Pyaasa
8.4 /10 1 Votes8.4
Release date February 19, 1957 (India) | 8.4/10 IMDb Genre Drama, Musical, Romance Duration Country India | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Release date 19 February 1957 (1957-02-19) Songs Aaj Sajan Mohe Ang Lagalo Cast | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pyaasa (Hindi: Pyāsā, meaning "Thirsty") is a 1957 Indian film produced by, directed by, and starring Guru Dutt. The film tells the story of Vijay, a struggling poet trying to make his works known in post-independence India, and Gulabo, a prostitute with a heart of gold who helps him to try and get his poems published. The music was composed by S.D. Burman.
Contents
With the commercial success of thrillers like Baazi, Jaal, Aar Paar and CID as well as comedies like Mr. & Mrs. '55, Guru Dutt and his studio were financially secure and established. From 1957, he could now make movies he really wanted to make, including Pyaasa. In 2002, Pyaasa was ranked at No. 160 on the Sight & Sound critics' and directors' poll of all-time greatest films. In 2005, Pyaasa was rated as one of the 100 best films of all time by Time magazine, which called it "the soulfully romantic of the lot." Indiatimes Movies ranks the movie amongst the Top 25 Must See Bollywood Films. On the occasion of Valentine's Day 2011 Time magazine has declared it as one of the top 10 romantic movies of all time.
Plot
Vijay (Guru Dutt) is an unsuccessful poet whose works are not taken seriously by publishers or his brothers (who sell his poems as waste paper). Unable to bear their taunting that he is a good-for-nothing, he stays away from home and is often out on the streets. He encounters a good-hearted prostitute named Gulabo (Waheeda Rehman), who is enamoured with his poetry and falls in love with him. He also encounters his ex-girlfriend Meena (Mala Sinha) from college and finds out that she has married a big publisher Mr. Ghosh (Rehman) for financial security. Ghosh hires him as a servant to find out more about him and Meena. A dead beggar to whom Vijay gave his coat and whom he tries to save unsuccessfully from the path of a running train is mistaken for Vijay. Gulabo goes to Ghosh and gets his poems published. Ghosh does so feeling he can exploit the poems and make a killing. The poems are very successful. However, Vijay is alive and in the hospital after the train mishap.
Ghosh and Shyam, Vijay's close friend, refuse to recognise him and he is committed to a mental asylum since he insists he is Vijay and is thought to be mad. Vijay's brothers too are bought off by Ghosh not to recognise him and a memorial is held for the dead poet. Vijay with the help of his friend Abdul Sattar (Johnny Walker) escapes from the mental asylum and reaches the memorial service where he denounces this corrupt and materialistic world. Seeing that Vijay is alive his friend and brothers take side with a rival publisher for more money and declare this is Vijay. At a function to honour him, Vijay becomes sick of all the hypocrisy in the world around him and declares he is not Vijay. He then leaves with Gulabo to start a new life.
Production
In the original ending Guru Dutt wanted to show that Vijay left all alone but on the distributors' insistence the ending was changed. The film was originally titled Pyaas (thirst), but Guru Dutt later changed it to Pyaasa to better describe the film.
The role of Shyam was originally to be played by Guru Dutt's real life friend, Johny Walker but was then assigned to one of Guru Dutt's assistant directors. Guru Dutt wanted to film red light area scenes on locations in Kolkata (then Calcutta) but the crew was attacked by a group of pimps. Guru Dutt however recreated sets on the basis of photos taken at Kolkata.
It is also surmised that the story is based on the life of film's lyricist Sahir Ludhianvi who had failed affair with poet and writer Amrita Pritam .
Cast
Memorable quotes
Music
The movie boasts one of the best performances of S.D. Burman, Sahir Ludhianvi, Geeta Dutt and Mohammed Rafi to produce one of the most lyrical Hindi musicals. Pyaasa marked the last collaboration of the long-lasting team of composer Burman and lyricist Ludhianvi.
In 2004, as part of a Sight & Sound feature "celebrating the relationship between cinema and music", Pyaasa was named by Olivier Assayas as one his favourites, going so far as to say that it was "possibly one of the most remarkable transpositions of poetry on screen".
The film then and now
(Source: ‘Ten Years with Guru Dutt – Abrar Alvi’s Journey’ an authorised biography by Sathya Saran, Pages 71 and 72)
Restoration
This film is restored & digitized by Mumbai-based Ultra Media & Entertainment. As per the report, the original camera negative had come to them from the archives completely melted, with parts damaged or lost. Their biggest challenge was the flickering. Every frame was at a different angle and there was no stability. After several clean-ups, they managed to retrieve the actual content from the original camera negative but it lacked clarity and depth. 45 restoration experts worked for almost 4 months over 2 lac frames. The original monaural soundtrack remastered at 24-bit from the 35 mm optical soundtrack. The company sent it to the 72nd Venice International Film Festival held in 2015 where it competed with 20 other films and was selected to be screened as part of the Venice Classics section aongwith 11 other films from all over the world.
Related films
References
Pyaasa WikipediaPyaasa (1957 film) IMDbPyaasa themoviedb.org