By Anup Dutta
Mumbai/Bhopal: Indian film history has never seen anything like Sholay, whose demographic was quite different. Over the last five decades, on cool, breezy evenings in several mohallahs, apartments, gallis, and village squares, people would sit at the dinner table or over a cup of coffee. Some spun stories of Sholay, others listened intently, ever since the film was released in 1975.
The class, the cast, and the context were such a triple whammy that they knocked out all else. At a crucial point, many would pause and ask, How did it all end? The making of Sholay infused the tale with its own legend. Every member of the crew has a different take to offer on what the film means to them.
The making of the film is filled with tracks and tracks of uncut stories of thrill, disappointment, love affairs, silence, and regret, all happening in slow motion. Despite his father’s (G P Sippy) cautious words, work hard, be calm, and accept the luck, young and energetic 27-year-old producer Ramesh Sippy believed in manifestation.
As the shooting progressed, part thriller, part drama, part sound, lights, and action, lie several uncut stories. And one such uncut story is of Dharam, Dharmendra, and Hema Malini. The story of the love lyrics of Basanti and Jai finds a mention in the book Hema Malini: Beyond the Dream Girl, authored by Ram Kamal Mukherjee.
“What had started as a friendly and light-hearted association as co-actors on the sets of Seeta Aur Geeta blossomed steadily into a deep and profound relationship during the making of Sholay, the biggest film of their careers and perhaps their lives,” wrote Mukherjee in his book.
The flashback blossoming love story appears persuasive and attractive, with Dharam Ji reportedly bribing the light boys to accidentally mess up shots so retakes could bring him closer to her (Hema Malini). That was the turning point. Dharam Ji’s plot, act, and script found acceptance as true love. For over four decades, the couple quietly tended that soil, with both being constant gardeners, watering each other’s emotions and luminous acceptance of each other.
On ground zero, there is a tale of quiet pain for Basanti (Hema Malini), who performed many dangerous scenes. One was where she had to ride her tonga at ferocious speed in a bid to escape dacoits ready to grab her. Basanti overcame another storm during the shooting of Jab tak hai jaan, where she is forced to dance before the staring band of dacoits outside Gabbar’s (Amjad Khan) den on serrated rocks. For the dancer Hema, the steps were easy, but not the stage.
The director wanted to shoot the song in peak summer (May) in a small place (read stage) between jagged rocks. The director’s idea was to shoot under scorching heat to capture the resonating expression of torture on Basanti’s face, spinning what true love means to her. Though plastic was predominantly used, Basanti, with blisters on her feet, danced on the actual bottle-throwing shot and ended up with a few splinters. Anyone else would have cried or complained, but Hema Malini shunned both and danced till the end, a moment that tested grit. Soon, what blossomed from the sets of Sholay made them inseparable till November 24 this year, the day Dharam Ji breathed his last.
It emerged that the journey of another couple, Radha (Jaya Bhaduri) and Jai (Amitabh Bachchan), was taken by surprise. Those were the days when Amitabh Bachchan hadn’t yet touched the towering “angry young man” success, and every move of Bachchan came with a thought to boost their careers. Perhaps this was their first assignment where the husband (Amitabh) had to take interest in his wife, playing the role of a widow.
It had been a couple of days since the shooting was in progress when one day it was brought to a sudden halt after Jaya Bachchan and Amitabh Bachchan welcomed their first child. When the shooting resumed, the Bachchans realised that the director may be young but maintained a devil-may-care attitude for every shot.
“Even a brief, poetic moment of Radha (Jaya Bhaduri) extinguishing lamps as Jai (Amitabh Bachchan) plays the harmonica spanned 20 days,” says Yasser Usman, author and columnist.
Thanks to years of delicate learning, Ramesh Sippy (27 years old then) wanted to film it exclusively during the fleeting Godhuli Bela (magic hour) between sunset and dusk.
There is no shade card on how the role of Gabbar came to Amjad Khan, who wore Army fatigues, blackened teeth, an intimidating tobacco-grinding habit, with perfect dialogue delivery of the line, “Kitne aadmi the?”
Some say that despite months of preparation, Amjad Khan struggled to deliver, with endless takes surrounding him by the end of the day. Once, Ramesh Sippy and the cameraman urged him to rest. So, throughout the first shooting schedule, Ramesh Sippy didn’t shoot a single frame of him. While Amjad sat alone on the set, whispers about his non-performance spread in the industry. In the end, Ramesh’s firmness helped Amjad become Gabbar Singh.
Eventually, the six-month schedule got stretched to one year. The movie went over budget to Rs 3 crore. The five-minute song sequence Yeh Dosti... took 21 days to shoot. The iconic train robbery sequence took seven days. The scene was filmed on a narrow-gauge railway line along the Bombay–Poona railway route near Panvel. The pivotal scene where Gabbar Singh massacres Thakur’s family took 23 gruelling days to film.
And last but not least, according to eminent director Shekhar Kapur,
“There has never been a more defining film on the Indian screen. Indian film history can be divided into Sholay BC and Sholay AD.”
(Anup Dutta is a senior journalist and teaches at Makhanlal Chaturvedi National University of Journalism and Communication, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh.)
