Salim-Javed : Learn from good and bad of Formula Kings!
In the commercial hindi cinema Salim-Javed have been termed as most successful writers of story, screen play and dialogues. They were best or not or they produced best products or not this is another question but undoubtedly they ruled the box office for some 10 years after the release and success of their first film “Hathi Mere Saathi”. They charged hefty amount and its said that often their fees defeated the fees of leading actors in their films and it was unheard in hindi cinema before because writers never got much money there.
Good or bad but perhaps they ushered hindi cine writers in to the professionalism. They wrote scenes which appealed to audience of that time and some of films written by them still have capability to fetch the attention and attraction of the audience. Its not less worthy that inspite of weak points in their written scripts, when visuals based on those scripts passed through the eyes of audience they loved them.
They picked up characters from real life and made them more dramatic and visually effective. For example, character of Soorma Bhopali in Sholay or several other characters in Sholay who had small role but still audience never could forget them. Analysis of their work may help writers of present era so that they match with the good of Salim-Javed’s writings and modify their weaknesses so that can write better films.
Good thing in their work is quite visible through their films. One can watch again and again to enjoy these old blockbusters.
They associated their characters with the mood of the people and affairs of their lives and exaggerated their emotions and this worked well with the audience. In their 2.5-3 hours dramas, audience could swing high and low depending on the mood of the events in their films. If they played with the emotions of the audience then they did not leave them with orphaned feelings in the end rather they hardly kept their films as open ended. It was always story which had an end. If emotions were inflated during the film then in the end they got emotional appeasement also when hero either was shown beating the villain or killing the villain.
They showed that
“Cinema inspired by old films, is not always bad”.
They proved it in Deewar and to some extent in Sholay also where they kept scenes inspired by some great films of the world.
They picked up the original angry young man’s character “Birju” played by Sunil Datt in Mother India and refined this character and created Vijay, who fulfilled the emotional dissatisfaction of the audience from the system. Rather they encashed the character of Karna in Mahabharata and often their lead character was either illegitimate son or an orphan.
Deewar(1975) = Mother India(1957) + Ganga Jamuna(1961)
Mother India : [itself was remake of Aurat(1940). Mehboob, refined his own old film Aurat and made a classic Mother India]
Oppressive and cunning landlord, Kanhaiya Lal forces Raaj Kumar to surrender his mortgaged land. Raaj Kumar has to plough, later, a barren land, which is full of stones and rocks. Accident happens and he loses his hands. He has lost self confidence and he does not like to be dependent on anyone. Though his wife Nargis tries to console him but he has lost self esteem and thus leaves the house in the darkness of night and disappears. Now Nargis has to raise her children on her own.
One son is rebellious since childhood and does not like when he is teased because of his father or family conditions. He throw stones on the landlord when later tries to insult his mother. This rebellious son of Nargis, keeps alive his spirit till end. He helps his mother so that sober brother can have proper education. But he is unable to bear the oppressions of land lord and after getting scolding from his mother he leaves the village and becomes bandit. Other brother is good son of his mother and supports good works. Mother warns his rebellious son who has become bandit and in the end kills him
* * * *
Ganga Jamuna(1961)
Like MI, One brother, Dilip Kumar, sacrifices his childhood and starts working at early age so that his younger brother, Nasir Khan, can study. Nasir Khan, after some initial difficulties in getting employment, is selected in police department and becomes police Inspector.
Dilip Kumar, who is left in village, becomes rebellion because of the tyrant landlord. Honest police Inspector, Nasir Khan, advices him to surrender but he cant and in the end he is killed.
Deewar (1975)
Satyen Kappu fights against the corrupt Mill owners. Farmers in village Backdrop (Mother India), are replaced with the labourers in city. Satyen Kappu’s wife and children are kidnapped and his hands (power of a Union leader) are virtually chopped off (AB’s hands are inscribed with line that his father is a thief! another symbolic thing).
Satyen Kappu’s image of honest union leader is lost and he also has lost self confidence and self esteem. Though Nirupa Rai consoles him but he does not bear his tarnished image and leaves the hospital and disappears.
One son is rebellious since childhood and incidence where people had inscribed on his hand that his father was a thief, never left him with peace. He stones the incharge of labourers, because he abused his mother. He helps his mother in work so that his brother can have proper education.
One brother does not bear giving his hard earned money to hooligans and he rebels and later joins the gang of a Smuggler. Other brother remains a good son of their mother
Mother warns her rebellious son and leaves him alone. Here not mother but honest police officer brother kills him
* * * *
Now all the above mentioned three Hindi films have been very successful and respectful films for the audience.
Deewar’s story and screen play is heavily inspired by Mother India and Ganga Jamuna but it has many different and additional twists also which make it as an interesting film to watch. For example, it was said that it is loosely based on the life of yester years smuggler Haji Mastan. He was also a coolie on the harbour and he became later a powerful smuggler. Amitabh’s character, Vijay also works on the harbour and later becomes a smuggler. Deewar has a continuous flow in the story and events happen with fast pace.
——-
Shakti(1982) It also has shades of Mughal-i.Azam and Mother India and Ganga Jamuna.
* * * *
Weaknesses:
Cinema in India has become a part of life of the people. Unlike Kids of 40s, 50s and even 60s, fortunate kids of 70s and 80s tasted films like they tasted Mugli Ghutti 555 and after becoming adult they have taken place of a regular audience of the films. TV enhanced their viewing and understanding about cinema. Its not necessary that what appealed to them in childhood in totality will appeal now also after watching so many films.
Storywise Salim-Javed could be blamed for developing formula type stories and they often repeated their own scenes in so many films. They often repeated their own scenes in many of their films.
And for new generation of writers, its must to see the weaknesses in the scripts created by Salim-Javed because that can make a path toward successful and quality oriented cinema which can have mass appeal also.
Sholay :
If someone is writing a story like Sholay then first s/he will take care of the angle that Thakur’s hands are chopped off completely from the shoulders and it looks objectionable and even pathetic to see and believe that such a person can be involved in the fight scenes himself. It can be handled in more refined way so that it looks more genuine.
Next time one writes a script then s/he should not show that in 2nd Scene between Basanti and Veeru, Basanti is going to pluck the mangoes from the trees and in scene 4th they are celebrating Holi. Mango is a crop of summer and Holi falls in March and between them there is big gap of 9 months and in that duration Basanti could have produced Veeru Jr if both were married in the Mango season. Though these two events are shown as almost two successive event happened in a narrow time segment.
New writer should see that a high water tank is not present in a village where electricity is not available yet. Veeru could have used any other high building for that Sharabi act but not a water tank. Or show atleast in one scene that village has electricity and only when its supply is failured, only then Radha or any other person use oil lamps in the night as it happens in real villages.
Rest many points are discussed in the post related to Sholay. http://passionforcinema.com/sholay-anything-you-wish-to-change/
Deewar:
Salim-Javed seemed to be obsessed with the idea of using flash back in their screen plays and its used in so many of their films and often its used in bad manners.
Deewar starts with the scene where ManMohan Krishna announces that Inspector Ravi Verma has to be given an award for his devotion and responsible services towards police deptt. Ravi Verma(Shashi Kapoor) goes to the stage and mentions that his mother deserves this medal and he calls her on stage and then Nirupa Rai, mother of Shashi Kapoor reaches at stage and goes back in flash back and we see whole story of Vijay. In the end, scene comes back to the stage and Nirupa Rai comes back in to the present.
Now events of 2.5-3 hours shown in the film are shown through her memory. She is remembering them that’s why we the audience get to know what was happened. This is so objectionable approach.
(1) First how she can do it in a felicitation programme and above this she is not reciting the story of Vijay to all but she is thinking.
(2) She was not present in many of the events happened in the life of Vijay so its bit stupid to show the film through the eyes of Nirupa Rai. And above this film shows Amitabh and Parveen Bobby, lying in the bed perhaps after making love.
Why writers could not remove their obsession of using flash back in their story is a mystery. Deewar could have been more sleek product in linear presentation.Whats the problem in showing film in linear way and in present era? Why it has to be a memoir always and that too remembered by some other who was not present on the spot where events happened and later the main character dies so who has told those events to this character who is either telling the whole story or recalling the whole story.
Salim Javed repeated same mistake of using flashback mode in wrong manner in Shakti again. Here Grandfather Dilip Kumar delivers whole story before grandson Anil Kapoor. Now again how Dilip Kumar knows minute details of the life of Amitabh Bachchan when later was away from the eyes of former? And again love making scene of Amitabh and Smita Patil. Is a grandfather telling this visual scene to his grandson?
Obviously Salim-Javed handled flash back scenes in weak manner and their stories could have been better if they had selected linear way of story telling. Either flash back matter was a slip for them or they took forgranted Audience’s sensibility and understanding.
This flash back problem is still existing in hindi films and perhaps this disease has affected most of the filmmakers. Its time to refine this art.
Analysis of old works helps in refining the art. Salim Javed refined mistakes done in the films by their predecessors and now its duty of their successors to refine the mistakes done by Salim-Javed. They contributed to hindi cinema in their manner and hindi cinema will always remember them as an integral part of its journey but Hindi cinema has to further go ahead so its must to analyse the old works. New writers can learn a lot for the good and bad of works done by Salim Javed. They developed art to make their scenes more powerful but often continuity was lost in their screen plays and if their bad elements are searched and refined then their good elements can again make nice screen plays to make good and successful cinema.
Tags: Dialogues
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Another Salim-Javed script
Seeta Aur Geeta = 1/Ram Aur Shyam.
ie: the female version of Ram Aur Shyam.
Later Ram Aur Shyam was remaide as Kishen Kanhaiya and Seeta Aur Geeta as Chaalbaaz.
Yaadon ki Baarat was also similar to Waqt, Pyar Ka Mausam, etc.
There some nearly forgotten films of Salim-Javed like haath Ki Safai and Chacha Batija.
Justin: you are right. Sita aur Gita was a remake of Ram or Shyam with changed genders and though Chalbaaz has nothing to do with Salim-Javed but all three films bring very good entertainment. Thanks to full dose of comedy involved in these films.
Yadon ki Barat has more effect of Zanzeer where Child AB witnesses Ajit killing his parents and keep remembering it through some special thing Ajit used to wear. In YKB also child Dharmendra witnesses killing of his parents and remembers that Ajit wears two different sized shoes in his feet. Lost and found brother formula, albeit matches with Vaqt.
Chacha Bhatija was a good comedy film. But story wise Hath ki safai was again lost and found brother story. and it wasted a actress like Simi Grewal in the role of wife of Vinod Khanna.
This is true SalimJaved, repeated their own stories and plots and scenes again and again and often with improvement. and this is also true that their writing was initiated with some inspiration from some already existed source. so originality is not seen in their work rather improvisation.
Much of Sholay was derived from Raj Khosla’s 1971 film “Mera Gaon Mera Desh”. i.e. Vinod Khanna played Jabbar Singh who became Gabbar Singh. Jayant (Amjad Khan’s father) played Jaswant Singh, who became Thakur Baldev Singh. Dharmendra played the hero. Tons of similarities. What made Sholay such a great film was what each performer brought to their characters and Sippy’s brilliant direction, and of course, Salim-Javed’s killer dialogues. No writer in Indian cinema has ever written dialog like them.
Yeah I’ve always found that Sholay was quite similar to MGMD… MGMD was more “hardcore” whereas Sholay was more of an all-round entertainer.
What would you guys say is Salim-Javed’s best script? Off the top of my head I’d say “Trishul”…
I had asked a scriptwriter to name some scriptwriters before the 80’s.
The only name came was Salim-Javed. He thought for a long time. Still he could not get any other names.
The only other name that came in my mind was Sachin Bhowmick. He has given more number of successful films than Salim-Javed. His latest film is Krrish. But even he is not as famous as Salim-Javed.
Salim-Javed were and are the most famous, but not the best, scrptwriters in Indian Cinema.
Yeah, not the best for sure. The most popular, and we know how that debate functions.
Gulzar-saab is my personable best in terms of a screenplay/dialogue writer. The man wrote some of Hrishida’s best films (Anand, Chupke Chupke, Namak Haram) as well as his own brilliant films (Angoor, Aandhi, Mere Apne, Khushboo, Parichay, Koshish, Maachis, Lekin).
As much as I am a certified S-J fan, really you can’t even compare the level of writing with that of Gulzar-saab. Hands down the best.
Hrishikesh Mukherjee himself had written gems like Bawarchi and Abhimaan, although as far as I know he didn’t write too many films.
In terms of dialog and story, I rate Deewaar as Salim-Javed’s best. And of course I LOVE their last film together – MR. INDIA!
Great!
I always wondered why S-J are considered the demigods of Scriptwriting. They always stuck with a formula.
Vijay: Sholay is a complete package as a film.
All human rasas are there. Screen Play has given full space to almost every main character to show its shade. Tragedy, comedy, violence, romance everthing was intermingled in the screen play and audience got to see all in a single film. Film is not monotonous in its mood and thats the biggest beauty.
and none of the actor missed the opportunity. Its a phantasy film but from which audience could bring back the dialogues to have fun with each other. and then presentation of the film. That signature tune for the Gabbar Singh’s presence on the screen. Does not matter if this idea was taken from G,B and Ugly. RDB did fantastic job. Music. Cinematography and 70 MM’s magic.:)
Yes MGMD can also inspire Sholay. That is independently a beautiful film. I never could forget Vinod Khanna after watching him with his turben and that black Tilak on his forehead and those piercing eyes filled with rage. A wonderful film.:)
Thanks for reving its memorries:d
Tony, Gattu: If its not odd, I would like to see it as :
Salim-Javed and their films are good for every kind of audience, those who would love to whistle or even dance inside the cinema hall. One can be intriduced to hindi films through their films and some of their films, one always can enjoy, but they are in minority. Many of their films are dead if you watch them three times in a month as they dont have subtlity flowing under the main plots. Its all very obvious there.They are like quite popular songs of Kishor Kumar. they can rejuvenate your mood but when you wish to listen something deeper then you have to search rare gems of Kishor Kumar which are not so popular and sadly Salim Javed never went in that category. They used their energies for sake of Box office only.
Those who are habitual of Menhdi Hasan can only occasionally listen, Pankaj Udhas. he is there at the entry gate but once your ears are well versed in listening and understanding of music is developed then its difficult to keep going your passion because then this sense that time is wasted in listening this kind of music comes. We automatically search for something better.
And when one is fully knowing the hindi cinema then he is not satisfied with regular watching ofn their films and then hunger for variety and bit higher handling can ask for Gulzar’s films like Mausam, Aandhi etc because they are not packages. He has a consistent story to tell and powerful scenes are not woven to make a film.
Those who have taken education in watching hindi cinema, may not always be satisfied with Salim Javed’s cinema. Their cinema is mood changer but not that cinema which brings you satisfaction which you can get from a wonderful book.that capacity lies in Gulzar’s few films.nazakat or feminism is lost in Salim Javed’s cinema. It will be very difficult for Salim Javed to write screen play for The Alchemist, here Gulzar can do good.
Though Javed saab can write beautiful songs for a film based on Zahir. Though if someone will go to Salim Javed to adapt Sheldon then they will do a good job. In prose Salim Javed have not explored much, so their work is analysed on that basis only. Means we dont know if they could have done better as no example is there where they tried any film which can compare with a good book consisting good literature. They are McD’s Burger (good sell) while Gulzar Saab’s is Dal Bati, takes time in prepration and even we dont get it often to eat but when we eat then we enjoy it completely and keep in memory for long time.
Justin: Surely there have been many other screen play and story writers who gave many successful films. Major thing is this that Salim Javed’s era’s hero Amitabh Bachchan is still active in films and his films are seen again and again so that makes alive the status of Salim-Javed also as screenplay writers.
When fame is the question Every new star is compared with the popularity of Amitabh Bachchan and when he comes in to the picture then his super hit films come forward and then names of ManMohan Desai, Prakash Mehra, Ramesh Sippy, Yash Chopra and Salim Javed pop up.
and Javed Saab himself is so active in song writing and wins several awards every year and his songs have been so popular in recent years so everything contribute. Gulzar saab can also be said as popular because his songs are popular and thus mention of of his old films occur.
Others might have given successful films but either they are not active now or their fame is hided behind the fame of directors and actors. Salim Javed stressed that their name will go on posters as written by Salim Javed and that makes a difference.
I think the other reason why, as far as hindi screenplay writers of the 70’s are concerned, we remember names like Salim-Javed, Gulzar-saab and Sachin Bowmick is because they have the largest bodies of (popular) work. There are other good writers but most of them have only written 1 or 2 great films. Like Asit Sen (the great actor/director) had written the classic film “Safar”. But as far as writing goes it was his only work of prominence.
The best thing to do is think of a film of that time you really enjoyed and look it up on IMDB.com. Then search the writers name and see what else they’ve done. I did that and the results really put things in perspective.
Speaking of Sholay, I think many people consider it a remake of Sergio Leone’s “The Good The Bad and The Ugly” but its not. That film was about three seperate characters who each have clues about the location of a gold treasure buried in a graveyard. They have to collaborate to get the treasure, but none of them really want to share it.
“Sholay” was essentially a version of “The Seven Samurai” and “The Magnificant Seven”, but of course rather than the villagers finding 7 men to protect them from the bandits, the Thakur finds 2 who also happened to the best of friends. In that respect Sholay is quite innovative. It borrows slightly from Sergio Leone’ spaghetti westerns like “The, The Bad and the Ugly”, “A Fistfull of Dollars” and even “For a Few Dollars More” but the essence and basic plot is Seven Samurai.
Another interesting desi-derivative of “The Seven Samurai” is Dulal Guha’s “Pratigya” (Dharmendra, Hema Malini”, where an outsider comes to the village (once again terrorized by a group of bandits) and teaches the villagers how to defend themselves, in essence forming an army to fight them off.
Of course Rajkumar Santoshi’s “China Gate” is another faithful version.
Tony: Sholay’s presentation might have inspiration from many films but thats a natural phenomenon. what we see in past influence us. Most striking similarity between Sholay and G,B, and Ugly is the signature tune. Both the films have a killing tune which, if played all of sudden in a super market or crowded place with high voltage audio system, will compel everybody to stop whatever they are doing to listen that sound.Such is the effect of that tune.
Re: Between The Seven Samurai and China Gate, “Khotey Sikke” of Firoz Khan is also lying.:)
Tony:
Sometimes its difficult in hindi films to know who has written what. Rang De Basanti’s story is credited to Kamal Pande and screen play is shared by Renzil D Silva and Rakesh Mehra.
and sometimes we see writers of Additional dialogues.
and sometimes only story and dialogue writer.
and in that scenario one man who decorated Amitabh Bachchan’s career is Kadar Khan. Other than Salim Javed, he should be credited to provide him the dialogues to his characters in many hit films. A wonderful writer, though got less fame than Salim Javed but he has many hit films in his kitty. Till Agneepath and Indrajeet he wrote dialogues for Amitabh.
Just curious…In the Sholay universe, Ramgarh had no electricity – hence Jaya lighting all those various lamps – and hence some brilliant cinematography….Well, remember the Water Tank Drunken Scene? Well, no power, no pumps, way too high tank. How?
sorry, sorry dude….wrong comment
Amborish: I quoted this example only in this post.
Script writers and directors missed this point that they should not have shown that big and high water tank in a village which has no electricity.
Dharmendra could have used any high building or place to do that drunken scene.
Yaar maybe that night “Thakur ke ghar light chali gayi thi”…lol…
Haan RK I agree with you there. In fact I often wonder how much of his films were written by Hrishida himself (you often see his name under story or as one of the screenplay writers). Same goes with others.
Oh yeah man Kadar Khan rocks! Was always a fan of his acting (how versatile was he?? Was there anything this man could not do??) To top it off the guy wrote killer dialogues. If there was a Hindi cinema “Hall of Fame”, there’s a surefire inductee…
Tony: Yes
Kader Khan is equally responsible for Amitabh Bachchan’s career as Salim Javed, ManMohan Desai, Prakahs Mehra, Ramesh Sippy, Yash Chopra and many other directors and Amitabh’s talent.
Kader Khan is responsible for Jeetendra’s high flying career in 80s.
His talent is multi facted and his dialogues have been wonderful. He has a knack for comedy ( his written dialogues as well as his own performance)
Such was his terror in 80s that its said Jeetendra had put restrictions in his films that either Kader Khan will write his films or will act because Kader Khan used to steal the shows.
When he said,” Tum hamara ye nahin karoge to hum tumhara wo kar denge” (If you dont do this for us we will do that for you)kinda dialogues written by himself gave him an edge over other actors in his films.
Yes he has some blots on his writing career for writing some double meaning dialogues for films like Maqsad.
But his pen works wonderfully in comedy and revolution based scripts. He has firebrand writing. and even he did not spare Dharmendra in a James Bond kind of film Shalimar and provided him dialogues dealing with Riches and poors.:)