ALAAP
(“Prelude,” Hindi, 1977)
Directed by Hrishikesh Mukherjee
Produced by N. C. Sippy
Story idea: Harindranath Chattopadhyaya, Hrishikesh Mukherjee; Screenplay:
Bimal Dutta; Dialogue and lyrics: Dr. Rahi Masoom Reza (“Koi
gata” by
Harbansraj Bachchan); Music: Jaidev; Cinematography: Jawant R. Pathare;
Art direction: Ajit
Banerjee; Playback: Lata Mangeshkar, Yesudas, Kum Faiyyaz, Asrani, Madhurani,
Bhupendra, Dilraj Kaur, Ustad Bade Gulam Ali Khan
Dedicated to the memory of the great singers K. L. Saigal and Mukesh, this
charming and unpretentious film offers a palate-cleansing change from the
spicy “masala” epics
that dominated its era, and features their superstar Amitabh Bachchan in
a decidedly offbeat role. Though its central themes of protracted father-son
conflict and
of a suffering artist in a callous world are routine enough, its comparatively
realistic depiction of life at various social levels in a provincial town,
witty yet understated dialogues and beautiful songs that are deftly integrated
into
the storyline, and masterful but low-key performances all serve to lift
it above the ordinary.
As the film opens, Alok (Amitabh Bachchan) completes a degree in classical
music and returns to his hometown where he promptly reconnects with
a childhood friend,
the spirited horsecart driver Ganeshi (comedian Asrani, who played
the Hitler-esque jailer in SHOLAY), who entertains him enroute home
with
a comic folk-style
song to his mare (Binti sun le, “Hear my plea…”).
Back at the prosperous family home, Alok is reunited with his adored
sister-in-law (Lily Chakraborty)
and elder brother Ashok, but soon runs afoul of their dictatorial father
Triloki Prasad (Om Prakash). Alok calls his old man “Herr Hitler,” and
with good reason, for he exemplifies the petty tyrant-in-his-own-domain
mentality
of certain upper-class men, who tyrannize their families and express
their “feelings” only
through tersely barked commands. Papa peremptorily informs Alok that
he must now abandon the silliness of music and join his brother in
the family law office.
After a humorous nighttime song in which Alok assumes a barrister’s
role and pleads the moon’s case to his sister-in-law, he accompanies
his brother to town, but plays hooky from the family firm to visit
Ganeshi’s modest
home. In an adjacent building, he finds a singing lesson in progress,
taught by a retired courtesan of Banaras, Sarjubai (Chhaya Devi); the
pupil is Ganeshi’s
sister Radhika Prasad, nicknamed Radhiya (Rekha). Sarjubai’s
devoted male companion, known simply as “Maharaj” (Manmohan
Krishna), plays percussion.
After a prickly
initial exchange with the grand old lady, Alok wins her heart and is accepted
as a pupil, much
to his own and Ganeshi’s delight; Radhiya
too is secretly pleased. He also learns of Sarjubai’s relationship,
long ago, with a heartbroken Raja (Sanjeev Kumar), which leads to the
song Ayi ritu
saavan ki (“the season of rains has come”).
Alas, Triloki Prasad soon comes to know that his son is consorting
with “useless
riff-raff”—people who drive tongas and smoke beedies—and
flies into a rage, both because of Alok’s disobedience
of his order and because he himself is running for the Chairmanship
of the Municipal Corporation (the
equivalent of Mayor) and he will not have the family honor besmirched
(there is a nice vignette here of him plotting caste-bloc politics
with a couple of
cronies—a true slice-of-life). He soon takes up the court
case of a scheming merchant who is seeking to have old Sarjubai
and her neighbors evicted, and he
also tries to arrange Alok’s marriage with the merchant’s
spirited daughter Sulakshana (Farida Jalal), but luckily she
already has a lover,
one Kishen. Triloki Prasad triumphs in court and Sarjubai loses
the home she had
purchased with a lifetime of savings; Alok is furious and uses
the money his triumphant father has given him for buying a car
to instead
purchase
a horsecart
with which to earn an honest living: thus he will daily shame
his stiff-necked father and live in sympathy with the humble
people
he has come to love and whom his father seeks to destroy.
Given that both baap and beta (father and son) display similar
rigidity of character, Alok’s
life goes steadily downhill from here on, despite his eventual marriage (requested
by
Sarjubai)
to the
devoted
Radhiya
and, in
time,
the birth
of a son
to the couple. Several attempts by his wife, sister-in-law,
and brother to patch things up with the perpetually fuming Triloki Prasad come
to nought, and it takes
Alok’s own fading health (like many a rickshaw driver,
he contracts tuberculosis), and a visit from the now aged
Raja, to make the scales fall from the old man’s
eyes. Too late, though: Alok’s melancholy final song
Koi gata, main so jata (“Someone sings, as I fall asleep,” penned
by Bachchan’s
real-life father, poet Harbansraj Bachchan) sounds like an
elegy for both him and Sarjubai.
Although Rekha gives a fine and understated performance as
Alok’s adoring
and long-suffering wife, romance of the usual sort is downplayed here, and the
strongest female character is in fact the aging courtesan-singer Sarjubai, wonderfully
portrayed by Chhaya Devi. Though she gradually assumes the role of Alok’s
lost mother, she never lapses into the pious maternal stereotypes common to so
many Bombay films, but instead offers a complex and rare portrait of an earthy,
mature, and experienced woman who has both loved and suffered deeply. She thus
adds a further dimension to the history of portrayal of courtesans and professional
women in mainstream cinema (cf. BHUMIKA, PAKEEZAH, UMRAO JAN), and even though
few specific details of her life are provided, we sense the extent of her experience
and of her independence of spirit, and we feel that we know her deeply by the
film’s end. It is she, with her surrogate but deeply
devoted family, who is the real antithesis of the selfish
and self-righteous
Triloki Prasad,
who
gradually cuts himself off from all his near and dear
kin.
[The DEI DVD of this charming film features a superior
quality print, though it is marred by a tendency
for the image to
move up and down
during the
first few scenes— as if the frames were slipping out of alignment (didn’t
anybody check on this?). Though a bit irritating, this undesirable feature does
not persist and is not enough to spoil viewing. Subtitles, though not provided
for the many songs, are generally good, however they mistakenly call Ganeshi’s
sister “Raziya” (a Muslim name!).]