Mumtaz Wore it best!

Mumtaz wore it best!!

Thanks to everyone's comment from my previous post on who wore it best, going by the amount of votes in the comments and Voting Poll, its safe to say Mumtaz was way ahead of the competition and won by a whopping 99% of the vote, I was hoping I'd be able to review a Mumtaz film for the Win but then I realised I have none of her movies, but I'm going shopping soon and I'll be sure to get some of her films but till then enjoy this superb romantic number of her (yet in orange again and she looks mighty FINE!!) and Dharmendra from the 1969 film Aadmi aur Insaan (Someone tell me, why isn't this song as popular as I think it should be, its over the hill Fabulous!!)

Bollywood Fashion Showdown: Mumtaz vs. Leena Chandavarkar vs. Sonam Kapoor

This edition of Bollywood fashion Showdown takes place between three Bollywood startlets in 3 different era's all wearing the Iconic Orange draped sari first showcased by Mumtaz in the Aaj kal tere mere pyar song from the 1968 film Brahmachari, thus let the battle commence

Mumtaz in Bramachari(1968)

First up is Mumtaz as already noted above, when she wore the Iconic Orange draped Sari in the groovy Aaj kal tere mere pyar song from  Bramachari (1968)
see her in action below

Forgive the grainy pictures, i took them off the Youtube video

Next came Leena Chandavarkar who wore a very similar Sari (in what looks like a parody of the Aaj Kal tere mere pyar song above) for the 'Hal dil laga' dance number in the 1971 film Preetam, see her in action below

Sonam Kapoor as Mumtaz 

Rounding off the battle is Sonam Kapoor who wore a very similar sari for a December 2010 photo shoot with Filmfare Magazine where she dressed up as Mumtaz in the Aaj kal tere pyar song as discussed above


So dear fellow readers, bloggers, etc. Who do you think wore the Orange Sari best, sound off in the comments below or vote in the poll on the right hand side of this Post (Voting Closes on Sunday Midnight) and the Winner shall be announced in due course!

Boond Jo Ban Gayee Moti (1967)

Apologies for my long absence, its great to be back and i really have to say i missed bolly blogging, Its been a while and i'm so eager to round off on the last two V.Shantaram movies i'm yet to review. Boond Jo Ban Gayee Moti (The drop that turned into a pearl) gave Mumtaz her first leading role in mainstream cinema after a whole string of B movies and supporting roles in many other productions

Our story starts with a man being taunted for wasting his years being a teacher, this results in a flashback

Before the death of his parents Satya Prakash (Jeetendra) is given the responsibility of caring for Mahesh his chota bhai (little brother), as such his brother's education and such other responsibilities lie on him

He manages to send Mahesh to Delhi for college, while he gets a job at the local governmnet run school


on his first day in a rather squirmy scene his students pack his drawer full of frogs (eurrgghh!!)

Village belle Shefali (Mumtaz) takes a liking to Satya Prakash due to his gentle and hardworking ethic, but then drama enters her life when her mother (Lalita Pawar) who had left since childhood following a marriage to Christan man (perhaps a missionary) attempts to rebuild a relationship with her

Shefali is having none of it and the villagers too aren't particularly helping matters as she's criticised for her conversion to christianity

While Satya is sacrificing a lot for the sake of his brother's education, rather than studying, Mahesh is living a partying lifestyle with girls, drinks, smoking etc.

Satya however is focused on his career as a teacher and sets upon putting theory into practice for the students, the headmaster opposes his teaching style which results in Satya getting the sack. He later gets the job back when they realise how much the students have improved or shall I say how smart they've become

Meanwhile Mahesh falls for wealthy Renuka, this love affair makes Mahesh even more estranged from his studies, which culminates in him not showing up for his final year exams, thus not only as he wasted his brother's precious efforts to educate him, but he also fails his finals

Rather than come clean to his brother, he steals a friends examination number and passes it onto his brother as his, an oblivious Satya is thankful and proud of his little brother


but then the story takes a major turn when Renuka who is Mahesh's girlfriend gets pregnant, she is later discovered dead, all evidences place Satya Prakash as responsible thereby leading him to be linked to the crime

Will he be proven Innocent? Who really killed Renuka? Will mahesh come clean about his dodgy ways to his brother?

Compared to some of the other V.Shantaram films i've reviewed on here Boond Jo Ban Gayee Moti (The drop that turned into a pearl) is a lot more restrained and devoid of the usual showmanship one associates with V.Shantram.

At the heart of the film is its exaltation and respectability of the profesion of teaching hence the name 'the drop that turned into a pearl' perhaps a metaphor for the work of a teacher being responsible for the drop turning into a pearl. The film also advocates the need of practical rather than just theoretical education. Though this are the fine points of the film some things like the comical court scene, (why does a court scene, well in some if not most Hindi movies, seem to be a place for high hysterics and drama, as implausible as they seemed in this, i have to admit they were quite funny).

I would have liked more insight into why Shefali's mother left her and the vilagers, or the reason for the villagers reaction to her conversion to christianity, this made the film have or should i say gave out a bit of an anti-christian vibe.

Performance wise everyone gives a restrained performance here and Mumtaz is lovable and confident in her debut leading role. Jeetendra was lovable and there was none of his Jumping Jack behaviours on here, a rather mature performance i must say. The supporting characters Akashdeep who played Mahesh and Vaishali who Renuka were lovable too

Lovely lovely songs by Satish Bhatia, according to imdb this is his only film score, there's the lovely 'Hum maine bhi' a wonderful song on nature 'Yeh kaun chitrakaar' but my two favourites are 'Meri zindagi ek khwab' all fans of campy song picturizations would love this, it features Mumtaz in everything from a fish inspired evening gown to a space rocket scientist

and the fun 'lovely lovely hai sama'

Paisa Vasool rating: 6/10

Loafer (1973)

Sweet escapist 70's bollywood fare with a super gorgeous Mumtaz, Handsome Dharmendra and perhaps the most flamboyant use of balloons ever in a bollywood movie

Ranjit is a naughty school boy, when a prank goes wrong at school, Mohan is forced to out Ranjit as the culprit. After school the two boys are involved in a fight where Ranjit tosses Mohan off the building by accident thereby leading to Mohan's death


Mohan runs for his life and falls into the hands of Mr Sinha (K.N. Singh) a shady criminal, he promises to take care of him


Ranjit (Dharmendra) grows up as a thief under Mr Sinha's shadow, he steals but he also runs a nightclub called playboy



when a stealing operation goes wrong Ranjit realises one of his staff is dishonest, the dishonest staff turns out to be Rakesh (Roopesh Kumar) who had been sent to spy on Ranjit by Pratap (Premnath) a rival thief who is jealous of Ranjit's success. When Ranjit discovers this, he lets Pratap know he's aware of his deeds



An angry Pratap plots to kill Rakesh but his sister Anju (Mumtaz) pleads for his life and Pratap sees her as the perfect opportunity to spy on Ranjit he recruits her saying if she works for him her brother will be spared from dying


Ranjit also forms a close relationship with fruit seller Mr Gopinath (Om prakash) who had helped him during a police chase

Mr Gopinath also has a daughter Rupa (Farida Jalal) whom he had sent to Private school in Shimla, he keeps the fact that he's poor from his daughter as he had gone bankrupt after falling into depression when he had lost his son Mohan and wife


When he goes over to Shimla to see his daughter Rupa (Farida Jalal) he lies about his status and manages to woo Mr Rajandranath Mehra (Raj Mehra) his daughter's guardians while at boarding school


Back in bombay Anju realises ranjit is falling for her, she too starts falling in love with him but she's racked by endless guilt and as a result finds it hard to continue Pratap's spy work. As a result Pratap threatens her and she manages to set Ranjit up to be beaten by Pratap's men

Ranjit is beaten so hard that he ends up in hospital, when he gets well Anju tells him the truth andreveals she had only spied on him to save her brothers life, he's taken aback by her honesty and promises to help free her brother


When an Exhibition of rare jewels come to town Plans are made to rob it.

Ranjit despite strict security manages to clean the place out, police start chasing and he runs into Gopinath's house for safety, there he spots Mohan's picture, and then realises Mohan's father whom he had killed by accident aas a kid is indeeed Mr Gopinath, he's racked by guilt


Mr Gopinath on the other hand starts drinking heavily after Mr Rajendranath asks for his daughter's hand in marriage, he's afraid his status a s a poor fruit seller would be found out which would lead to his daughters being disgraced


How will he overcome this? Will he ever find out that his son Mohan was killed Ranjit? Will Panjit reveal the truth to him? What would be Mr Gopinath's reaction

Overall Loafer (Ruffian) is a sweet movie about guilt and forgiveness dipped in a mish mash of romance, action and goood ol' romance, its well worth watching and definitely entertaining. i really can't say a bad word about this film, okay there were some silly comic side plots but overall Loafer is a well packaged commercial drama with the right elements of just about everything

Mumtaz was cute in this, she gave me some serious funkalicious fashions


I really love Om Prakash he was or should i say is always adorable


I loved this retro flask thing, so sleek


Dharmendra was on major form as well, his pairing with Mumtaz made for a cute couple


Superb soundtrack by Laxmikant Pyarelal all the songs on here are winners which makes me think if i had to pick my all time favourite music directors Laxmikant Pyarelal will be in my top 5. There's the seductive 'Motiyon ka ladki hoon main', the melodious 'main tere ishq main' which just makes you appreciate Lata's voice enough to even drown in it, another romantic one number by Mohammed Rafi 'aaj mausam bada' and Asha sizzles on the funky 'kahan hai woh' with so many colourful ballons, something tells me the art director for this dance sequence must have had a huge balloon fetish

Padma Khanna putting many a Cheerleader to shame with her balloon pom poms



Another favorite of mine is the beaiutiful 'Koi Shahiri babu' with some Male impersonator action going on very much like that in the 'didi tera devar deewana' song in 'Hum Aapke Hain Koun'





Total Score: 7/10 ( a highly enjoyable escapist fare)

Loafer is available on Youtube with English Subtitles

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Suraj (1966)

Suraj, Suraj (sunshine), where do i start with this delightful movie, stolen kids, deception , evil scheming, wonderful costumes and great songs all make for a tasty 60's masala treat

After Sangram Singh (Niranjan Sharma) saves the life of Vikram Pratap Singh (David Abraham), he is highly grateful, as a reward Pratap Singh promises his daughter to Sangram Singh's son in Marriage, he secures this promise with a necklace

While the young king is playing with king Sangram Singh's guard Ram Singh (Gajanan Jagidar) the necklace drops and a palace maid steals it,Ram Singh is then accused of the theft and punished and shamed by the King, when the necklace is eventually found Ram Singh had left the palace and Sangram Singh gets no chance to apologise

Ram Singh is angry and promises to get even, he steals the young prince from the palace and then sends his own son back to the palace a few years later as the prince, he also creates a scar in his are similar to one the original prince has

The King and Queen are suspicious but when they discover a burn similar to the one the Prince has, they believe its truly him


Ram Singh then brings up the King's son as a thief with the intention of scorning the King one day, he also changes his name to Suraj

although Suraj is brought up as a thief, he has a heart of gold

Prince Pratap Singh (Ajit) who is actually Ram Singh's original son that is being brought up in the palace grows up to be a tout (oh the irony), terrorrising the villagers and troubling the young girls

Princess Anuradha (Vyjayanthimala) who has been promised to Prince Pratap Singh too comes of age and when her father tells her of her upcoming marriage to the prince, she's none too pleased but agrees to go and visit him just to please her father

She takes her maid servant Kalavati (Mumtaz) with her and when they get there she swaps roles with Kalavati arguing she wants to see what everyday life is like

Thus Kalavati becomes the princess and Princess Anuradha becomes the maid

While on her journey through town to discover what normal folks are like she meets and falls for Suraj in a spate of irony since he is in fact the original king

In another Spate of Irony the King doesn't take a liking to the acting Princess (Mumtaz) but falls for her handmaid who is fact the real Princess


Who would the king marry? Will the king discover that Prince Pratap Singh whom he has raised is not his real son? Will Suraj discover he is in fact the real prince? For obvious answers to these and many more fun reasons please watch Suraj?

An all round fun film is what Suraj (Sunshine) is, its full of hilarious well placed ironies plus the masalaic formulas of swapped children, mistaken identities & evil schemes, this movie has all the elements that became the standard formula of most masala films in the '70's and '80's.

I absolutely loved Rajendra Kumar in this, this was such a fun role for him and he pulled it off with panache, no tears or emotional acting for him in this, just fun all the way through

Johnny Walker as usual is comic relief with some hilarious Cock Jokes, according to my subtitles anyway

As for Ajit, what a handsome man he was, why didn't he ever make it to top hero status? He was hilarious and fantastic as the scheming terrorising prince

there was serious sexual chemistry between him and Vjayanthimala in a Villain fancies heroine kind of way


Never has Vyjayanthimala looked so gorgeous if you're a fan of Vyjayanthimala you might wanna add this to your collection, and although she doesn't dance so much in these she balances her roles as Princess Anuradha who knows what she wants and the damsel in distress perfectly


Baby Neetu Singh too had a small role


What an outstanding soundtrack by Shankar Jaikishen, all the songs from this films are gems, they won their 5th filmfare best music director award for this. From the romantic 'Chere pe giri' the sweet and heartwarming vocals of Sharda in 'Deko Mera Dil', the evergreen 'Baharon Phool Barsao' which won Mohammed Rafi his 4th filmfare best male playback award and the beautiful 'Ho Kaise Samjhaon', the fun 'Ho Ek baar' and the sweet enchanting 'Titli Udi' sang by the fabulous Sharda, which is said to ave been the No. 1 hit song of 1966


Total Score: 8/10 (A wonderfully entertaining Fairytale)

Suraj is available in 16 parts with English Subtittles on Youtube


the wonderful Sharda (image courtesy of BrookHaven National Laboratory)

Sharda whom i had heard nothing of till i saw this movie, apparently never made it big even though her voice was spectacularly magnificent due to dirty politics and monopoly of The Mangeshkar sisters whom i adore, but as much as i love them, when i read of allegations of them refusing to sing for producers should they give songs to anyone else i'm a little disappointed but that disappointment doesn't take away from the legends i think they rightfully are.

Sharda and some top industry people in the 60's Image courtesy of BrookHaven National Laboratory.

Sharda's education also seemed to have worked against her, read more on Wikipedia, i don't know how true the wikipedia article is, but with the very little that's written on her, the wikipedia article is well written and seems fair. She also has her own website as well which is aptly titled titliudi.com

See more of Sharda at the Brookhaven National Laboratory