Sholay
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One of the biggest hits in history of Bollywood, Sholay (in English as Embers, Flames, Flames of the Sun), released in 1975, was recognized as the Best Film of 50 years at the 50th Filmfare awards. It is also the highest grossing movie of all time [1] in India with collections of Rs. 2,134,500,000/- or US $ 50 million. It is widely acknowledged by movie critics to be one of the best movies ever created by Bollywood and to be the most watched and popular. It was declared "Film of the Millennium by BBC India and internet polls in 1999.
Sholay revolutionised Hindi filmmaking and brought true professionalism to script writing. It was the first Hindi (and possibly Indian) movie to have a stereophonic soundtrack. It is one of the most influential films to have come out of Bollywood. When released the film was initially declared to be a commercial disaster. However, the collections slowly picked up and became a huge hit. As a testament to its popularity, the movie ran uninterruptedly for 286 weeks in a Mumbai theatre Minerva.
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Credits
The film was produced by G. P. Sippy and directed by his son Ramesh Sippy. It was written by their favourite scriptwriter pair Salim-Javed and its music was directed by R. D. Burman.
The film consolidated the position of Amitabh Bachchan as the uncrowned king of Bollywood actors, but in some ways the actor who definitely stole the spotlight was theater actor Amjad Khan, who played the role of the ruthless villain Gabbar Singh with great panache. The initial choice for the role was Danny Denzongpa, but he could not act in the film due to call sheet problems.
The main actors in the film ended up marrying their respective romantic leads in real life - Amitabh married Jaya Bhaduri in 1973 during the making of the film, and Dharmendra married Hema Malini in 1980, five years after the release of the film.
Plot outline
The film is about a retired police officer Thakur (Sanjeev Kumar) who hires two convicts Veeru and Jai (Dharmendra and Amitabh Bachchan) to capture Gabbar Singh (a dacoit) who is responsible for killing the cop's entire family (except the cop and his daughter-in-law). It has the typical ingredients of the more successful Bollywood movies: action (some sections being loosely based on Westerns such as The Magnificent Seven and Once Upon a Time in the West ), memorable songs, reel and real romances between the lead pairs, comedy by the main actors themselves (rather than by professional comedians) and tragedy. Speaking of comedy, the character of the jailor played by Asrani, is loosely based on the clumsy Inspector Jacques Clouseau of the 'Pink Panther' fame, but Asrani is credited with having emulated the character with finesse - his character is also a subtle critique of Indian sycophants during the British Raj.
Interesting Fact
In the scene where Gabbar Singh kills the entire family of Thakur, everbody is being shot except the small kid, because it was considered too disturbing for that time's censors to clear it.
Amitabh Bachchan originally wanted to play the role of Gabbar Singh, rather than that of Jaidev.
The climax
The original ending (that can be seen today on some DVD versions) shows the ex-cop killing Gabbar Singh. However, the CBFC (Central Board of Film Certification (more popularly known as the Censor board) that has to pass movies fit for public viewing) found the ending gruesome, especially in the context of the prevailing times then, as India was under emergency.
The original ending had Thakur kill Gabbar with his specially-made spiked shoes. The Board objected that a police officer would commit murder, and ordered the ending to be changed. The ending was changed to show the police arresting Gabbar Singh in the nick of time. Several other smaller changes differentiate Sippy's original 204 minute version from the censored theatrical release. Template:Endspoiler
Impact on popular culture
Image:Sholay.jpg The movie had a strong impact on popular culture, especially due to the times it was released in. Its success spawned several clones both on film and on television, including some spoofs. Comedian Jagdeep who played the character of Soorma Bhopali, made a film in 1988 with the character's name. In 1991, Amjad Khan played the role of Gabbar Singh again in Ramgarh Ke Sholay, a parody. It was also the first movie whose dialogue's also sold in cassettes, the famous Gabbar Singh sequence of "Kitnay aadmi the" and "Arrey O Saambha" becoming part of Indian film folklore. Macmohan the actor who played Saambha has always lived in the shadow of his tiny role in the film, where he had only one line in the entire movie, yet became famous.
The names Jai and Veeru seem to have become popular names for accomplices in Bollywood. In the 2001 movie Jodi No.1, the protagonists go by the names of Jai and Veeru (played by Sanjay Dutt and Govinda respectively). The Hindi version (dubbing) of the Hollywood movie Dr. Dolittle 2 had the animals going by the names of Veeru (Bear), Basanti (the female bear) and Jai (the dog playing friend to the bear). The 2004 movie Main Hoon Na, had references to several Bollywood movies with the prominent ones derived from Sholay.
Ram Gopal Varma announced in 2005 that he would be paying homage to Sholay with a new movie in the underworld setting, similar to his Sarkar paying a homage to The Godfather. Casting is currently on with several surprises such as Amitabh Bachchan playing Gabbar Singh (the villain), Ajay Devgan playing Veeru, the role was earlier assigned to his real life son Abhishek Bachchan, new actor Mohit Ahlawat would play Jai. South Indian actor Mohanlal will potray the character of Thakur/Inspector, Katrina Kaif playing the role of Thakur's widowed daughter-in-law, other prominent bollywood figures such as Urmila Matondkar,Sunil Shetty and Rajpal Yadav are said to be a part of the mega project. The move to make this movie has already generated controversy with the producers of original movie threatening to sue for copyright violations.
In Chacha Chaudhary, one of the popular series in Indian comics, a villain is named Gobbar Singh (again a dacoit) - an allusion to Gabbar Singh, the villain of Sholay.
A mobile game was also created by Indian Video game developers Indiagames, to mark the 30th anniversary of the film. The game became one of the highest selling games in the history of Indian Mobile gaming.
Inspirations
The theme and essence of Sholay was inspired by several films from Hollywood and India. The adventure and drama prevalent in the film was inspired from the Westerns, especially Sergio Leone's Spaghetti Westerns, with which the writer and director were influenced by. The theme of a village grouping or hiring gunmen to protect itself from bandits was inspired from The Magnificent Seven (1960), and The Seven Samurai which again was the inspiration for The Magnificent Seven. The theme of two light-hearted outlaws came from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), on which the writers wanted to base the characters of Jai and Veeru.
The Indian films which were an inspiration were Raj Khosla's Mera Gaon Mera Desh (1971) (translated to My Village My Country) and Narendra Bedi's Khote Sikkay (1973). Mera Gaon Mera Desh was the story of a one-armed man who reforms a petty criminal and uses him to protect their village agasint dacoits.
The music for the song Mehbooba was taken from a song by Demis Rousso, which the director liked. The name and violence of Gabbar Singh was adopted from a real-life dacoit of the same name who was a menace in the villages around Gwalior in the 1950s. He was known to capture the police and cutoff their ears and noses. For the preparation of the role, Amjad Khan read Abhishapth Chambal, a book on Chambal dacoits written by Taroon Coomar (the film's herioine Jaya Bhaduri's father).
The names of Veeru and Jai came from writer Salim's friends while in college, and the name of Thakur came from Thakur Baldev Singh who was Salim's father-in-law. The recurring theme throughout the film of the same-sided coin came from Garden of Evil (1954) starring Gary Cooper. The looks and dialogue delivery of the short but popular role of the jailor played by Asrani were an imitation of Hitler. The jailor's laughter was an imitation of Jack Lemmon in The Great Race (1965).
Production
The film was lavishly mounted, took two and a half years to make and went over budget (nearly 3 crores). Much of the film was set among the rocky terrian of Ramnagaram, a village near Bangalore. A road was built from the Bangalore highway to Ramnagaram for the purpose.
Awards
Despite becoming the most successful film of its time, it failed to win any major popular or critics awards. The lone Filmfare award it got went to M.S. Shinde for Best editing. The film had over 3,00,000 ft of negative initially, which had to be edited to less than 20,000 ft. The final censored film was 18,000 ft and the duration of the film was 3 hours and 20 minutes.
Sholay was honored at the 2005 Filmfare Awards as the Best Film of the past 50 Years. Ramesh Sippy was there to receive the award.
Famous dialogues
कितने आदमी थे? -- Kitne aadmi the? ("How many men were there?")
जो डर गया, समझो मर गया -- Jo darr gaya, samjho marr gaya. ("He who is afraid, is as good as dead.")
बसंती इन कुत्तों के सामने मत नाचना -- Basanti, in kutton ke samne mat naachna. ("Basanti, do not dance in front of these dogs.")
अरे ओ साम्भा -- Arrey 'O Sambha ("Hey! Sambha")
तेरा क्या होगा, कालिया -- Tera kya hoga, Kaaliya? ("What will become of you, Kaliya?")
तुम्हारा नाम क्या है, बसंती -- Tumhara naam kya hai, Basanti? ("What's your name, Basanti?")
आधे इधर जाओ, आधे उधर जाओ, बाकी हमारे साथ आओ Aadhe idhar jaao, aadhe udhar jaao, baaki hamare sath aao ("Half of you go this way, half of you go that way and the rest, follow me.")
हम अंग्रेजों के जमाने के जेलर हैं -- Hum Angrenzo ke zamane ke jailor hain! ("I have been a jailor since the British times!")
लग गया निशाना -- Lag Gaya Nishaana. ("Right on Target")
कुत्ते कमीने, चुन चुन के मारूंगा -- Kutte-Kamine, chunn-chunn ke maroonga ("You dirty dogs, I'll pick each one of you and hunt you down")
बहुत जान है इन हाथों में, ये हाथ मुझे दे दे ठाकुर! -- Bahut jaan hai in haathon mein, ye haath mujhe de de Thakur! ("Your hands move too much, give me your hands chief!" - Gabbar to Thakur, at the beginning of the movie when Gabbar chops off Thakur's hands.)
बहुत जान है इन हाथों में, ये हाथ मुझे दे दे गब्बर! -- Bahut jaan hai in haathon mein, ye haath mujhe de de Gabbar! (Thakur to Gabbar, towards the end of the movie as Thakur subdues Gabbar and exacts his revenge by trampling Gabbar's hands under his spiked shoes.)
बहुत याराना लगता है -- Bahut yaarana lagta hai ("He seems to be very dear to you")
दुनिया में सबसे बड़ा बोझ होता है बाप के कन्धों पर बेटे का जनाज़ा -- Duniya mein sabse bada bojh hota hai baap ke kandhe par bete ka janaaza ("The heaviest burden in the world, is that of a son's coffin, on a father's shoulder")
सो जा बेटे, सो जा, नहीं तो गब्बर आ जाएगा -- So ja bete, so ja. nahin to Gabbar aa jaaega ("Go to sleep my child, or Gabbar will come")
चल धन्नो आज तेरी बसंती की इज्जत का सवाल है -- Chal Dhanno! Aaj teri Basanti ki ijjat ka sawaal hai ("Come on Dhanno! Today, (your) Basanti's honour is at stake")
Further reading
Chopra, Anupama, Sholay - The Making Of A Classic (Penguin Books) 2000 ISBN 014029970x
External links
{{{2|{{{title|Sholay}}}}}} at The Internet Movie Databasede:Sholay