The 'Method Actor', decades ahead of his time, preceded America's 'Method Acting School' - Dilip Kumar, the legend lives - V. Gangadhar, Free Press Journal

The 'Method Actor', decades ahead of his time, preceded America's 'Method Acting School'

http://freepressjournal.in/dilip-kumar-the-legend-lives/



Edit    December 18, 2012 02:27:08 AM |






By V Gangadhar

 

Dilip Kumar, the legend lives

He was the first Indian actor to adopt what came to be known as ‘method acting’. In the years to come some of the finest exponents of this kind of acting were Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift and James Dean, who had studied acting under experts, but the thespian, without any such assets, was pitchforked straightway before the arc lights.

 

Strange but true, our greatest actor, Dilip Kumar(91), had not seen a film till he was 14. Coming from the rugged hills of Peshawar, the twists and turns of life brought him to Bombay, Pune and Deolali and it was one such twist which brought him face to face with one of the immortals of our cinema, Devika Rani. She found something special in this shy young man and introduced him to films after providing him with a new name, Dilip Kumar. ‘Jwar Bhata’ was the film and it flopped to be followed by another flop. But some of the producers were prepared to take chances with the young actor and finally his ‘Milan’ clicked in a big way.

     Serious and sensitive, young Dilip Kumar was keen to find out why his earlier films failed. He read the scripts and watched the films again and again. He became a regular at theatres screening Hollywood films where James Stewart and Ingrid Bergman were his early favourites. Of course, Hindi cinema was different in content and presentation but the young actor arrived at the conclusion there was a niche for the kind of acting he wanted to do and was capable of doing it.

     Dilip Kumar was the first Indian actor to adopt what came to be known as ‘method acting’. In the years to come some of the finest exponents of this kind of acting were Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift and James Dean. They had studied acting under experts and also appeared on theatre. But Dilip Kumar, without any such assets, was pitchforked straightway before the arc lights. Ashok Kumar was the most famous young actor, Raj Kapoor and Dev Anand were yet to arrive. The Dilip Kumar style of acting began to attract attention. Cinema was no doubt entertainment but then life had its share of tragedy. Millions of people lost out in their struggles in love, making money and human relationships and Dilip Kumar excelled in portraying such characters. In a way, he was Hindi cinema’s version of the Greek tragic hero or those created by Shakespeare in his great tragedies. ‘Taqdeer’ (destiny) played a major role in shaping his movie roles.

     His was the brooding presence. He seldom spoke aloud but with greet intensity. In role after role in films like ‘Andaz’, ‘Jogan’, ‘Mela’, ‘Arzoo’, ‘Shikast’, ‘Shaheed’, ‘Tarana’, ‘Daag’ and ‘Deedar’, Dilip Kumar enacted gut-wrenching roles, always losing his beloved or mother or other close ones. He was exploited, took to drinks or suffered physical disabilities. Many of these roles resulted in inspired performances by Dilip Kumar. The drunken Shankar in ‘Daag’ mourning his dead mother, the frustrated romance with a widow in ‘Shikast’, the cruel memories of a past which separated him from a childhood sweetheart in ‘Deedar’ .the blind lover haunted by the presence of a dangerously insane wife in ‘Sangdil” (adapted from Jane Eyre) broke new paths in Hindi cinema.

     In the newly-independent India, many of these films had a special social significance. Even Raj Kapoor with a flair for comedy and imitation of Charlie Chaplin understood the theme of his age and with the help of writers like K A Abbas made socially relevant films like ‘Awara’, ‘Shri 420′, ‘Boot Polish’ and ‘Jish Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hain’. Unlike Dilp Kumar., Raj Kapoor successfully clowned his way into the hearts of fans even while conveying the fims’ message. But the Dilip Kumar films were more personal. ‘Footpath’ in 1953 was such a brooding, dark film on the evils of black marketeering that many people found it difficult to sit through it. Shot entirely in the slums, it had a bold scene showing heroine Meena Kumari bathing under a public tap. This was unusual realism for the early 1950s though Meena Kumari was fully covered. Gemini films’ S S Vasan elicited an outstanding performance from Dilip Kumar in his ‘Paigam’ which dealt with trade unionism. Years later, Dilip Kumar played another role on the same subject in ‘Mazdoor’ but it had more melodrama.

      Even today, automation was a touchy issue in India because of its unemployment problem. B R Chopra’s 1957 film ‘Naya Daur’ pitted man against machine, with Dilip Kumar playing a tongawala pitted against a mean machine, the bus. The kind of patriotism shown in the film was a bit exaggerated but the message was brilliantly delivered. After the release of Bimal Roy’s ‘Devdas’ dealing with the immortal, drunken lover, Dilip Kumar was mentally devastated that he reportedly turned down the plum role of the poet-hero in ‘Pyassa’. It was time to flaunt his versatility and flair for comedy in films like ‘Azad’, ‘Kohinoor’ and ‘Ram Aur Shyam’. They became huge hits and helped to build up the legend that was Dilip Kumar.

     Very often, the media focused mainly on the later films of Dilip Kumar where he was forced to play characters who were a bit loud (‘Gopi’, “Aadmi’, ‘Bairaag’, ”Sagina’ and even Manoj Kumar’s ‘Kranti’ where noise emerged stronger than patriotism). By that time, Dilip Kumar had become ‘Dilip Saab’ and produced his own film, ‘Ganga Jumna’, the tale of a dacoit, pitting him against his own brother, a police officer, played by his real life brother Nasir Khan. The film, along with Bimal Roy’s ‘Madhumati’ was a huge hit and confirmed that Dilip saab was the unchallenged number one in the world of Hindi cinema. Ramesh Sippy brought together Dilip Saab and Amitabh Bachchan and one need not mention who was the winner.

     In  many ways Dilip Saab was more than an actor. He was an intelligent spokesman of his age, utterly secular and not afraid of petty tyrants like Balasaheb Thackeray who faulted him for accepting an award from Pakistan. Dilip Saab was a believer in international brotherhood, like Jawaharlal Nehru, he was a citizen of the world.  I interviewed him three or four times, once in the company of his good friend J K Kapur, producer of ‘Sagina’. We had lunch, biriyani and salad, Dilip Saab was the perfect host and later brilliantly expounding on the dangers of communal propaganda during elections. Fond of sports, he played football and badminton and started the football club ‘Bombay Dynamos’ along with fellow actor Pran.

     Dilip Saab was a true representative of his age, as an actor and  a human being. Never interested in rat race, he acted only in about 60 films, but these were enough to stamp his greatness. Here is belated birthday greetings for the one and only genuine ‘Saab’ of Hindi cinema.

V Gangadhar

 

BJP's 'dirty picture' - By Seema Mustafa - THE FREE PRESS JOURNAL - MUMBAI

http://freepressjournal.in/news/47720-bjp-s-dirty-picture.html

BJP's 'dirty picture'

• India
• Feb 13, 2012

FRANKLY SPEAKING BY SEEMA MUSTAFA

The filth that has crept into the party is a natural corollary of its anti- women, communal and divisive agenda
 
Is there a contradiction between an individual who insists that women should be fully clad in public, and watches pornography whenever he gets a chance? Actually not, as the first follows the second with both indicative of a dirty mind that treats women like objects and commodities to be used and discarded at will.

The three Ministers caught watching pornography in the Karnataka Assembly are all members of the Bharatiya Janata Party, clearly 'respected'by their senior colleagues.

It would have been a surprise had they been members of any other party, as the filth that has crept into the BJP is a natural corollary of its anti- women, communal, and divisive agenda. Right wing politics of the BJP kind breeds dirt that then spreads to a point where deviant criminal behaviour is accepted, and perhaps even perceived, as normal.

One would expect a political party calling itself national, and aspiring to be in government at the Centre as well, to have taken immediate action against the three Ministers - Laxman Savadi, J Krishna Palemar and C C Patil - instead of hedging bets. The resignations came only after the Opposition created a ruckus and it became very clear to the party and its government in Karanataka that the three men, close to a corrupt mining mafia in the state, were left with no choice in the matter. Even so it was really sad to see BJP spokespersons fielding questions on television, and instead of going all out to condemn the Ministers seeking refuge in the usual " let there be an enquiry, let the Speaker ( of the state Assembly) decide." The men in question claimed that they were 'working'and not watching a pornographic clip on their mobile telephones.

But the explanation made matters even worse because they said they were watching a gang rape that has the nation up in arms. The BJP remains reluctant to castigate these men, and to throw them out of the party. And even if it does so at the end of the day, the reluctance to do so has sent shock waves through the country.

BJP President Nitin Gadkari seems to be sheltering all that is criminal and deviant in the party. The mining mafia in Karnataka has a good representation in the state government, and many say these men call the shots at every level. They keep the political parties in good funds, and protect their own against any action. Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi is another case in point, with the BJP with support from several corporate honchos and sections of the media, insisting that he was 'innocent'of any involvement in the Gujarat violence where women were brutally raped and killed all over the state. This kind of mentality, protected and sheltered and nurtured, leads to the kind of behaviour that was captured on cameras in the Assembly.

The lack of remorse is amazing.

These men are elected representatives of the people, sworn to uphold the Indian Constitution and the rule of law.

Instead they violate the law at every step. Be it attacking young women for wearing jeans or watching pornography or as one of the Ministers had earlier gone on record to maintain that women should dress properly or they would invite rape. That comment should have been enough for the BJP to initiate action against him at the time, but then how can it when it endorses the same thinking and mindset.

It seems that all that is base and viciously anti- woman is drawn to the BJP. This is but natural as somehow right wing ideology of the kind espoused by many of our political parties and groups encourages such positions.

Fiscal growth that makes our Prime Minister very happy does not turn into mental growth at any level, as the status of women in India continues to be dismal. The murder of young women for making their own choices in Haryana and the role of Khap Panchayats in determining their fate has gone unchallenged. Both the Congress and the BJP, for the sake of votes, have kept quiet when confronted with this local form of bestiality, with the result that the killers have remained outside the law. And in fact, the mindset has been strengthened because of this support to a point where many young people have had to flee their homes to escape Khap Panchayat trials, and almost certain death.

Instead of scoring brownie points as the Congress seems to be doing, the political parties should take the lead in launching a massive movement for the true empowerment of women through the universal principles of justice and equality.

But clearly this is like asking for the moon, as these same political parties have totally failed to accommodate even 33 per cent women within their organizations as a first step to ensuring similar reservation for women in the Legislatures. Women activists are usually ignored by the political parties with only relatives of known male politicians getting nominations to fight the elections. Others who have managed to contest an election or two speak of harrowing experiences, with every political step fraught with humiliation and uncertainty.

Even while writing this one has received a mail about the dipping sex ratio in Gujarat. Of the 956 girls for every 1000 boys in the zero to six year age group in 1961, modern Gujarat under the great administrator Modi now has a ratio at 886 per 1000 boys according to the 2011 census. In other words, instead of moving ahead we are moving backwards, and instead of ensuring a place for our girls in the sun are ensuring that they are moved into the backwaters, discriminated and forgotten.

FRANKLY SPEAKING - SEEMA MUSTAFA