YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

The songs were as hard to execute as the scenes. They took several days over many schedules and involved hundreds of dancers, special camera devices, a tanga and even a train. As usual, Ramesh pulled out all stops. 'Yeh Dosti was a twenty-one-day endeavor. The song establishes the friendship between Veeru and Jai. Its easy camaraderie is the foundation of the film. The cheer of the happy version perfectly offsets the dirge-like version at Jai's death. It was decided that a motorcycle with a sidecar would capture the spirit of the male-bonding anthem. But to shoot the entire song from a moving vehicle was static and limiting. So they built a special contraption, which would enable the crew to use different kinds of camera movements. The contraption allowed for varied camera angles. Divecha could start on a tight close-up of one character, pull back, move around to include both and then turn almost 180 degrees to the other side. Shots like these would make the audience feel that they were traveling with Veeru and Jai. But they weren't easy to get. First the bike would be fitted onto the contraption, and then the whole paraphernalia would move along with the camera and tracks and a low trolley moving up and down. Coordinating the elements - reflectors, sun-guns, speakers - needed minute organization and the patience of a priest. There were frequent mechanical faults: the towing hook would come off, or the pulling vehicle would get so heated up that it woudn't start. None of which stopped Ramesh and choreographer P.L Raj from planning even more intricate moves. 'Yeh Dosti', they decided, would end with the sidecar breaking away, doing a short solo run and then coming together with the motorcycle again. It was a neat gimmick. If only they could make it work. The sidecar had to be pulled away from the motorcycle without making the pulling obvious. And then there was the toughest part: the two had to reunite after separating on the fork on the road. They attached the sidecar to the camera on a trolley and rehearsed the shot with Amitabh, who was riding the motorcycle. It all depended on his sense of timing, because he was on a moving vehicle while the camera was on a fixed trolley. Amitabh would have to time it to perfection - start at the right moment, and accelerate or slow down according to the movement of the camera. Amazingly, he brought in the motorcycle for a smooth, perfect docking on the very first take. It was a miracle. The unit broke into a spontaneous applause and even the normally reticent Ramesh jumped off the camera stand and hugged Amitabh.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

In the climax sequence, Gabbar holds Basanti's arm and menacingly delivers his lines: 'Dekho chhamiya, zyada nakhre mat karo humse, nahin to ye gori chamdi hai na - saare badan se khurach khurach ke utaar doonga.' By now, Amjad had settled in. The insecurities of the early schedules were replaced by confidence and he wore Gabbar's persona like a second skin. In the heat of the performance, Amjad gripped Hema's arm a little too tightly. It hurt. But the shot was canned and the crew moved on to the next one.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

By the evening, Hema's arm was sore and the bruises showed. At the dinner table, Dharmendra could barely control his anger. Dharmendra, or paaji, as everone called him, was in love with Hema Malini. Hema, professional to the core, gave little trouble. But Dharmendra wore his heart on his sleeve. When he and hema shot romantic sequences, he paid the light boys to make mistakes so he could embrace her again and again. Dharmendra and the light boys had a perfectly worked-out code language: when he pulled his ear, they would make a mistake - mess up the trolly movement or make a reflector fall - but when he touched his nose, they okayed the shot. The fee was Rs 100 per retake. On a good day, the light boys returned from the day's shooting richer by Rs 2,000.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

Like Sanjeev, Dharmendra rarely turned mean with alcohol. In fact, he became more affectionate and child-like. He caused a few delays and some chaos but was never difficult. Quite the opposite, in fact. The climax shot required him to throw the counterfeit coin - which Jai used to arrive at decisions - in anger and sorrow after Jai's death. Production had made six conterfeit double-headed coins for retakes. But in that rocky terrain, once a coin was thrown it was almost impossible to retrieve it. Dharmendra was a little tipsy, and it became apparent that he might require more than six retakes. Khalish, growing more nervous by the minute, quickly collected as many twenty-five paise coins as he could find. He asked Dharmendra to be careful. For the long shots Khalish would hand Dharmendra the twenty-five-paise coins, and for the close ups, the special double-headed ones. Dharmendra was all co-operation, and the shot was canned with one counterfeit coin to spare.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

All this passion wasn't Dharmendra's fault, really. As Hema says, 'It was such a beautifull atmosphere that everyone was in love... even the old camera man.' Pran, whom was in Bangalore for another shoot, had introduced Divecha to a local girl. She was seventeen. Divecha, in his mid-fifties, fell hopelessly in love. But it wasn't the typical film-industry 'it-doesn't-count-on-location' fling. Despite extreme stress on the home front, Divecha remained commited to the girl till he died in 1978.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

The hardest part was the editing for the final cut. Ramesh spent hours sitting at the editing table with his editor, Madhav Rao Shinde, affectionately called Dada. Shinde had a gargantuan task. Salim-Javed's script was brilliant, and so many of the cuts were suggested by the script itself, but the film was simply too long. Ramesh had exposed over 300,000 feet of negative. It had to be whittled down to less than 20,000 feet. Shinde had edited all of Ramesh's films and by now had an instinctive feel for what Ramesh wanted. But he had never had so much material to work with.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

Entire sequences ended up on the Film Center Floor. Among the best that didn't make it was a comedy sequence that preceded the Soorma Bhopali section. Maruti, a popular comedian of the day, played a dhaba owner in it. Veeru and Jai eat at the dhaba, gargle and spit vigorously, and have a fight with Maruti when he objects to their doing quli in his premises. Mushtaq Merchant playing an eccentric Parsi gentleman had a scene in which Veeru and Jai steal his motorcycle. He was reduced to a figure ebbing into the horizon just before the 'Yeh Dosti' song.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

Saachin's death scene was also cut. Shinde kept the brutal lines of dialogue out, slicing from Gabbar killing an ant to the horse carrying Ahmed's dead body into the village. The edit fit with the overall tone of the film, in which violance is more often suggested than seen. The audience never sees Thakur's arms being hacked off. Like the cut from Gabbar raising the sword to an armless Thakur, Ahmed's unseen death had far greater impact. 'Sholay' was finally ready in July 1975. Two and a half years labour lay spooled in tins. Looking at the film, Ramesh thought he had turned the curve, that the hardest part was behind him. He did not know that the battle had just begun. Gabbar dies in 'Sholay' Or at least does in the original 'Sholay' that Ramesh had shot, Salim-Javed had written. The Thakur kills Gabbar with his feet, wearing shoes that the servant Ramlal has fashioned with nails fitted in the soles. The armless Thakur first crushes Gabbar's arms. Then they stand face to face, two armless warriors, two equals. And then the Thakur pounds Gabbar to death as if he were a venomous snake; he does not stop till the dacoit is a bloody mess under his shoes. Then he breaks down and cries. He weeps long and hard: his life's mission is complete, but all he feels is a vast emptiness. It is a apyrrhic victory. Revenge begets loss.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

YEH DOSTI HUM NAHIN:

ye dostee hum naheen todenge, todenge dam magar teraa saath naa chhodenge

meree jeet teree jeet teree haar meree haar, sun aye mere yaar
teraa gam meraa gam meree jaan teree jaan ayesaa apanaa pyaar
jaan pe bhee khelenge, tere liye le lenge, sab se dushmanee

logon ko aate hai, do najar hum magar, dekho do nahee
ho judaa, yaa khafaa, aye khudaa, hain duwaan, ayesaa ho nahee
khaanaa peenaa saath hai, maranaa jeenaa saath hai, saaree jindagee



THE VIDEO: YEH DOSTI HUM NAHIN:

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"


THE LADY OF THE LAMPS: JAYA B:

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

The Central Board of Film Censors hated this ending. The board objected to the suggestion that a police officer - even one who was no longer in service - would take the law into his own hands and commit a murder. They also objected to the film's balletic violence. It wasn't graphic, but it was so finely choreographed that it had far greater impact than actual gore. The audience wouldn't see Thakur's arms being chopped off, but the visual cut from Gabbar raising the sword to the Thakur standing with his empty shirt sleeves flapping in the wind was unforgettable. Ramesh had made violence aesthetic and attractive. If passed, 'Sholay' would open the floodgates for lesser filmmakers. There would be cuts in 'Sholay.' But first, the Sippy's would have to change the end.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

Ramesh was incensed. It was almost as though he was being penalized for being talented. Every nuance in the film had been carefully considered and crafted. Not a frame was superfluous. The board wasn't just asking for cuts, it was asking for a totally different conclusion - an ending that would have the police intervening at the crucial moment to prevent the Thakur from killing Gabbar. It seemed like a parody of what had been done in a hundred other films. It had none of the bleakness or tragedy of the original. With a conclusion so feeble, 'Sholay' would no longer be Ramesh's vision. It would become another film altogether.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

In the resolutely repressive environment of the Emergency, fundamental rights did not exist. Neither did artistic freedom. Compromise wasn't a choice, it was the only option. But Ramesh was adamant. He hadn't toiled for two years to cop out now. He wasn't going to change the end. Ramesh tried to reason with the members of the Board, pointing out to them the flaws in their own argument. But the Board would not budge. Increasingly frustrated, Ramesh did something most uncharacteristic of him - he raised his voice.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

The Sippy's called on every connection they had. G.P Sippy was a resourceful man with considerable clout. He worked the phone for hours, arranging high-powered meetings. Anyone who might have influenced the Board got a call. Father and son also had bitter rows. Ramesh argued as an artist who was watching his work being mauled, and G.P as a realist who knew that compromise was inevitable. At one point, Ramesh even considered taking his name off the film. But eventually the producer prevailed. G.P explained ground reality to Ramesh: If they were stubborn, the film woudn't get released. Being a lawer himself, he knew better than anyone else the futility of going to court. In an Emergency they had no rights. And at the of end three years of production, they had very little money. They couldn't afford to take the higher ground.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

The release date had been fixed for 15 August 1975. As was the practice then, Ploydor had released the music two months earlier. In a extraordinary display of comfidence, they had released 30,000 records, double the usual film launch. They had also offered the dealers a special scheme. At the end of the year, dealers could traditionally return 7.5 per cent of the goods that they had not managed to sell. Polydor told the dealers: Take as many records of 'Sholay' as you want, but return the unsold ones before the film's release. After the release, if the music ran and dealers wanted records they would have to pay more. Any delay in release would adversely affect Polydor's business. There really was no option; Ramesh would have to re-shoot the end.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

It was a Herculean task. It was already July 20. Within the following week the ending would have to be re-shot and re-dubbed, the background music redone and remixed in London, and the film printed for release. The cast was hastily summoned. Sanjeev Kumar was attending a film festival in the Soviet Union. He flew to India immediately. For two days, the cast and crew assenbled in Ramanagaram. It seemed like old times again. They were back amidst the giant boulders, in the harsh sunlight, all commited as before to the ambitious project that had brought them together.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

With the cuts implemented and the new ending inserted, the Board of Film Censors was satisfied, and the final 70mm prints were then made in London. The negative for the 35mm was brought back to Mumbai and printed at Film Centre. And so 'Sholay' was ready for release-a weaker version of 'Sholay', with a new, lesser ending.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

But apparently, somewhere in the world, rumoured to be impossible to trace now, a few prints survive of the original, untouched film, with all its final bleakness intact. Occasionally, videotapes and dvds of the original film surface, copied from copies of copies. Those who have seen these nth-generation copies say that despite the fuzziness and the bad sound, the Thakur's hopeless weeping is chilling, and it becomes clear to the viewer that all the visceral of power and violance lead inevitably to this agony, this loss. In those long-ago days of the seventies, this was the moral vision that Ramesh Sippy and Salim-Javed tried to bring to the Indian viewer. Due to the wisdom of our censors, what we got instead was an easy pabulum about the virtues of following the law, and a film that least in part had an aesthetic clumsiness forced into it.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

'Sholay' flopped. The critics were harsh, the performance at the box-office was mixed, and the industry, waiting for the smallest hint to knock the mega project of the brash young director, was merciless. For the first time since Salim-Javed narrated the four-line idea two and half years ago, Ramesh panicked. The weeks leading up to the release had been a blur. Ramesh was bug-eyed from lack of sleep. The climax re-shot and re-mix had increased the birth pangs ten-fold. Prints and negatives were flying between Mumbai and London. There was no time to savour the finished product. Meanwhile the hype had assumed a life of its own. The trade could talk of little else. Every day there was a new rumour: the film was being offered an 'Adults only' certificate; the censor board wanted further cuts; the 70mm prints were not ready, so the Sippy's postponing the release date... and on and on. A column in 'Trade Guide', the industry trade magazine, wrote: 'Wherever we went, we heard nothing but 'Sholay'... sometimes we also thought we would get allergic to it. Everyone wanted to see nothing but 'Sholay.' Many people in the industry preffered to discuss 'Sholay' to their own film.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"


Amit and Dharam rolocking in
YEH DOSTI HUM NAHIN:

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"




HOLI KI DIN ENACTED IN THE DEN OF GABBAR SINGH:

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"



Helen provided us with that 'wicked' dance that almost did not make the cut
One can actually see the dust flying in the air, as Helen gyrates in
MEHBOOBA OH MEHBOOBA:

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

Our thanks goes out to Monono for giving us these wonderful shots:

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

VIDEO: SUBTITLED VERSION OF MEHBOOBA OH MEHBOOBA:

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

Minerva, on Mumbai's Lamington Road, had been selected as 'Sholay's main theatre. Minerva was known by its tag line: 'The pride of Maharashtra.' It was the only theatre at the time with a screen big enough for 70mm and six-track sound, and with 1500 seats it was also the largest cinema in the country. The theatre was dressed up like a bride for the release. Outside stood 30-foot cutouts of the star cast: Dharmendra, Amitabh, Sanjeev, Hema, Jaya and, of course, Amjad Khan. Inside were rows of photographs from the film, and garlands of flowers.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

The premiere night was a glittering affair. On 14 August, two premieres were held simultaneously, one at Minerva and one at Excelsior. For the cast and crew, it felt like life had come full circle. It was pouring outside, just as it had been on the first day of the shoot, and Jaya was glowing again - this time pregnant with Abhishek. The industry's top names, all spiffed up and shiny, walked into Minerva to see what the fuss was about. But there was a problem - the 70mm print hadn't arrived yet. It was still stuck at the customs.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

The 70mm saga was a plot worthy of Salim-Javed. A senior bureaucrat in the finance ministry had declared war on the Sippy's. Since a large part of the post-production work was done in London, several permissions were sought. The bureaucrat felt he hadn't been given adequate importance and was still simmering. He decided to use every ploy to throw 'Sholay'off track.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

When the unit went to London, he wrote to the Indian High Commission there to keep close tabs on them. The Commission obliged. When the 70mm print came out, Ramesh decided to have a screening for friends and family. It was fixed for 10 one morning at the Odeon at Marble Arch. Ramesh also rang up the High Commissioner. 'But how,' said a senior secretary at the commission, 'can you have a screening? You don't have permission for that. Your contract says materials must go straight from Technicolour to India.' Then suddenly the secretary changed track: 'Okay, we'll come.' Ramesh had an intuition that all wasn't well and at the last minute cancelled the screening. It was fortunate. Because at exactly 9:50, people from the High Commission turned up to seize the print. Orders were sent out to stall the Sippy's at every level. When Ramesh landed in Mumbai, he was stripped searched. When even that didn't produce anything, the bureaucrat simply told the custom officials not to clear the print. On the morning of 14 August the prints were still lying in tins at the customs.

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YESTERYEAR CINEMA: "SHOLAY"

G.P Sippy, never a man to take a beating lying down, went into action. He organized a high-level meeting. Attending on G.P's terrace were Rajni Patel, a noted lawer and a close confidant of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, and V.C Shukla, minister for Information and Broadcasting, who was also the chief guest at the premiere. Shukla simply called Delhi and blasted into the bureaucrat: 'What are you trying to do? Tell them to release the prints now.' The bureaucrat, taken aback by the reach of the Sippy's, mumbled a quick 'Yes sir.' But he managed to delay the prints by a few more hours. By the evening they still hadn't reached the theatre, so 'Sholay's premiere audience saw a 35mm print.

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