Raj Kapoor, The Master Showman Options

[swarapriya]

Gopichand Jasoos (1982)

Here is a nice musical from the great Usha Khanna. All songs of this album are by the courtesy of the Forum members ...

[swarapriya]

Prem Rog (1982)

Raj Kapoor produced and directed this movie with his son Rishi Kapoor in the lead and his younger brother Shammi Kapoor in a pivotal role. The story presented great possibilities for dealing with age old customs of problems facing young widows, but instead Raj decided to take a neutral seat and drew audience sympathies by playing with family conflicts. It has several good performances, especially by its young heroine, Padmini Kolhapure, for which she fetched the Filmfare best actress award. But highlight of the movie is its music. My favorite is the duet by Lata and Suresh Wadkar, "Bhanvare Ne Khilaaya Phool".

There are only five songs in this movie, but each one of them is of long duration. I will upload these in two back-to-back posts. Here is the first set of songs ...

[swarapriya]

Songs of "Prem Rog (1982)" Continued ...

Here are the rest of the songs from this beautiful album ...

[swarapriya]

Vakil Babu (1982)

This was Raj Kapoor's last movie as an actor. The acting jouney of a superb career that started in 1935 when he was a kid, has passed through many memorable places leaving behind several milestones for his fans to remember. As an actor and director Raj Kapoor accomplished a lot. He made several socially conscious movies early in his career that were heraldry. Even though in his later years he was only a shadow of himself, yet what he has accomplished was wondrously glorious.

Even though this movie was his last appearance, Raj did make a brief appearance in a British made documentary called Kim in 1984. He was still active until his death busy either producing or directing movies. We will talk about these in the coming weeks.

There are only four songs in this movie. These are all by the courtesy of the Forum members. Here are the songs ...

This post has been edited by swarapriya: Jul 28 2009, 09:59 PM

[Aditya Pant]

SP,

The singer for Phir Kya Hua, Aa Gayi Jawani is Asha Bhosle.

Aditya

[swarapriya]

SP,

The singer for Phir Kya Hua, Aa Gayi Jawani is Asha Bhosle.

Aditya

Thanks Aditya. I made the appropriate change per your suggestion. Cheers. -S

[swarapriya]

Ram Teri Ganga Maili (1985)

This was Raj Kapoor's last movie as a director. It introduced a new heroine named Mandakini. It relaunched his son Rajeev Kapoor as an actor who was struggling with several flops to his credit. The movie almost parallels the story from Maha Bharata, that of Shakuntala. Poet Kalidas wrote a book of verses called "Abhigyana Shaakuntalam" on it. It was shot near beautiful Gangotri, where the Ganges river is born. Then as the story unfolds, it traverses the path of Ganga, from Gangotri to Kolkata. It had some great music by Ravindra Jain and one of my favorite songs, the title song by Lata, "Ram Teri Ganga Maili Ho Gayi".

When the movie was released, it was a runaway success. But not because of its inspiring title, or its heartwarming songs, or its glorious photography where the Himalayas and the river Ganga look so pious and poignat. . It is because Raj Kapoor decided to bare young Mandakini exposing her to show her breasts on the screen. This was unprecedented for any Hindi movie. And it was totally unnecessary. Surprisingly, the censor did not put much fight with Raj on this. In spite of the success they enjoyed, the movie didn't do much for careers of either of the young pair that headed the cast.

Because of the numbers of songs, I will upload these songs in back-to-back posts. I am also including couple of specials that inculde commentaries for "Legends" albums.

Here is the first set of songs ...

This post has been edited by swarapriya: Jul 29 2009, 08:19 PM

[swarapriya]

Songs of "Ram Teri Ganga Maili (1985)" Continued ...

Here is the second and final set of songs from this beautiful album. I am also including here a song from the Legends album of Lata with Raj Kapoor giving a brief commentary for the song "Sun Saahiba Sun". Also, for the same song, from the Legends album of Raj Kapoor, that has a commentary by both Lata and Raj.

Now for the songs ...

[swarapriya]

Eeshwar (1989)

Even though Raj Kapoor didn't appear in this movie, archival footage of his movies is shown. The filmography lists this as one of Raj's starrer. These songs are still available in the Telugu Regional section on the "K. Vishwanath" thread. You can access these songs at the following location ...

http://www.hamaraforums.com/index.php?show...77229&st=26

This post has been edited by swarapriya: Jul 29 2009, 10:35 AM

[Faraaj73]

Ram Teri Ganga Maili (1985)

This was Raj Kapoor's last movie as a director. It introduced a new heroine named Mandakini. It relaunched his son Rajeev Kapoor as an actor who was struggling with several flops to his credit. The movie almost parallels the story from Maha Bharata, that of Shakuntala. Poet Kalidas wrote a book of verses called "Abhigyana Shaakuntalam" on it. It was shot near beautiful Gangotri, where the Ganges river is born. Then as the story unfolds, it traverses the path of Ganga, from Gangotri to Kolkata. It had some great music by Ravindra Jain and one of my favorite songs, the title song by Lata, "Ram Teri Ganga Maili Ho Gayi".

SP

The song Ram Teri Ganga Maili that you've uploaded is sung by Suresh Wadkar....also, I hope you will be terminating with Henna (and not before) in your RK series.....

This post has been edited by Faraaj73: Jul 29 2009, 05:17 PM

[Aditya Pant]

SP

The song Ram Teri Ganga Maili that you've uploaded is sung by Suresh Wadkar....also, I hope you will be terminating with Henna (and not before) in your RK series.....

That's correct. The Lata version is titled Ek Dukhiyari Kahe

Aditya

[swarapriya]

SP

The song Ram Teri Ganga Maili that you've uploaded is sung by Suresh Wadkar....also, I hope you will be terminating with Henna (and not before) in your RK series.....

I will upload songs from Henna later today. Thanks.

[swarapriya]

The song Ram Teri Ganga Maili that you've uploaded is sung by Suresh Wadkar....also, I hope you will be terminating with Henna (and not before) in your RK series.....

Also, Faraaj, thanks for pointing out my error. I have rectified the problem and the table should reflect this correctly now. Cheers.

[swarapriya]

SP

The song Ram Teri Ganga Maili that you've uploaded is sung by Suresh Wadkar....also, I hope you will be terminating with Henna (and not before) in your RK series.....

That's correct. The Lata version is titled Ek Dukhiyari Kahe

Aditya

Thanks for catching up with the error.

[swarapriya]

Henna (1991)

Raj Kapoor worked on this story for some time. It was attributed to K.A. Abbas with whom he collaborated in many socially uplifting movies. Everything was in place to launch the movie and the search for heroine took sometime before Raj decided on the actress from Pakistan, Zeba Bakhtiar. Unfortunately, even before the movie could be started he passed away in June 1988 from complications related to asthma.

Raj Kapoor's sons wanted to bring this movie to the audience as it was their father's last pet project and dealt with the subject of love that goes beyond boundaries drawn by humans. This reminds me of the famous song Sahir Ludhianvi wrote for "Dhool Ka Phool" made in 1959. The song was "Tu Hind Banega Na Muslmaan Banega". It was tuned by N. Dutta and was sung with so much emotion and poignancy by Rafi Saab. In the song Sahir declares that " ... Khudrat ne to bakshi thi humen ek hi dharti, humne kahin Bhaarat kahin Iran banaaya ...". That is the essence of the barriers that are erected between the two young lovers which forms the central theme of the movie.

In the process of making this movie, Randhir Kapoor, who directed the movie, admitted that he retained the original story idea as was developed by Abbaas ji but made several changes to the script that Raj okayed. Per Randhir, this was done so that the movie will not be controversial. In the process of conveying the message of the central idea, the movie became another entertainer, admittedly an engaging one because of the story. Thanks to beautiful photography and excellent music by Ravindra Jain, the movie clicked at the box office.

Interestingly, this was one of several movies Raj made in the twilight of his career with a female protagonist as the primary focus. His "Satyam Shivam Sundaram", "Prem Rog", and "Ram Teri Ganga Maili" all had similar central theme with a woman standing tall in the middle of unlucky circumstances whereas all other actors were just supporting players. This movie was also no exception.

Because of the number of songs, I will upload them in back-to-back posts. I am also including a special version of the song "Chitthiye Pankh Lagaake". This song precedes with Randhir Kapoor's brief commentary. This song ends with Raj Kapoor's words of thanks when he received the much coveted Phalke award. It is from the "Legends" album on Raj Kapoor, CD 5.

Here is the first set of songs ...

This post has been edited by swarapriya: Jul 30 2009, 08:21 AM