Recap-
Dev Anand is two films old and discovering that the world is not kind and gentle but people see something in this young man, maybe it’s his dedication and commitment to evolve, maybe it’s his pleasing presence. He continues to get work.
Ab aage-
In 1947, Baburao Pai, the man responsible for launching Dev Anand, left Prabhat and started his own - Famous Pictures and Studios- and took along Dev Anand and Guru Dutt to make Mohan. Guru Dutt assisted the director Anadinath Banerjee and Dev acted in it. One source says Guru Dutt also acted a part in it.
Like Guru Dutt, Anadinath was also an alumnus of Uday Shankar’s India Cultural Centre at Almora. Uday Shankar was at the helm of a dance revolution that was brewing in the 30s. While traditional practitioners were trying to revive classical forms, he managed to combine them with folk and western styles to create a style of dance dramas that earned him and Indian arts fame and respect in the West. He set up this school or Centre to create a generation of artists who would take pride in Indian forms yet be open to innovation and experimentation. The Centre had leaders in their fields teaching Dance, Music, Poetry an even Psychology. He wanted his students to emerge as fully rounded individuals and not just dancers.
With his students and collaborators choreographing for trendsetting flms like Awara, CID, Baazi, his dance style came to influence film dance choreography in the 40s. His other famous brother is Pt. Ravi Shankar, who joined his troupe at the age of ten, travelling the world with the dance group before training as a musician.
Uday Shankar also made one film called ‘Kalpana’(1948) which is a story told primarily through dance movements and performances. It’s an unusual marriage of German Expressionism with classical Indian bhav, every now and then bumping into Surrealism.
It begins with sort of an Artist Manifesto.
He sees it as his duty to observe the human condition keenly and report truthfully.
Many of his students and collaborators brought his ethics and ideology to Dev Anand’s world- some of them being Guru Dutt, Zohra Sehgal, Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar Khan, Anadinath and more.
We could perhaps have drawn more inferences and connections if we could watch Mohan. But the film doesn’t exist. There is a reference in the July 1948 issue of Filmindia that it is awaiting an early release but some sources say the film was never released.
Wonder what happened.
There are two songs available on youtube- only an audio version.
Mere Jeevan Mein Aayi Bahar.
Kab tak mere bhagwan tu sota hi rahega.
Interestingly, they both credit Jawahar Kaul as the singer. He was a popular actor of the time who some of us might remember in a small role in Sahib Biwi aur Ghulam, as Waheeda’s fiancé. There is a some controversy online about the credit. Some aficionados suggest they were sung by Channulal Pardesi.
In Mohan, Dev Anand stars opposite Hemavati or Hema, who was an IPTA member. She had acted in Deewar, a play (3 hour long!) directed by Prithiviraj Kapoor that stirred quite a storm with the audience. (For any young folk, let me just add, P Kapoor was Kareena Kapoor’s Great Grandfather and a giant of Theatre and Films) Deewar was performed 712 times between 1945 and 1959. It was part of a quartet of plays staged in protest of Partition of India. Of course, as much as the plays were celebrated, Prithviraj Kapoor’s staunch secularism earned him death threats, censor troubles and boycotts. For him art was akin to activism. But then, in the 40s every artist of calibre was an activist, associated with IPTA (Indian People’s Theatre Association) and a lot of them congregated at 41, Pali Hill, Chetan and Uma Anand’s house.
Hema’s acting skills. however, didn’t manage to please Mr Patel of Filmindia.
‘Almost all the players, with the exception of Hema, give good performances. Hema makes queer mouth formations and spits out her dialogue too abruptly.’ And more…
Hemavati went on to marry D K Sapru (cousin of the film villain Jeevan) and produced Punjabi films into the 90s. Her children Priti Sapru and Tej Sapru are well known names in the Punjabi film industry. D K Sapru was also launched by Prabhat Films and went on to have a long career. Some might recall him as the senior zamindar in Guru Dutt’s ‘Sahib Biwi aur Ghulam’, the one who orders for choti bahu (Meena Kumari) to be killed.
Hemavati
D K Sapru
I think we can safely assume Mohan didn’t do much for Dev’s career either. There’s not a lot of other information about the film or the director Anadinath Banerjee, with whom Dev worked in a few more films.
Let’s just take this opportunity to look at what Dev was competing with at the box office.
Mid 1947 Dilip Kumar’s Jugnu became the biggest hit - Dilip Kumar’s first hit and Noor Jahan’s last film in India before she moved to Karachi.
The most delightful trivia from the film is the guest appearance by Mohd. Rafi, as a college boy.
Mohd. Rafi as a college boy in Jugnu
It’s an inter hostel College romance between a boy and a girl. ‘Daulat’ or lack of it provides the conflict and the story ends in tragedy for the lovers.
There was a call to ban the film for it’s ‘vulgar’ representation of college environment. There are a couple of risqué scenes like the apple biting contest in which girls are meant to bite apples hanging from a tree, without using their hands. It may have been too suggestive for the time. There’s a kathak inspired dance item on stage by the lovely Latika of tibetan descent (also comic star Gope’s wife). Her skirt is a little too transparent for this critic’s liking.
Overreact much, Mr Patel?
According to the review, ‘S H Rizvi tells us in Jugnu that…India is nothing more than one long sex hunt in which boys chase girls, explore their handbags, rob their tiffin boxes and sing suggestive love ditties with vulgar gestures…’ By the way, S H Rizvi, who is being so reviled, was not a nobody, he was an influential film personality, also married to Madam Noor Jahan, the nightingale of India until she moved to Pakistan.
The film was a hit when it was released after the suggested cuts by the censors. But that’s Dilip Kumar’s story.
Dev Anand still has to find his feet. Mohan probably just came and sank or sank even before it was released. But his next film determined the course of his life - he tasted success and fell deeply in love- a love story that was to become legendary.
Vidya - agle episode mein.