Musings on Guru Dutt’s Pyaasa

The Story

The plot of Pyaasa though unique, lends heavily from two sources. One which is quite evident is Saratchandra Chatterji’s Devdas and the other is the story of Jesus Christ.

 

Pyaasa (1957)

When I first saw Pyaasa, I must have been eleven or twelve years old. Well, in fact, I didn’t get to watch it because 1. I had a exam the next day, 2. I had a splitting headache. The end result was I couldn’t watch the film, except for a few glimpses from behind the curtain, I didn’t learn, my headache didn’t get cured. Huge failure on all fronts! When I was 19 or so it was aired again on DD at midnight or something. This time I could watch it and I was floored!

 

Mr. & Mrs. 55 (1955)

It is so hard to decide if I like this film or not. The story is anti-feminist and traditionalist. But at the same time the director/story-writer’s take on “upper-class liberal reformers who seek to impose their ideology on society at large”, as Philip Lutgendorf  puts it, in the form of Abrar Alvi’s witty dialogues are simply great. It is simply difficult to have a single opinion on this movie. Dustedoff  has also provided a nice review of this movie on her blog.