Life has this beautiful attribute of keeping things in a chain of events that makes the music all the more rocking and lively. What better life than a Guru Dutt movie!
Pyaasa arrived at my hard drive in that diabolic situation of my own life, when I was seeing a lot of D.Mukherjee's around and needed something to get inspired to follow Christ than following a Pathetic Devdas. Ok! How many Devdas I have seen apart from the original Devdas Mukherjee, who only loves himself and no one else in this world? I think I have seen quite a few in Indian cinemas. “Sikander” in “Muqaddar Ka Sikander”, “Mishter Appu” In “Udaan” (In the making of yet another Devdas, watch the movie you will know!) or a new age “DEV D”. Though I don’t like Mukherjee babu a lot, but what attracts me about the Saratchandra Classic is its base. The base of a Devdas story is very strong, probably one of the strongest base among any Indian Novel. The timeless triangular structure of a self descrtructive man, a promiscuous lady and a girl who choose another man, is sure to carry a lot of wait, a good enough chunk of life. Quintessentially Guru Dutt added one more side to it, the side of Jesus Christ and Pyaasa happened!!
The true magic of Pyaasa does not lie in its story telling, but in how it’s shown on screen. Take example of the first scene.
A poet named Vijay (Guru Dutt) lying on a grassy field watches the silver lining on sky, the birds meander around, some how lost in the unbound infinity in dilemma of where to fly. The wind blows and flowers sway. For a moment, nothing seems better than a life in this beautiful nature. Poet utters a song of his own in happiness, and a bumble bee attached with a string sits on a flower to suck in to the honey. Suddenly bee sits on the floor of the grassy ground and a passerby tramples over it. The bee dies. Life as it is, duration, with momentary happiness put here and there, cuts the scene to its obvious majority. Poet’s mood breaks. He leaves the place.
Vijay has abdicated romance from his poetry, where pinkish poetic lines seem to be the order of the day for the editors of printing media. Vijay’s poetry gets tagged as “Dus aane ki shayari”, finds its place in editors office “Dustbin”. Vijay’s thoughts are far from depicting a feminine beauty, more engrossed in showing what this world is all about, where the problem hides in this corrupted system. Vijay is not a Devdas, though his college mate and ex girl friend Meena (Mala Sinha) has left him in search of wealth, and status in society. Though Vijay has not forgotten Meena, but he disagrees to start a new affair with her when Meena asks him to do so, when they meet again in Meena’s husbands (Rehman) Office. Mr. Ghosh. Husband of Meena offers a job to Vijay in his office, but it’s was just in the fantasy to keep Vijay down as a slave of him, who used to be his wife’s ex boy friend. For the same reason he does not print Vijay’s poetry in his magazine. The evolution of Humanity in a three layered shape gets portrayed beautifully when Mr.Ghosh, Vijay Meets for the first time in Vijay’s college alumni.
A column followed by Mr.Ghosh and Vijay standing in a linear structure, shows how evolution of feelings has occurred from dead to a half life-less and then to a man full of life. There’s another brilliantly picturised scene when Meena says “Mujhe toh Upar jana tha” to Vijay and moves towards the lift, the shutter closes, she goes upwards, depicting her need and greed for wealth.
The angel of ChandraMukhi bangs on the screen, scorching it by sheer beauty, as Gulabo (Waheeda) arrives. Here I would like to ask one thing, why ChandraMukhis have always been far better than Parbotis in all Devdas classic? May be it’s an eternal truth also on celluloid too. Gulabo, a prostitute by her job, finds interest in Vijay’s poetry which was sold by Vijay’s Brothers as scrap papers in market. She takes those papers to her home. Vijay comes into Gulabo’s site through his own poetry, when he listens to his own song in Gulabo’s voice while passing a night in a park alone. Quite ironically Gulabo, a prostitute, understands the power and necessity of Vijay’s poetry for the first time in the world as she says; she does not need to know Vijay, because his lines speak for him. Like any Devdas movie, Vijay does not fall for Gulabo, though Gulabo could help herself but to feel the same for Vijay. The best part of a Gulabo-Vijay chemistry is shown in the brilliantly picturised “Kirtan” song called “Aaj Sajan Mohe Ang Lagalo”. When the song shoots of, Gulabo, Deprived in Love looks at the singers in suspicion and wariness. As the mridanga beats rise to crescendo she moves slowly upwards the stair, tears fall down from her eyes; she raises her hand and steps backward and moves to her room. I found “Meera Bai” in Gulabo in that scene; who is ready to sacrifice her all in the name of god and divine when the world rejects and points thumbs down.
Vijay looses his job, even his mother. Vijay comes to know about his mother’s death as he watches his brothers near Hooghly ghat, doing post crematory rituals. Again a brilliantly picturised scene! When Vijay watches his brothers the ghat is submerged in the water of Ganges in high tide. As he comes down, we can see the mud, as if the water too (life in other words) leaving Vijay. Vijay drinks alcohol heavily on that night, even comes to a prostitutes’ house. He sees a prostitute who is also a mother, is not allowed to take her ill child on her laps as she is dancing in front of the customers. Tears trickle down Vijay’s chick. He leaves the place. Gulabo again discovers him and takes her to her house. Vijay asks Gulabo why he is still living a life, as he has nothing to do in this world, he has lost his job and mother too. Rest of the life seems to an absurd duration for him now.
Passing that night at Gulabo’s place he leaves again only to suicide. On the way he finds a poor man shivering in cold. He gives away his overcoat, in which he had kept his last letter to Meena. The poor man understanding his intension follows Vijay, but his leg gets stuck in the railway track. Vijay understanding the death on the cards tries to save the poor man, but fails. The world knows Vijay died by the evidence of the overcoat and that letter. But Vijay himself gets hospitalized in coma. Mr.Ghosh reads out the death story from the newspaper so that Meena listens to it. Meena is shown holding a magazine called Life , where “Jesus Christ” is on the covers.
In the mean the Gulabo comes to Meena, and offers Vijay’s poetry to her asks her to print them. Meena, who epitomizes materialism asks price for those eternal masterpieces. Gulabo denies taking a single penny. In fact she offers all her jewellery to Mr.Ghosh to meet her urge. Vijays poetry gets printed at last and soon becomes best seller. Mr.Ghosh declares Vijay’s death to the world.
Now Pyaasa takes a new turn in the story as it now clearly focuses on the disease of this society, called materialism, a disease that makes poetry more important than the poet, creation more popular than the creator. Everybody takes a share of Vijay’s success, even who hardly knew Vijay. In the memorial show of his own death Vijay arrives at the theater, stands like Jesus Christ, light falls on his back like hello, and he croons those memorable lines “Yeh Duniya agar mil bhi jaye toh kya hai”, which still holds a value in this world of terrorism. What if terrorist achieve the world they are looking for??
Announcing his return, Vijay denies agreeing that he is the Vijay who everybody wants to see. Meena asks the reason, whether he is upset with anyone. Vijay replies No he is upset with the system only as the system has made those people to behave like that. He does not want to live here, so he is leaving. He takes Gulabo with him and leaves.
If someone says Pyaasa is a love story, then I will say he is brutally regretting the classic. Pyaasa is about Life, about its absurdness and against everything that is materialistic. A person is what he has done, No one is good, and No one is bad. Vijay epitomizes that Life, which is duration between a birth and death, is so absurd if it has nothing to do. When he had lost his mother, he felt the urge of suicide, but Gulabo has made him think about life again. Devdas going for a ChandraMukhi is a big step for me, and it is kind of signature of a so called clichéd word “Move on” in life. It’s so good to see a Vijay, Sikander, Mishter Appu or a DEV moving on in their Life. Vijay does claim his feat, as we often do in this corporate world. He has nothing to take from his life as he knows death will come one day. Nothing is "Na-hanyate" in this world.
Pyaasa, Is what life is. It takes a full circle back to the first scene which was so beautiful in the midst of the nature; as I felt the same when Vijay chose Gulabo, than to end his life.
No comments:
Post a Comment