Purab Aur Paschim
There seems to be a very thin line separating the war films, the historical films or even the patriotic films of the Hindi Cinema, in a way all these three categories are totally interlinked. As the real or even the reel life warriors have always fought the various battles out of sheer patriotism, for the intense love for their country and have then become historical figures in the process.
So some of the earliest Black & White Patriotic Films, steeped in extreme patriotism, of the Hindi Cinema have been made as early as the year 1925 onwards for i.e. ‘Charkha’ & ‘Veer Kunal’ in the year 1925, ‘Bhagwa Jhanda’ alias ‘Saffron flag’ in the year 1926, ‘Flag Of Honor’ in the year 1929, ‘Patriot’ in the year 1930, ‘The Battle’, ‘Martyr’ & ‘Sword Of Allah’ in the year 1931, ‘Shan – E – Hindustan’ & ‘Hindustan’ in the year 1932 & ‘Bharat Veer’ in the year 1933 to name just a handful of them.
And then with the advent of the color era it was Manoj Kumar, more popularly known as Mr. Bharat, who had totally dominated the patriotic scenario in 60’s & 70’s decade firstly by acting in a Black & White film titled ‘Shaheed’ in the year 1965, in which even the late Prime Minister of India Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru had made a special appearance, and secondly by going on to make more and more such patriotic films in color like ‘Upkar’, ‘Kranti’, ‘Purab Aur Paschim’ , ‘Roti Kapda Aur Makaan’ et al and of course all his films not only emphasized but also reflected his intense patriotic fervor and even his deep rooted love for his motherland, India. In fact Manoj Kumar was to Patriotic films, what the Ramsays were to Horror films.
Then it took a Hollywood director like Richard Attenborough to rekindle the patriotic loyalty of the Indian’s by making a Celluloid Masterpiece film ‘Gandhi’ starring who else but a Hollywood actor Ben Kingsley in the title role. No wonder then, that the Indian directors followed suit with Shyam Benegal leading the brigade, when he made a film titled ‘The Making Of Mahatma Gandhi’ starring Rajat Kapoor in the title role of Mahatma Gandhi.
Thereafter the decade of the 60’s also saw a few classic yet very successful Patriotic Films made by the late Producer – Director Chetan Anand titled ‘Haqueequat’ {Not to speak of the Ajay Devgn starrer of the same name but made in the 90’s decade} starring Dharmendra and the late Priya Rajvansh besides a host of other stars of that era. Then there were also films like ‘Hum Hindustani’ starring rank newcomers and Producer – Director Mehboob Khan’s film ‘Son Of India’ also starring newcomers.
While some of the other such patriotic films of the 40’s and the 50’s decade include ‘Pyara Watan’, ‘Hum Dono’ starring the evergreen Dev Anand in a double role, ‘Sher – E – Watan’, ‘Hind Ke Lal’, ‘Hamara Watan’, ‘Hamara Desh’, ‘Hindustan Hamara’, ‘Bharat Ke Lal’, ‘Bharat Ki Beti’ and the most talked about film of that era namely ‘Dharti Ke Lal’. And a series of films, of the funster duo the late Mehmood Ali – I. S. Johar starrer like ‘Johar Mehmood in Goa’, ‘Johar Mehmood In Hong Kong’ etc.. Yet all these films were like just a few drops in an ocean.
Dharti Ke Lal
Cut to the decade of the 60’s to the 90’s where apart from the Manoj Kumar brand of Patriotic Films there were other notable films too like ‘5 Rifles’, ‘Leader’, ‘Jhanda Ooncha Rahe Hamara’, ‘Desh Ke Dushman’, Rajesh Khanna starrer ‘Apna Desh’, ‘Azaad Desh Ke Ghulam’, ‘Bharat Ke Shaheed’, Mithun Chakroborty starrer ‘Watan Ke Rakhwale’, Kamal Hasan starrer ‘Mayor Saab’ {Dubbed version of the original Tamil film} and then even the mighty Big B had acted in a couple of such Deshbhakti oriented films like ‘Desh Premee’, ‘Inquilab’, ‘Main Azaad Hoon’, ‘Hindustani’, ‘Hindustan Ki Kasam’, ‘Major Sahab’ & ‘Khuda Gawah’. Besides how can one forget the midget hero Aamir Khan’s earlier film ‘Sarfarosh’, ‘Rang De Basanti’ and the last released patriotic saga ‘Lagaan’ albeit being a little off track.
Besides how can one overlook the Punjabi Jat Dharmendra & director Anil Sharma’s contributions in this field as together the duo have given quite a few of such hit films like ‘Elaan – E – Jung’, ‘Hukumat’ & ‘Tehelka’, While Dharmendra on his own did Ramanand Sagar’s films like ‘Aankhen’ & ‘Lalkar’. Next, patriotically following in the footsteps of his father even Sunny Deol has served his own doses or rather sometimes overdoses of patriotism from time to time with a few notable films like ‘Indian’, ‘The Hero’, ‘Zor’, ‘Gadar – Ek Prem Katha’ and many more besides the dud caper ‘Jaal – The Trap’. So what if terrorism had also seeped in, in some of them, by raising its ugly head.
In between there were other such highly impressive films too like the Nana Patekar starrer ‘Krantiveer’ directed by Mehul Kumar, ‘Krantishetra’ & ‘Sardar’, while one more last released patriotic film turned out to be ‘Subhashchandra Bose’. Incidentally the last 2 films both directed by Shyam Benegal had also given a great insight into the life & times of these patriotic leaders of our Nation.
A special, well deserved mention at this juncture should also be made of the Vidhu Vinod Chopra film ‘1942 – A love story’ starring Anil Kapoor & J. P. Dutta’s film ‘Border’ & ‘LoC – Kargil’ starring a galaxy of Bollywood stars. But the earlier mentioned film had also claimed quite a few of the casualties in the Capital State New Delhi, a result of a bomb explosion allegedly planted by some anti – social elements, while the devout & the patriotic patrons were engrossed in watching the same film in Uphaar theatre out there.
Border
And finally in the new millennium one also witnessed a new trend of patriotic filmmaking, in fact a mad rush to jump onto the bandwagon of simultaneously making films based on one subject, on one particular patriotic figure and this time around and in this case it was our nation’s most revered martyr Shaheed Bhagat Singh. Hence as many as 5 films were made on the legendary cult figure namely Tips films ‘The Legend Of Bhagat Singh’ starring Ajay Devgan, Dharmendra’s home production banner Vijeta films ‘1931 Shaheed Bhagat Singh’ starring Sunny Deol as Chandrashekhar Azaad & Bobby Deol in the title role, ‘Shaheed – E – Azam Bhagat Singh’ starring the then rank newcomer Sonu Sood, besides two other unreleased films with inane titles which incidentally also got dumped into the trash cans of the cine laboratories of Mumbai.
Not only this, as believe it or not there were as many as 5 films being made on another legendary political figure the late Indira Gandhi. But nothing of those films was heard after its initial launch with a big fanfare.
The Legend Of Bhagat Singh
Besides not to be left behind and out of the rat race of this patriotic wave even the small screen at that time had dabbled with its own version of the patriotic brand of tele – serials like ‘Kashmeer’ on Star Plus channel which was also later on unceremoniously pulled off the air midway and then there was ‘Mulk’ on Zee TV Channel which had also suffered the same fate.
To round it off on a patriotic note all the Satellite Channels then in the mad rush of being one up on each other, as each one of them drew up their own schedules & plans to telecast most of the past patriotic films of those times, no doubt, to commemorate the eve of the Independence day, a trend which is still followed sometimes on the small screen. Period!
