekar as the timid shy bank clerk, who woos the girl of his dreams, Vidya Sinha, with the help of Ashok Kumar, playing Col Julius Wilfred Nagendranath, as his love guru. Ashok Kumar was simply outstanding in this movie and along with Utpal Dutt’s Bhavani Shanker in Golmaal, I would put this as one of the best comic performances I have ever seen. Choti si Baat, was followed by Chitchor in 1976, starring Zarina Wahab, Amol Palekar and Vijayandre Ghatge, which dealt with the case of mistaken identities due to same name. Great songs like “Gori Tera Gaaon”,”Aaj Se Pehle”, “Jab Deep Jale Aana”, superb performances by all 3 lead actors and of course Basu da’s direction made this movie a must watch. Ironical that Rajshree Productions should recycle this story to produce a piece of garbage called Main Prem Ki Diwani Hoon. I guess MPKDH suits the definition of recycled garbage perfectly well. In 1977 Basu Chaterjee came up with another great movie Swami starring Shabana Azmi, Girish Karnad and Vikram( remember him). Basically based on the story of the heroine married to another person and her heart pining for her lover, Basu da dealt with this complex theme in an absolutely sensitive manner. The final scene when Shabana decides to go back to her husband is handled without any over the top emotions and in a simple manner. The same theme of husband-wife-lover was again handled in subsequent movies like “Voh 7 Din” and “Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam”. As like other Basu da movies this had great songs like “Ka Karo Sajani”( Yesudas), “Pal Bhar Mein Yeh Kya ho Gaya”(Lata) and “Yaadon Mein Voh”(Kishore). The same year also saw Basu da handling the marital discord theme in Priayatma starring Jeetendra and Neetu Singh, but it was not such a great movie.

And in 1978 Basu da again came up with a wonderful family story in Khatta Meetha which was based on the Hollywood flick “Yours,Mine and Ours”. It dealt with story of a widower(Ashok Kumar) and widow(Pearl Padamsee) marrying again and the ensuing chaos in a hilarious manner, as the kids from both marriages cant stand each other. One of the few movies which took a realistic look at the Parsi community and didn’t caricaturize them unlike in other Hindi movies. During the same time similar movie was also made with Rakhee and Sanjeev Kumar called Humhare Tumhare, with the same story. The same year saw him directing Dharam paaji in a comedy Dillagi which however did not do too well. Nor did the attempt to do a desi version of The 39 steps Chakravyuh starring Rajesh Khanna and Neetu Singh, achieve much success, as the movie was a big failure at the box office.

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