Madhumati
Madhumati is a 1958 Indian Hindi-language paranormal romance film directed and produced by Bimal Roy, story and screenplay written by Ritwik Ghatak. The film stars Vyjayanthimala and Dilip Kumar in lead roles, with Pran and Johnny Walker in supporting roles. The plot focuses on Anand, a modern man who falls in love with a tribal woman named Madhumati. But they face challenges in their relationship finally leading to a paranormal consequence. The film was ranked 11th in the Outlook Magazine's 25 leading Indian directors' poll for selecting Bollywood's greatest films in 2003.
Madhumati was filmed in various Indian locations, including Ranikhet, Ghorakhal, Vaitarna Dam and Aarey Milk Colony. The soundtrack album was composed by Salil Chowdhury and the lyrics were written by Shailendra. The film was released on 12 September 1958. It earned ₹40 million in India and became the highest-grossing Indian film of the year, and one of the most commercially successful and influential Indian films of its time.
Madhumati was one of the earliest films to deal with reincarnation, and was described by analysts as a potboiler that has a gothic and noir feel to it. It inspired later regional and international films that have reincarnation-based themes. It led the 6th Filmfare Awards with 12 nominations and won 9 awards including Best Film, Best Director for Roy, Best Music Director for Chaudhary, Best Female Playback Singer for Mangeshkar—the most awards for a film at that time—a record that it maintained for a record 37 years. It also won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Hindi. It was remade in Malayalam as Vanadevatha.
Plot
On a stormy night, engineer Devendra drives down a hill road with his friend to fetch his wife and child from a railway station. A landslide blocks their path and they take shelter in an old mansion. Devendra finds the house eerily familiar. In the large front room, he finds an old portrait, which he recognizes. He’s joined by his friend and the old caretaker. Devendra, experiencing flashbacks of another life, sits down to tell his story while the storm rages outside.Anand is the new manager of Shyamnagar Timber Estate. An artist in his spare time, he travels to the hills and falls in love with Madhumati, a Kumaoni tribal woman whose songs have haunted him from a distance. Anand's employer, Raja Ugra Narain is a ruthless, arrogant man; Anand, who refuses to bend to his will unlike others, is on the receiving end of his wrath. Anand has enemies among his staff. After he’s sent away on an errand, he returns to find that Madhumati has disappeared. He learns that she has been taken to Ugra Narain and confronts him, but his men beat him unconscious. While taking Anand's body out of the palace, they come across Madhumati's father, who fights to stop his own daughter's death. Although he comes out on top in the fight, he dies on the road shortly after, while Charandas hides and takes Anand's body to a hospital.
Anand lives but his mind wanders. One day, he meets a woman who looks exactly like Madhumati. She introduces herself as Madhavi but Anand refuses to believe her. He tries to reason with her and is beaten by her companions. Later, Madhavi finds a sketch of Madhumati and realizes Anand was telling the truth. She takes the sketch with her and tries to learn his story. Meanwhile, Anand is haunted by the spirit of Madhumati, who tells him Ugra Narain is responsible for her death. He appeals to Madhavi, who agrees to pose as Madhumati before Ugra Narain and make him confess to her murder.
Anand returns to Ugra Narain's palace and seeks permission to paint a portrait of him the next evening. The day after, at the stroke of eight, Ugra Narain sees Madhavi posing as Madhumati in front of him. Ugra Narain is shaken; he confesses his part in her death and is arrested by police waiting outside the room. Anand realizes that the questions Madhavi posed to Ugra Narain, especially about Madhumati 's burial place, were things she could not have known; even Anand did not know. Madhavi smiles and moves towards the stairs. The real Madhavi, dressed as Madhumati, then rushes into the room. She is late because her car broke down on the way. Anand realizes he saw Madhumati's ghost and not Madhavi. He runs to the terrace, where the ghost beckons to him. Madhumati had fallen from the same terrace, trying to escape Ugra Narain. Anand follows the ghost and falls to his death.
After telling the story of Anand and Madhumati, Devendra receives news that the train on which his wife was traveling has met with an accident. The road is cleared and they rush to the station. Devendra walks through the station fearing the worst but is relieved to see his wife Radha, emerging from the train unharmed. Radha is the reincarnation of Madhumati, and Devendra informs her, based on his recent recollections, that they have been partners through several births.
Cast
- Vyjayanthimala as Madhumati/Madhavi/Radha
- Dilip Kumar as Devendra / Anand
- Johnny Walker as Charandas
- Pran as Raja Ugra Narain
- Jayant as Pawan Raja, Madhumati's father
- Ramayan Tiwari as Bir Singh
- Tarun Bose as Devendra's colleague
- Bhudo Advani as Baba
- Jagdish Raj as Police captain
Production
Roy had previously signed Vyjayanthimala and Dilip Kumar for two films. The first, Devdas, based on the eponymous novel, received much critical acclaim and a National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Hindi despite being commercially unsuccessful. Kumar and Vyjayanthimala were selected to play the lead roles in Madhumati. The former was eager to work again with Roy after their previous film Devdas and accepted the role. Vyjayanthimala agreed to work on the film after learning that Pran was a part of the cast.
Unlike another film noir, which was mostly filmed indoors, Roy decided to film Madhumati outdoors and at a hill station. It had a six-week schedule at a location in Ranikhet, Nainital. Some scenes were filmed in Ghorakhal near Nainital. When the negatives were developed, most of the footage was found to be fogged. Since a reshoot in far-away Uttarakhand was not possible, sets were created near Vaitarna Dam, Igatpuri. The art direction team, led by Sudhendu Roy, created fake pine trees, which were planted to match the location in Nainital. A large part of the film was filmed in Aarey Milk Colony, a small forested area in Mumbai. A scene in which Dilip Kumar looks for Vyjayanthimala in the woods was filmed in Igatpuri. The foggy effect was recreated using gas bombs. The costumes of the film were designed by Yadugiri Devi, Vyjayanthimala's grandmother; these were later approved by the art director Sudhendu Roy. Vyjayanthimala wore silver jewelry from her collection in the film. The actress had also hurt her foot while dancing.
Due to Madhumatis extensive outdoor shooting, the film went over budget by 8.1 million, adding to the troubles of Bimal Roy Productions, which organized a film preview and lunch for the distributors. Roy told them about the company's financial problems and that he had decided to forego 70,000 of his director's fee to make up for the loss. All of the distributors pitched in with money and made up for the deficit.
Themes
Film critics and academics have analyzed Madhumati in several ways. In the book The Woman Who Pretended to Be Who She Was: Myths of Self-Imitation, Indologist Wendy Doniger said reviewers of the late 1950s had described the film's theme as "a conventional plot, a typical Hindi ilm otboiler, in which the hero experiences a sense of déjà vu leading to his flashback of a former life". In the book Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire, Vijay Mishra states that the film has a "gothic noir" feel. According to Mishra, there is a more direct relationship between rebirth, spirits, and ghosts, which naturalizes the Indian Gothic.Analysts from the University of Iowa compare the initial meeting of the main characters, stating that it resembles the meeting in Raj Kapoor's film Ram Teri Ganga Maili, where the woman "stands in for nature and unspoiled folk tradition and the villain for exploitative culture, with the hero as an intermediary". They also write, "Anand's own egalitarian progressivism, coupled with his sympathy for Madhumati and her family, soon sets him on a collision course with the Raja, who takes revenge through a malevolent scheme".
According to Jayson Beaster-Jones and Natalie Sarrazin, Madhumati was one of the first Hindi films to use the now-common "narrative of the plain-based hero entering the mountains and being seduced by a tribal girl." Rajadhyaksha said the imagery is similar to that of the film Ajantrik, writing that Madhumati links "the beautiful Madhumati with nature and tribal cultures beyond the grasp of capitalist appropriation". Film critic Bharati Pradhan said Madhumati stepped away from "the standard Roy themes of social realism as seen in his Do Bigha Zameen, Biraj Bahu and Devdas ".
Music
The Madhumati soundtrack features 11 songs composed by Salil Chowdhury. Shailendra wrote the lyrics and Mukesh, Lata Mangeshkar, Manna Dey, Mohammed Rafi, Mubarak Begum, Asha Bhosle, Sabita Chowdhury, Ghulam Mohammed, and Dwijen Mukhopadhyay provided the vocals. The music was composed before the lyrics were written. Folk music sung in the tea gardens of Assam was used in the soundtrack and Polish folk music was used for the song "Dil Tadap Tadap Ke Keh Raha Hai", which was adapted from the 18th century Silesian song "Szla Dzieweczka do Gajeczka". The song "Aaja Re Pardesi" was adapted from the background score of Jagte Raho. Dinesh Raheja, writing for Rediff.com, said, "The music and the tonal correctness of the performances hold us in thrall".The soundtrack of Madhumati became the best-selling Hindi film soundtrack of 1958. Salil Chowdhury won his first Filmfare Award for Best Music Director. Suhana Safar Aur Yeh Mausam Haseen is one of the most popular songs by recording artist Mukesh and is regularly played at dandiya functions. Filmfare started giving the best playback singer award in this year and Lata Mangeshkar won this award for the song "Aaja re Pardesi". She thus became the first singer ever to win the Filmfare award for a playback singer since, in the beginning, there was only one award given to a playback singer, male and female singers included.