Guru Dutt and his movies

 It is a leaden gray Saturday evening, raining dense into the night. I am stuck on Guru Dutt. Pyaasa (Thirst/Yearning) rests heavy on my mind, Kaagaz ke Phool (Paper Flowers) is not light as the title means, although this must be the second or third time I am watching these films, but years and life had happened in between.

I scour the internet and read or watch every single piece on Guru Dutt, one of India's legendary directors/actors. I read about his friendship with Dev Anand, I leaf through the chapters of his life with his wife and the singer who lend her voice to the songs in several of his movies - Geeta Dutt nee Roy Chaudhary, his team of creative minds who got together in every film of his - cinematographer V.K.Murthy, director/writer Abrar Alvi, his muse, actress Waheeda Rehman, actors Johnny Walker, Rehman. I find that he lost a ton of money on Kaagaz ke Phool - India's first cinemascope which was a movie he directed to showcase the talents of his cinematographer friend Murthy. How he recouped his losses with Chaudvin ka Chaand. 

The more I read or watch interviews I realize how much Guru Dutt is the poster boy for the temperamental, mercurial artist. For a mind in such constant state of disquiet, who brought his emotions and life translated raw into cinematic medium (referring to Kaagaz ke Phool & Pyaasa), it seems almost unlikely that he would exit through a natural death. Of course he didn't. I read about his last evening with his brother, Abrar Alvi and Shakti Samantha before he committed suicide or had an accidental overdose of sleeping pills and alcohol. He was 39.

Film schools all over the world teach Pyaasa and Kaagaz ke Phool to the students of world cinema. Kaagaz ke phool is a movie about the world of movies. Its camera is turned inward on a director down on his luck played by Guru Dutt himself. Although now regarded as a classic of Indian cinema, Guru Dutt stopped directing movies and confined himself to production and acting after the failure of Kaagaz ke Phool at the box office. 

Much has been analyzed and written about Guru Dutt's body of work. He would make three or four movies that would appeal to the public and keep the counters ringing before plunging deep into his pet project, like Pyaasa or Kaagaz ke Phool. Guru Dutt the artist, the director, seem to have a real serious case of melancholia, so much so that Dev Anand once remarked after Guru Dutt's passing that Guru Dutt was a young man, he should have made happy films instead of stories about depressed people.

This is the only footage of Guru Dutt in color, the famous song from the movie of the same name, Chaudvin ka Chaand