Tea .. An emotional connect.

 Tea for me has always been family.

Dad and Mom were avid tea lovers , twice till breakfast and twice later in the day.

 When I was fifteen, I was entrusted a certain degree of autonomy in the kitchen. The very first instance of this that I remember is making my father pre breakfast chai in 1979. The recipe could not have been simpler, but it has remained with me since that day: a half cup of water, a half cup of milk, wait to boil, one heaped teaspoon of tea powder and finally a conservatively portioned teaspoon of sugar, stir. I still remember my father’s face, his happiness that his. son was making his chai, the sense of togetherness that existed in that moment. I also remember that he told me it was good; I do not fully know if that is true but it has stayed with me.

This, for a long time, was my only association with tea. I grew older and shifted cities and I would still make tea, but always for someone else .

My father used to bring home teas from various parts of the world. This one is nestle tea from the United Kingdom and so on. Being young and more rebellious than I am now (?), I refused then to indulge in the same interests as him, but over time we have bonded over the same thing. Many fruitful discussions with him were over a cup of tea whenever I came home.

When I stayed away from home in the hostel for graduation, it was the same, canteens and tapris filled with memories of conversations that can only occur as people bond over chai, or tea, or cha, or chaiya, or any of the other numerous names that it inhabits. Our daily routines were centred around the practice of visiting the local chai shop and our night closed only once we reached the night cap.

Soon in the late 90s I shifted to coffee. Coffee had more sophistication , but when I got the chance the Chai used to come to the fore.

The essence of tea has been for me making relationships, from my family to my friends to shopkeepers and strangers. So, what is it about tea that drives itself into us so deep? It is never the work-drink, that has always been the prerogative of coffee for that stimulating boost. But somewhere between tea leaves and the warmth of a freshly brewed cup of tea, I feel refreshed and somehow more in tune and concurrence with people around me.

Just as monks used to drink tea ( Herbal or Kawaha) to gain some perspective about a deeper truth in the world, perhaps that is what I feel when I share these bonds of mine with others; perhaps it is in purity of each leaf be it leaves ,dust green or flavoures and in the sincerity of conversation that we forge these bonds. (Which I now have at office in the last lap of my career).

Dad however stuck to tea and enjoyed his two or three cups even when he was with me.

Incidentally his last cup of tea at home was an hour before he went for dialysis on 7th March and never came back.

As I read somewhere

"If you are cold, tea will warm you;

if you are too heated, it will cool you;

If you are depressed, it will cheer you;

If you are excited, it will calm you.

We humans are like Tea, we don’t know our own Strength until we’re in Hot Water”

The Okra Launch Tour Day 1-2

Mahyco has a great history with Okra (Bhendi).

Last week I travelled to Hyderabad and Indore for the First two launches

On 9th and 11th.

We ( Crop Lead Sandip, Shripad Patil and myself ) left for Hyderabad on Monday afternoon.

Before that had gone to office after a gap of one month.

Nice catching up with colleagues , two of whom have now out in their papers.

Reached Airport well in time and had a hour long wait for baggage and security. A funny thing at security is that one has to remove his belt and since I have recently lost weight (yes I have ).

Went to the Lounge and had some grub before joining my copassengers

The flight was on time and soon at 6pm reached Hyderabad Hot Abode.

After checking in .. called up my friends Sarah who had invited me and Other friends for a dinner at her newly redeveloped home.

It was nice catching up with her, Padmawati and Vanita with their husbands. Where 43 years had gone was a mystery !

After dinner Sarah and Sukumar dropped me at the hotel.

I was tired and fell asleep almost instantly as I was chanting.

Next day we had breakfast and went to Hyderabad office .

Sushma had reached earlier ( taking a 6am flight from Chennai).

I was seeing her and meeting her for the first time in 2022.

Happens I presume.

Initially a bit occupied soon we moved into working mode .. attending the  Sales meet , a first after eons of time.

This was followed by the Launch program agenda , the brand endorsements which were at office were taken to the hotel and the overall decorations were looked into.

Shripad, Sushma , Sandip and Yousuf took charge and the hall was ready.

The seniors started trickling in.

We went back to office as Tarique was coming there and he had some thing to discuss with me.

He had a meeting with a Nursary consultant and a call with MD.

The day seemed never ending..

In between Ajai Gaur (National Manager Sales) had also come and caught up with him too but his regressive thought process made me cringe.

Finally we were on our way to hotel .

All were visibly tired.

At the hotel freshened up and went for dinner.

That was another funny ordeal..

Possibly another day.

Along with the launch.

Hope hearing part one of the journey was interesting and would look ahead to part 2.. soon.

Do Aur Do Paanch 42 years

Hum woh hain jo Do aur Do Paanch Kara den..

42 years of Do Aur Do Paanch.

This is comparitivly low key movie of Amitabh Bachchan and Shashi Kapoor with Hema Malini and Parveen Babi to add the glamour.

This action comedy was directed by Rakesh Kumar (who was responsible for bringing Amitabh Bachchan on board in this film being a friend after Khoon Pasina , Mr Natwarlal and with Yaarana on the floors.)

Vijay (Amitabh Bachchan) and Sunil (Shashi Kapoor) are rival petty crooks who have conflicts with each other.

The twist in the movie begins when Uncle(Kadar Khan with black goggles and overcoat) wants to kidnap Bittu son of Multi Millionaire Seth ( Dr Shriram Lagu) to avenge some age old rivalry.The father thus puts his only son to a boarding school ( which is a fortress) under the able guidance of his teacher Shalu(Hema Malini) and principal(Sajjan).Uncle hires Laxman for the job to abduct him .Now both Vijay and Sunil want to have a big loot by kidnapping Bittu.

Vijay and Sunil create fake identities for themselves and join the school as teachers called Ram and Laxman, respectively. Ram joins as the P.E. instructor of the school while Laxman is appointed as the music teacher. The principal's daughter Anju(Parveen Babi) falls in love with Amitabh and Shalu falls for Shashi.What follows is a series of comic situations where both the heroes try to out wit each other.

(Especially the scene when Amitabh is made to eat parothas by all the children and his stomach nearly splits. His expressions in the scene was just outstanding. And the scene when Parveen faints in Ram's room and Laxman blocks his way out of the house. It was hilarious!!! and when Amitabh says "Sangeet Samrat" and starts singing making a fool of Shashi during a bonfire program is just rib tickling).

Obviously they become friends and destroy Uncle's evil plan .

The film maintains a brisk pace through out .

Rajesh Roshan's music is first rate.  All the songs are melodious and fun. "Mere Zindagi Ne Mujhpe Ehsaan Kyaa Kiya Hai", "Do Aur Do Paanch", "Hoti Hai Raat", and a small portion of "Prem Se Humko Jine Do" Kishore Kumar is simply at his best. The song "Yeh Zulfon Ki Bhikri Ghatta Kya Kahti Hai " rendered by Asha Bhonsle is soothing and pleasing to ear.  Furthermore, the background score is noticeable and pleasant.

Amitabh and Shashi who have proved their chemistry in earlier movies excel in this movie  it was their third in a row after Kaala Patthar and Suhaag in 1979 and followed by Shaan in December 80)with their first rate acting and dialogue delivery and timing. Hema Malini and Parveen Babi as love interests have supported ably with their acting and comic skills. Kader Khan has little screen presence but leaves a lasting impression as villain "Uncle" (a different flavor of villain). There is menace in his role but at the same it evokes laughter. Not to forget is Master Bittu the child artist who has acted very well and is the heart of the movie. The list of supporting cast is huge but all of them have acted well. It is necessary to mention that in this huge cast and spectra of talented actors Amitabh Bachchan as always stands tall through his screen presence and persona.

The title sequence of the film had animated versions of Amitabh Bachchan and Shashi Kapoor. This was done in the visual style of The Pink Panther .

(Earlier seen in Chalti Ka naam Gaadi)

The film didn't do well but is a personal favourite.

Black is Beautiful

17 Years of " BLACK"

Black is beautiful..

#LongPost 

Black is a 2005  film made and  directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali and starring Rani Mukerji and Amitabh Bachchan. Black revolves around a deaf blind girl, and her relationship with her teacher who himself later develops Alzheimer's disease. The film draws inspiration from Helen Keller's life and struggle.

Sanjay Leela Bhansali; a filmmaker who enriches and raises the bar of the emotional content within Indian cinema with each one of his movies.

Black is simple, it’s subtle. But within the simplicity and subtlety, Bhansali is able to make you hold your breath and cause every muscle in your body to tense up; not with tear-jerking drama or at nail-biting suspense, but rather at an eight year old girl’s realization of knowing how to utter the word ‘water’ for the first time in her life after being forcefully drenched in the fountain on her front yard by her teacher. 

Black‘s heroine is Michelle McNally (played as a child by Ayesha Kapoor, and as an adult by Rani Mukerji), a girl robbed of her sight and hearing by an illness at a young age. The first half of the movie tracks closely to Keller’s life story. By age eight, Michelle has developed into a wild, almost feral child due to her inability to communicate. Her parents, equally frustrated by being unable to reach their daughter, are on the verge of sending Michelle to an asylum to prevent her from accidentally harming her baby sister, Sarah.

As a last resort, the McNally’s hire eccentric teacher Debraj Sahai (Amitabh Bachchan) to tutor Michelle. Early in the movie, Bachchan’s performance is almost too eccentric to be believable, as Debraj uses unconventional methods to reach out to Michelle.

Debraj is eventually able to teach Michelle the connection between words and objects, and she’s able to finally communicate with her family through sign language. She’s accepted into a university, and Debraj helps her to continue her studies and live on her own. 

At the same time as Michelle suffers through and triumphs over her challenges, we also witness numerous other changes. Debraj begins to succumb to Alzheimer's, first forgetting the way out of the Principal's office and then forgetting Michelle and leaving her stranded during an ice cream celebration for her improved typing. We also see Michelle reconcile with her sister Sarah, who we find out was jealous of her parents' affection for Michelle throughout her life. After attending Sarah's wedding, Michelle begins to wonder about love, which she has not experienced, and she even asks Debraj to kiss her on the lips. Debraj reluctantly does so but decides to leave Michelle on her own because of this demand and the position she has put him in. Twelve years after enrolment, Michelle does manage to gain her BA, and with her proud parents looking on her, she even gives a speech to the graduating class. Without wearing no black graduation robe, she thanks her parents and her teacher and she announces that she will only wear the robe so that her teacher may see her first.

By then Debraj is in a mental hospital due to his almost complete inability to remember his past and even how to speak. Michelle visits him wearing her robe and we see glimmers of memory return as Debraj realises that she has graduated and even does a victory dance. As the window opens to the rain outside, we see Debraj's hand in Michelle's reaching into the rain, and we hear the teacher-student pair say the first syllable of the word "water", with echoes of the scene in which Michelle first begins understanding the meaning of words earlier in the movie. However this time, it is Debraj who is beginning to learn to speak and understand.

Amitabh Bachchan is spellbinding as Debraj and confronts the emotional and ethical issues of tutoring a young woman, as opposed to a little girl. His struggles with a sudden decline in mental function that changes his relationship with Michelle are unique to him.

There are no superlatives to describe his performance.

Rani Mukherjee's performance is so captivating and expressed that it’s easy to forget that she doesn’t deliver any lines of dialogue.

Besides the two leads, Black features a terrific supporting cast. Nandana Sen walks a fine line, showing the despair behind Sarah’s bratty behavior. And Shernaz Patel is wonderful as Michelle’s troubled mother, Catherine. She’s in an impossible situation, trying to protect Michelle even though it exacerbates the girl’s problems while trying not to overlook her other daughter. Catherine is heroic in her own right for not sending Michelle away and, in effect, covering her own eyes and ears to her child’s plight.

Dhritiman Chatterjee’s portrayal of the somber and narrow-minded father is done quite intelligently.

One can go on and on..

The background music by Monty Sharma is melodious and scene centric.

This film is exceptional .

Black is indeed beautiful.

Seventh Heaven : Satte Pe Satta

Revisiting Seventh Heaven..

Satte Pe Satta

Released 40 Years back on 22.1.82.

Satte Pe Satta is an iconic classical musical comedy in a truly commercial format.

Satte Pe Satta's cast included the top stars of the decade: Amitabh Bachchan, Hema Malini and Amjad Khan, with an able supporting cast.

The story revolves around seven brothers (Bachchan, Sudhir, Indrajeet, Kanwaljeet, Shakti Kapoor, Paintal and Sachin) who live in a farmhouse and are ignorant about the rest of the world. Filthy, ill-mannered and unsophisticated are words that would best describe them. Named after the 7 days of the week ( Som, Mangal, Budh, Guru, Shukra, Sunny and Ravi)

They find love and support in the form of Hema Malini's character Indu who is to be Ravi's (Bachchan) lady love. After a lot of drama, the brothers accept her and, more importantly, she accepts them.

The other brothers fall for 6 girls they spot on a beach. These girls ( Asha Sachdev, Prema Narayan, Aradhana, Rajni Sharma, Madhu Malhotra and Nazneen) have the job -- to look after Ranjeeta, who can't walk and is dependent on a wheelchair. Her uncle, Amjad Khan, wants to kill her and inherit her wealth.

The desperate, lovelorn brothers kidnap the girls one night. This gives Khan an idea as to how he can kill Ranjita. He replaces Bachchan with a lookalike, Babu (Amitabh again). But all's well that ends well as Babu undergoes a change of heart and finds love with the very lady he was sent to kill.

Satte Pe Satta has right doses of humour, music and action. Director Raj Sippy handled the characters with expertise. Though there were a lot of them, no one looked out of place. Amjad Khan was the perfect choice as there weren't many villains who could match Bachchan's charisma.

Who in a double role, is a treat to watch. He shows three shades in the movie: the rowdy eldest brother, a sophisticated husband madly in love with his wife and the taciturn villain Babu who is shaded in grey. Even his hair and eyes are coloured grey!

Ravi's drunken scene with Amjad Khan can be compared to the one in his earlier film, Amar Akbar Anthony. It was so difficult that it was not dubbed and the voice recorded in the original shoot was used in the movie. You can even hear the camera whirring in the background!

Apart from Amitabh Bachchan the other star of the movie is Pancham in a Saptam mood.

R.D.Burman composed eight near-perfect tracks for the film. Even the background score is one of the best ever in Indian films. Every appearance by villainous Babu from his entry on screen is accompanied by a unique sound. Annette (a singer in RD's group) used to gargle to create the sound and it's echo effect.

Pyar humein kis mod pe is a treat both for the eyes and ears. The tempo of the song builds beautifully to first show the brothers' despair as they pine for their respective lady loves and then their excitement as they make their way to kidnap the girls. Jhuka ke sar ko is a sweet number done in the Western-musical format, interspersed with dialogues. Check out the mouth organ prelude of Zindagi milke bitaayenge played by Pancham (Burman) himself. He was fond of the instrument and also played it for his father's song Hai apna dil toh aawara (Solva Saal, 1958). Mausam mastana is another rare song . Other chorus songs include the voices of lyricist Gulshan Bawra, Sapan and Basu (assistants to the composer) and Pancham himself.

Dilbar Mere is considered one of KKs best ..The song is also interesting as it marks the change Amitabh's character undergoes to impress Hema.

The title song is also a treat. Note how Shakti Kapoor's character's stuttering speech is used in the songs. It shows the director's and composer's effort at detail.

Support came from Vijayendra Ghadge, Sarika ( The hospital scenes introduction of Hema Malini to Amitabh are so well depicted )

The bond between the brothers has been scripted very well.The brothers use a string of weird words 'Chain kulee ke main kulee kee chain' in order to gather strength at the time of crisis.( aptly used in the climax)

The comedy sequences are hilarious especially the visit of Hema to the farm house as a nurse and subsequently as a wife where she sees the reality of the 7 brothers.The dinner table scene from Satte Pe Satta was evidently one of the film's many highlights. Here, the band of six brothers can be seen attacking the food cooked by Hema Malini's character. Funnily, the six brothers do not jump on to eat the food until Amitabh Bachchan's character walks in and gets food for himself first. This scene is the trigger point for the six brothers to leave their unhygienic and unsophisticated lives behind.

The sets were beautifully created to suit the rustic environs. Raj Sippy's direction showed sophistication. His handling of the script showed maturity. There was never a point in the movie where the audience lost attention. This venture was is and remains a complete entertainer.

The Lost Diva Parveen Babi

"KOI ISS LIYE PEE RAHA HAI KI AAJ DOSTON KE SAATH HAI, AUR KOI ISS LIYE PEE RAHA HAI, KI AAJ DOST SAATH NAHI". – PARVEEN BABI AS ANITA IN DEEWAR (HER ENTRY)

That's Parveen Babi for you.

Hard to believe it's 17 years she passed away in to eternity.

Though she is often reduced to the pejorative term diva, as if being a beautiful presence on-screen requires no talent at all. It would be cruel not to pay tribute to her characters. For example, let us consider the other female star of the 70s – Zeenat Aman. Zeenat was also an emblem for the unabashed female sexuality. In contrast, Parveen Babi’s characters have no backstory. There is no redemption arc needing to justify why she is what she is.

She was often considered to be Zeenat Aman's rival owing to their sex-symbol tag. In fact, she acted alongside Zeenat Aman in Ashanti (1982) and Mahaan (1983). Even in hero-centric films like Deewaar (1975), Shaan (1980) and Namak Halaal (1982), she made her presence felt with her serene aloofness. She even stole the thunder from her co-star Hema Malini in Manoj Kumar's Kranti (1981)

Parveen Babi is somewhat of a byword for tragedy in Bollywood; a star who everyone recognises, but nobody fondly remembers. Few, if any, look beyond the shallow sympathy her story of mental illness and failed relationships evoke. Fewer still acknowledge that under this div(a)ine halo, she was a strong person. She was a survivor and still passed away a schizophrenic.

Amitabh Bachchan co-starred with Parveen Babi in eight films - Majboor, Deewaar, Amar Akbar Anthony, Shaan, Kaalia, Mahaan, Khud-daar and Do Aur Do Paanch apart from Namak Halaal, Suhaag and Sesh Premee where they were not cast opposite each other.

Parveen also starred in offbeat films like Vinod Pande's Yeh Nazdeekiyan (1982) and Hrishikesh Mukherjee's Rang Birangi (1983) which is a personal favourite.

In retrospect, Parveen Babi’s characters are a natural extension of her real-life persona. Albeit the word ‘bold’ has lost its meaning due to chronic overuse over the years, I believe she is the true owner of the title. In a country where personal issues are shushed down to present a veneer of normalcy, she chose to be open and vulnerable. She might have become immortal on the silver screen. Yet, she left with us the image of a strong, vulnerable, fragile, and indeed, mortal woman.

She graced the TIME magazine cover too.

Sadly Mahesh Bhatt under the name of Biographical cinema has depicted his relationship with her in Arth (1983) wherein the character of the other woman, played by Smita Patil, was based on Parveen.

He made Phir Teri Kahani Yaad Aaye in 1993.

In 2006 a year after she passed he made Woh Lamhe... (2006) based on his life with her.

Now again he has made a serial on Voot " Ranjishe Sahi" in 2022.

Time now that she is left alone in peace.

The Adaptive SHOLAY

#BollywoodHollywood

Episode 2

Today would like to move on to the 70s.

A Movie which was talked about after this series debuted

SHOLAY

Before going in to this let me share you some Trivia

Mera Gaon Mera Desh (1971)

Khote Sikkay ( 1974 )

Pratigya ( 1975 )

Sholay ( 1975 )

The premises of these films is same.

It is quoted that MGMD is the germ of Sholay. However looking closely we will see that Pratigya is more so based on Mera Gaon Mera Desh .

Khote Sikkay and Sholay have a similaSikkey.

Both inspired by the Western genre, complete with horses and ponchos. It has a similar plot to Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai as well as The Magnificent Seven, while Feroz Khan's character is similar to the "Man with No Name" stock characters in Kurosawa's Yojimbo and Sergio Leone's Dollars Trilogy

( Gabbar, Jabbar, Jagga)

Now it is a known fact that The Magnificent Seven is an official Adaptation of The Seven Samurai

There are 7 protagonists.

In Khote Sikkay they are five and in Sholay Two.

Later Adaptations include

Aandhi Toofan 1985 ( Two Protagonists)

Karma 1986 ( Three Protagonists )

Army 1996 (Five Protagonists)

China Gate 1998 ( Nine )

So on Seven Samurai / Magnificent Seven there are 6 popular movies and many more.

So coming to the point the Wild Western theme of a team or group coming together to save a village / town.

Seven Samurai:

This is a Japanese film ( not Hollywood for the Technically Specific).It is not easy to say anything new about the one of the most analyzed and scrutinized movies of the film history. Nevertheless, and despite being eventually only repeated, it shall be mentioned that movie has a simple but very engaging story - a group of peasants, representing a village, periodically stormed by gang of bandits, looting their crops and other possessions, hires a veteran samurai, who gathers six samurais to protect a village from the cruel bandits. As the samurais teach the natives how to defend themselves, the village is attacked by a pack of 40 bandits to help them protect the village.

The Official Remake of this film was 

The Magnificent Seven (1960 & remade in 2016.

A gang of bandits led by Calvera (Eli Wallach) periodically raids a poor Mexican village for food and supplies. After the latest raid, during which Calvera kills a villager, the village leaders decide they have had enough.They approch Chris Adams (Yul Brynner), a veteran Cajun gunslinger, for advice. Chris suggests they instead hire gunfighters to defend the village, as "men are cheaper than guns." At first agreeing only to help them recruit men, Chris eventually decides to lead the group. Despite the meager pay offered, he finds five willing gunmen. They are the gunfighter Vin Tanner (Steve McQueen), who has gone broke after a round of gambling and resists local efforts to recruit him as a store clerk; Chris's friend Harry Luck (Brad Dexter), who assumes Chris is hiding a much bigger reward for the work; the Irish Mexican Bernardo O'Reilly (Charles Bronson), who has fallen on hard times; Britt (James Coburn), an expert in both knife and gun who joins purely for the challenge involved; and the dapper, on-the-run gunman Lee (Robert Vaughn), plagued by nightmares of fallen enemies and haunted that he has lost his nerve for battle. On their way to the village, they are trailed by the hotheaded Chico (Horst Buchholz), an aspiring gunfighter whose previous attempts to join Chris had been spurned. Impressed by his persistence, Chris invites him into the group. 

They save the village but not before 4 of them perish .

As the surviving three ride out they say..the farmers won we lost.

Now if I analyse all the Bollywood remakes..this will go on.

The story of SHOLAY is folklore as also the other films mentioned.

In each version of this story, many of the details have been changed — the location, the particulars of the villain’s plot, the mix of characters who make up the team of protectors — but the bones remain the same: A bad guy threatens a small town; the villagers hire a wandering protector who gathers a motley crew of fighters; the fighters fortify the town; there’s a protracted assault; some of the fighters die; the village is saved.

In SHOLAY this is limited to Two.

So it won't be wrong to say that SHOLAY finds inspiration from these classics.

In the age of franchise sprawl, where movies must juggle stories and subplots that cross over multiple films and where filmmakers are always trying to stay one step ahead of online fans with shocking plot developments, that’s an art that’s largely disappeared. But the timelessness and influence of Seven Samurai , Magnificent Seven and Sholay is a reminder that simple stories haven’t lost their power or relevance: Sometimes the most satisfying stories are the ones that don’t surprise you at all.

Hope this comparison of Adaptations works and is likes by the followers and Critics of SHOLAY.