‘India is a large country and we have many languages. Hindi is just one of them – it’s the national language and it’s spoken, by and large, across the country. Each state has its own language, and each state has a healthy film industry of its own.
If you really want to experience Indian cinema, you have to experience it in its various languages – it would be unfair to pick any one language over the other. Here’s what I would start with…’
Pyaasa
Dir Guru Dutt (1957)
Two-and-a-half hours of epic emotion, involving a failed poet, a lovelorn prostitute and a case of mistaken identity. The soundtrack, featuring ‘Hum Aapki Aankhon Mein’, is generally thought to be one of the genre’s definitive collections.
Mother India
Dir Mehboob Khan (1957)
India’s Gone With the Wind. At almost three hours, this bum-number traces the story of a misfortunate family trying to make ends meet in rural India. Things go from bad to worse when an indebted husband loses his arms to a boulder accident, and his wife has to take to the fields in his place. But will their misfortune haunt their children? A tear jerker, if ever there was one, as much for the sheer beauty as the on-screen tragedy.
Mughal-E-Azam
Dir K Asif (1960)
A tragedy based on the life of Mughal Prince Salim. The pleasure-loving prince falls for a court dancer, but it soon turns sour when his father finds out and sentences the dancer to be buried alive. Plenty of high-emotion warbling ensues.
Teesri Manzil
Dir Vijay Anand (1966)
A murder mystery built around suicide and Presley-esque rockers. Still popular to this day, despite the fact that audiences throughout India know full well how the movie concludes.
Sholay
Dir Ramesh Sippy (1975)
BBC India declared it ‘Film of the Millennium’ in 1999, and at 199 minutes, it’s almost as long as a millennium. Still, it stars Amitabh ‘Big B’ Bachchan, so who on this mortal earth would complain?
