Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam : A Salam !

These days when I read those forwarded mails subjected as “50 reasons not to marry a Bengali girl”, I do a chuckle and feel pity for the lack of imagination of post 60’s bollywood that has mainly been the reason of curving the niche of Bengali men as anything but henpecked. But the thing is, that’s not been the case over the years. When I started watching all those Hindi movies that showcased Bengali lifestyle in celluloid, I not only experienced some avant grade directorial brilliance but also discovered some striking research work of “Babu culture and its machismo”, that had gone in to produce those films. One of those films should be “Shahib Biwi aur Gulaam” directed by Abrar Ali, produced by the legend Guru Dutt [Many feels the movie is actually Ghost directed by Guru Dutt only].

Like most of the Guru Dutt movies SBAG too is a chiaroscuro meditation on time, memory, and social and personal injustice, all falling on the same string of classical tradition of Pyaasa and Kagaz ke phool. But there’s an exception here. For a change SBAG pivots around a female character played by Meena Kumari as Chhoti Bahu. Chhoti Bahu’s character is somewhat ambiguous. The shade of the character is sketched so neatly that you could take both sides of the coin. She is perceived differently in the film too. While the voluptuous sister in law of her thinks she is foolish woman who has not learned to enjoy her new status and wealth; her husband [Chhote Babu] thinks, as she is born and brought in a poor Bengali family, all she needs to do is to care for him and regard him as god. While Bhoothnath, the character played by Guru Dutt sees her as an ethereal being who is beyond any imagination or comparison.

Well, SBAG holds a large array of feminine nature across its span. While the Badi Bahu is half mad and deranged so much in her moral sense that she washes her hand 63 times to be auspicious, Majli Bahu has succumbed to the hands of brothel-prone masculinity of this chowdhury family, that teaches her to be happy in breaking and recreating jewelries.
Chhoti Bahu rejects to be typecast. She is ready to cross any mile to get her husband back in home. She is ready to try her hands in “Mohini sindoor”, a vermillion that claims to keep the “suhaag” in tact; and when that attempt falls apart she is even ready to sing and drink wine with her husband like a courtesan does. Going farther down the line of jeopardy, we see a character played by Waheeda Rehman as Jabba, who is young, likes Bhoothnath from the word go and flirts openly with him continuously. Her words and action both show extreme freedom throughout the movie. She will not take the fact that her father has fixed her marriage with a guy whom she does not love, so she squelches the marriage after her father’s death. A striking maturity of Jabba is exposed by this denial as she was shown as an adoring daughter, but she knows her mind well.

Cut back to the narrative of male dominance we see the commentary on Bengal's decaying feudalism. Its presiding males, two Chowdhury brothers who occupy themselves with such traditional aristocratic pursuits as pigeon-keeping, elaborate “marriages” of pet cats, and drunken nights in high-class brothels, regularly abuse their tenants, servants, and wives. On the other hand, Mr.Suvinay, the owner of “Mohini Sindur” factory is the face of Bengal’s rising “Brahmo-samaj” [which was influenced by Protestant ideology and which sought to “purify” Hinduism of “superstition,” “idolatry,” and customs such as sati or widow immolation]. Suvinay’s house is designed with its upright piano, lace curtains, and mythical figurines in European porcelain, shows the conceivable encapsulation of bourgeois Brahmo syncretism. Then there’s a character of a lunatic Timekeeper in Zamindar’s house who thinks all these aristocracy of the Haveli will end one day. Probably a poetic justice of the fact, that he knows it all and world thinks he is insane.

The whole plot is unfold by Bhoothnath and Servant Bansi, who chronicle the history of the family and witness the ravages of time and changes that took place in haveli

Like all other Guru Dutt movies too, the cinematography and work of light and darkness is to be seen in SBAG too. Even some subplots of the story are so deep that it leaves you spellbound. Though Guru Dutt and Waheeda Rehman were in full throttle of affair in their personal life, the movie repeatedly and significantly defers their union to unfold other more important parts of the movie. The song “Meri baat rahi mere man men — “My unspoken words lie sealed in my heart” on the lips of Jabba tells thousand words of her helplessness as impeccable pictirization repeatedly plays a game of daylight and darkness on Jabba’s face. Even the brothel song Saqiyaa, aaj mujhe nind nahin aaegi — “Friend, tonight I shall not sleep” is brilliantly choreographed and consoled with verbatim expressions. You just got to see how its picturized; as the patron moves from the ceiling the shadows of the co dancers move, yet they all are in perpetual darkness; a striking portrayal of concealed and revealed feminity.

I will not ponder too much on “Na Jaon saiyan” as the world knows all about the masterpiece number, but surely about “Piya aise Jiya me”. You Just got to see Meena Kumari’s acting prowess in the number. Just by her facial expressions and tricks of eyes she portrays the female desire so amazingly.

Then there is a scene where the Majli Babu is shown sitting in the room alone and a triangular shade of light falls on him and rest of the room is darkened. It is again a sharp [triangular] visual that denotes the fast decaying aristocracy; which is soon on the verge of finish.

In a short span of time, the movie shows so many facets of life, that it deserves multiple viewing to grab all. I would regard SBAG as a Hindi substitute of Mr.Ray’s epic work in “Jalsaghar” and recommend all to see this classic if they haven’t seen it yet. Its a movie that Rocked me BIG TIME !!

Taxi driver : A loner's view on Urban culture

“I don't mind this empty room, and I like it when I'm alone,
I'm trying not to think about you, I'm
Not waiting by the telephone,
I'm watching a late-night movie, where the lovers say goodbye,
And it's really getting to me, and tears are in my eyes,
But I'm not crying, I'm not crying,
I'm not crying over you, I'm over you;” – I am not crying over you by Chris de Burgh


“Ei ekla Ghor amar desh, amar ekla thakar Obbhesh
Vabi Kichutei vabbona tomar kotha
Boba Telephone er pashe boshe
Tobu Gobhir Raat er Ogovir cinema e
Jodi Prem chay natuke Biday
Ami achhonno hoye porechi abar
Dekhi chokh bhije jay kannay” - Ekla Ghor by Fossils

The reason I have started this article with these two different songs coming from two different ends of earth with absolute identical meanings, is because I believe loneliness is an universal term and Martin Scorsese’s Taxi driver is only made to project what loneliness does to a human being than to expose alienation in urban society of New York City or anything else, as it comes directly from the screen play. I have never been to New York City, and I am hardly accustomed to what a Yankee does to live his/her life. But like me any one could connect to this master piece across the glob, is because there are no different types to loneliness. But with friendliness, yes, it comes in all shapes and sizes. As different sex you indulge more, you could impure it with love, which can drive you to a kiss, and a kiss could drive you to bed. Or on the other way around you don’t indulge more, keep it simple, meet twice or thrice a week, check with each other about, how life is going on , if possible play in grounds together, chat if both comes online simultaneously; you still may refer yourselves as friends. But at the end of the day, no one knows what exactly a friendship is. The bottom line is friendship comes as disease to extrovert nature, while an introvert believes, either he is too naive to meet with others, or he is too superior to loose his piousness,time and value with jerks all around.

It explores the psychological madness within an obsessed, twisted, inarticulate, lonely, anti-hero cab driver and a Vietnam War Veteran (De Niro as Travis), who misdirectedly lashes out with frustrated anger and power like an exploding time bomb at the world that has alienated him. To prove my point about an introvert, here comes the tagline of the movie as Martin say’s “On every street in every city, there's a nobody who dreams of being a somebody.”

Well, loneliness is something like water. Its pure, its tasteless, its life and beyond everything you put it in any bowl, it will take the bowls size. Loneliness gives you satisfaction that you are different and no one is like you, you can also grief and repent on it as everyone has someone to look for, I have none!! You can add value to loneliness at whatever way you can, negative or positive, which friendship can never pull off. That’s what Travis is. He is an insomniac; he does not know what to do at night, so he drives a taxi, roams around the city. He goes to see porn movies at night, and that’s the only type of movie he knows. Interestingly chir de burgh’s song some how speaks the same shade of loneliness. About his loneliness, Travis ponders “Loneliness has followed me my whole life. Everywhere. In bars, in cars, sidewalks, stores, everywhere. There's no escape. I'm God's lonely man”

Travis has a very definite mindset to what’s right and what’s wrong. He does not follow daily news, but he takes no back gear to shoot his answer to the next probable minister Senator Charles Palantine; and I quote “Whatever it is, you should clean up this city here, because this city here is like an open sewer you know. It's full of filth and scum. And sometimes I can hardly take it. Whatever-whoever becomes the President should just [Travis honks the horn] really clean it up. You know what I mean? Sometimes I go out and I smell it, I get headaches it's so bad, you know...They just never go away you know...It's like...I think that the President should just clean up this whole mess here. You should just flush it right down the fuckin' toilet.”

There’s two or three ways of looking into this movie. One, the definite decay of urban culture across New York. Two, what a fun loving guy does at night, which is of course the majority or three, seeing this society through the eyes of Travis a loner.

Being an extrovert you may question, why I should see through his eyes. Sometimes it sparks from Travis’s comments that he is jealous about people meeting up, having sex. Travis can work on Jewish holidays but that does not mean that every one should be like that. He can not even cope with actors making love on television, he breaks it. In every scene, it comes out that loneliness brings you to that level of fidelity, that your thought process becomes darker; you feel the whole living around you is sheet.

People say and it is widely believed that Love brings the rebel out of you. Taxi Driver shows the real side of Love, when love rubbles you. A break off is a more productive industry or factory than Love is. A break off makes you more attacking, more rebellious than ever you were. You feel like what ever you could have, is no more with you, and no more will ever be. So the game sums up like you have nothing to loose. You just don’t care. Same happens with Travis too. Travis felt there’s some kind of resonance between him and the blond beauty Betsy, who works in Palantine’s vote campaign. He meets her in a coffee shop and expresses his feelings about her. Betsy says that she feels, Travis is like Kris Kristofferson's song “Pilgrim chapter 33” where the lyric goes something like this "he's a prophet and a pusher, partly truth, partly fiction. A walking contradiction". So loyal he is, Travis readily rejects the compliment and says pusher part was not for him. On the contrary few minutes ago he had cracked a joke to Betsy that he needs to be more ORGAN-EZIEZD. He believes Betsy and his thinking is of same lines, because according to him Betsy is also a loner and looking for some fun, which he could only belt out. Not that he wants to sleep, but he takes her to a porn movie. Betsy comes out of the theater and regrets Travis after that.

Love was never pink for Travis. It always came in whites and red in dark of late night New York, as he writes on his diary “Each night when I return the cab to the garage, I have to clean the cum off the back seat. Some nights, I clean off the blood.” He has seen a frustrated husband as his customer, who sits in his taxi only to see his wife making love with another guy’s apartment and like a hopeless expresses his anger to him by saying, he wants to shoot his wife by a magnum .44 gun. He feels he is not the only loner in the city.

He sees whores, skunk pussies, buggers, queens, fairies, dopers, junkies, sick, venal all come out night animals and he prays that one day rain will come and remove all these dirt away from the city. Betsy’s going away, was a turn around. Travis lost his faith and hope on Rain.

Its enough to be sitting around and seeing all these happen around you. Now its time to do something. Its time to get every muscle to be perfect, its time to be the strongest. He chooses to save beautiful little Iris from her promiscuous career and the pimp named Sport. To see what he does next and what happens to him, you got to see the movie.

Taxi Driver is schizophrenic, and it’s too dark and uncomfortable at times. But that's all you see in everyday's newspaper, you can never hide that truth.Take the lid out of the manhole, the dirt flows beneath. The Manhattans and the sky scrapers give a different story though of urban triumph. Having said that, it’s the story of an extrovert majority. When an Introvert loner pulls the lid off the face of the whole, his words no more sound “Square”, it’s a “Hole”. Take what ever way you want, Martin Scorsese has given the Loners view, how weird it may be.