Five years later, the trolls and the trade critics had been silenced, the word of mouth was overwhelming
Illustration/Uday Mohite
It was August, 15, 1975, when Ramesh Sippy’s Sholay was released in Minerva, the Pride of Maharashtra, in Grant Road. We were 13, when Jaswinder Sawney (a school mate) and I, “snuck” into the auditorium — Jaswinder’s dad being the theatre manager.
We couldn’t catch the “first day first show” being a school day, so the 5.30 pm show on Sunday was. As the crowds poured out into the street, there was a stunned “paisa vasoolness” that would guarantee repeated viewings. The hand-drawn poster that ran across the front face of the theatre, had Jai, Veeru, Basanti, Thakur, Radha, and Gabbar staring out at us.
If the poster had wound its way round the back of Minerva, the Sippys would have had Soorma Bhopali, the Jail Warden, Kaalia, Sambha, Mausie, Rahim Chacha, and Dhanno the horse on it. Armed with our greasy samosas, we climbed up the stairs to the first floor, we were virtually stampeded as audiences sped towards their seats, desperate not to miss a single word of dialogue, not a moment of screen time.
As I sat there, watching a 70mm film for the first time, stereophonic sound surrounded me, bullets flying, horses stomping hooves, coins being flipped — at well over three hours. This was unhurried film making, subtle inspite of the scale, seminal inspite of the spectacle, and hugely emotional inspite of the epic-ness. In 1980, our voices were deeper and our moustaches fuller, we were done with our ICSE boards, and Jaswinder’s dad treated us to a second viewing. Five years later, the trolls and the trade critics had been silenced, the word of mouth was overwhelming.
The crowd favourite was Gabbar Singh, stained teeth and sneering smile, that a vision of pure evil, savage and sadistic could be so popular, there were “taalis” and “seetis” every time he appeared, with the audiences echoing, “Kitne aadmi thhe”, “Arre o Sambha”, “Tera kya hoga Kaalia”, “Bahut yaarana lagta hai”. Gabbar was the villain, but he was everyman’s “bhidu”, bindaaas in his “bad-ism”.
Nobody could compartmentalise, or cardboxise this movie into easy generalisations — “Oh it’s a Kurosawa Seven Samurai copy”, “It’s a Magnificent Seven remake” Sippy and Salim-Javed had woven elements of Sergio Leone, the spaghetti western, Sam Peckinpah’s falling bodies, the use of slow motion, adding dollops of masala. Romance, revenge, ravines, rollicking humour, rifles, into a fabulous bhelpuri, giving Bollywood its first real “curry Western” — the Good, the Badmashes and the Agni.
As we live in an era, when it’s getting harder to get audiences to come to the cinema, sequels, soppy love stories, South remakes, no formula is a slam dunk certainty, they’re even re-releasing films, that Sholay ran five years in a single cinema, on sheer word of mouth,
What was it about Sholay that blew us away in ’75, and continues to fifty years on? Did the first experience of widescreen make us wide-eyed, and work its way into our collective DNA, was it the sheer craft, that every frame had rigour and detailing, of a director-cameraman camaraderie, RD Burman’s orchestrated background score, down to the tiny themes (take Jai Veeru’s “Yeh Dosti” as a leitmotif).
What was it that made us remember so many slices of cinematic history, snatches of evergreen dialogue, as we enter into the arena of evil being a perfectly acceptable form of behaviour preferable to even heroism. We talk of most movies being a one-time watch, but I settled down to watch Sholay for the nth time, well certainly my favourite scenes. The train battle, the Jai-Veeru bromance, Gabbar Singh in all his scenes (Javed Akhtar’s Awadhi dialect), the Holi fight as Jai throws powder into Gabbars eyes, Jai’s death scene and finally Thakur’s revenge.
Back in 1975, they lived and shot together for over two years, in Ramangara: Dharmendra, Hema Malini, Jaya Bhaduri, Amjad Khan and Amitabh Bachchan with Ramesh Sippy. The bonding, the chemistry between them that is so apparent, that extensive rehearsals, numerous retakes were possible — the film is being re-released with the original ending, where Gabbar dies in the end, except Amjad Khan will live forever in our collective souls.
As will Sholay, the Pride of India.
Rahul da Cunha is an adman, theatre director/playwright, filmmaker and traveller. Reach him at rahul.dacunha@mid-day.com
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