Colour films in Hindi-Urdu
Colour films in South Asia: 3--(Hindi-Urdu films)
By P. Dewan
(Part 3 of 'Colour films in South Asia')
Kisan Kanya, India’s first colour film
Attempts to shoot the first Indian colour film failed when the negative for Sairhandri, directed by Rajaram Vankudre Shantaram, was ruined during processing abroad. Prabhat Film Company's “Sairandhri” was the first talkie film produced in Multicolour in 1933. However, its colour quality was not satisfactory and what could be seen was black and white.
Kisan Kanya (lit: the peasant girl; 1937/ Dir: Moti B. Gidvani; prod. Ardeshir Irani) was arguably India’s first colour film to be actually released. This story about rural poverty did not go down well with mass audiences, so colour films did not catch the public imagination—till Aan (1953).
India was thus the sixth country to have produced a colour film; at most seventh, if firmer dates about the first Soviet colour film indicate otherwise.
One source(asia.isp)says that Bhavnani Productions ‘Rangeen Zamana” produced and directed by M. Bhavnani in 1948 (released as “Ajit” in 1949) was the first feature film produced in Kodachrome and blown up to 35mm. It has not been possible to get independent corroboration of this claim, but if true this is very impressive because Kodachrome was a superior (and expensive) technology, as good as the best in the world.
Technicolor
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Technicolor in India
Aan, a Dilip Kumar- Nimmi starrer by Mehboob Khan, was the first Indian film, the prints of which were in Technicolor, the most expensive colour format of that era, or ever. It was shot in 16 mm and later blown up to 35 mm. It was a landmark success.
V. Shantaram’s Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baaje (1955), Mehboob Khan’s Mother India (1957) and V. Shantaram’s Navrang (1959), all in Technicolor, too, were the biggest hits of their respective years. Only Sohrab Modi’s lavishly produced Technicolor Jhansi Ki Rani (1956) fared badly at the box office.
Technicolor’s run of success continued into the 1960s, but not as triumphantly. Gunga Jumna, and Sangam were, again, the biggest hits of their respective years. But Son of India and Mera Naam Joker tanked.
So, Technicolor was no longer a guarantor of success. Besides, Eastmancolor, which had pleasant colours, though not the sharp details of Technicolor, had reached India, and was much cheaper than Technicolor.
The Technicolor process
Technicolor was expensive because the image being photographed (i.e. the light coming from this image) had to pass through three strips of black-and-white film. Together these three strips formed a rich colour image. This colour went by the brand name Technicolor.
The camera’s lens split the light coming from the actors and the background into two beams, one of which went through a green filter and the other through a magenta filter. The topmost strip could receive only blue light and recorded blue images. The green filter obstructed red and blue light; the second strip received this image. The magenta filter kept green light out; the third strip recorded the residual colours.
The cyan, magenta and yellow dye images from these three negatives were superimposed on a single strip of film, which resulted in sharp, nuanced Technicolor images.
The historical benefit of this complicated and expensive technology is that old Technicolor prints (notably, Mughal e Azam) retain their original colours, while pictures shot on cheaper colour films have faded or lost one shade or even one or more colours. The original colours of Mughal e Azam’s two Technicolor sequences remain vastly crisper, more detailed and lustrous than the bulk of the film, which was colourised from black and white in 2004.
'Color by Technicolor'
Those who appreciate good colour photography often wonder why of all Technicolor films ‘Mother India’ has the narrowest range of colours, the images do not have the sharp outlines of Technicolor and why the colours look quite jaded. This could possibly be because the negative was in Gevacolor and only the prints in Technicolor. (imdb) Such hybrid printing is known as 'Color by Technicolor' and the credit titles of Mother India' (and Jhanak... and Navrang) accept as much. Incidentally, the credit titles of 'Aan' read 'Print by Technicolor.'
The 'Mother India' picture on this page is not at all typical of the quality of colours seen in that film. It was the only one of dozens of stills that did not have a limited number of shades and colours. The colours of Mother India typically look like the 'Mother India' picture on this page: (Indpaedia)
'Color by Technicolor' films are those that have used the post-production services of one of many film laboratories scattered across the globe and owned and operated by Technicolor. This laboratory would have developed, printed and transferred the film but no Technicolor format or printing would have been used. (Wikipedia)
International collaborations
Two of India's earliest colour films were made in collaboration with other countries.
SovColor
The bilingual Indo-Soviet film ‘Pardesi’ (Hindi-Urdu/ Russian/ dirs: Khwaja Ahmad Abbas, Vasili Pronin/ 1957) was in SovColor, though no colour print of the Hindi-Urdu version is known to survive in India. The T Series DVD is in B&W. The film is called Хождение за три моря in Russian.
Written by Khwaja Ahmad Abbas and Mariya Smirnova, the film is the true story of the Russian trader Afanasi Nikitin (died 1472), who is the second known European (after Niccolò de' Conti) to have visited India (both the north and the Deccan) and have written about the land, its people and his journey. Russian actor Oleg Aleksandrovich Strizhenov played Afanasi.
The full film is available in B&W on [YouTube] in B&W. Its Censor Certificate states ‘Colour, Scope’ and gives the name of its filmmakers as ‘Meera Movies’ and ‘Son[?]a Sansar International.’
However, more excitingly, more than 25 minutes of the film are available in sharp, high quality colour and widescreen in the form of Hindi-Urdu songs [YouTube]. They have perhaps been taken from the Russian version in which the songs would have been in Hindi-Urdu. The music is by Anil Biswas. However, since the songs have not been subtitled, perhaps a colour print in Hindi-Urdu is available somewhere.
The naked eye will indicate i) how vastly superior SovColor was to all contemporary colours, except perhaps Technicolor (which had sharp details), and ii) how well the colours of this SovColor film have survived despite the lapse of more than fifty years.
Thailand
Angulimal (1960) was directed by Vijay Bhatt, starred only Indian actors,and was produced by the Thai Information Service Co. Ltd.
GevaColor
India had been making colour films since the 1930s. Every Technicolor film from Aan to Gunga Jumna (1961), except Jhansi ki Rani, had set new box office records. And yet colour did not catch on in India because only the top Moguls could afford Technicolor and only ‘A plus’-budget films could be made in Technicolor.
GevaColor changed things somewhat. It was so cheap that it took colour down not to the next lower rung of films, films that were merely ‘A budget,’ but straight to B and C films in Hindi-Urdu, and to the top rung of Tamil and Telugu cinema.
(Since the 1990s India’s highest paid actor has generally been Rajinikanth, the Tamil superstar. The budgets of the top Tamil films sometimes exceed those of the top Hindi-Urdu film of that year. On some counts the Telugu film industry is huge. Since the mid-1980s technical firsts—notably 3D—have come from the South, in this case from Kerala. However, till at least the early 1970s the budgets of Hindi-Urdu films were vastly bigger.)
The MGR-starrer Alibabhavum Narpathu Thirudargalum (1955), the first Tamil (and first south Indian) colour film, was entirely in Gevacolor, while Nadodi Mannan (Tamil/ 1958) had some Gevacolor inserts. Lavakusa (1963), the first Telugu colour film, and an NTR-starrer, too, was in Gevacolor.
In Hindi-Urdu, Hum Hindustani (1960), an A film was entirely in Gevacolor. It was an ‘above average’ success (Boxofficeindia). Now the democratisation of colour started in Hindi-Urdu cinema, too.
Pyar Ki Pyas (1961), a B-budget family weepie and a flop, was in GevaColor and CinemaScope. Even in 1961 relatively few people were aware that such a film had been released.
The next GevaColor film in Hindi, Sampoorna Ramayan (1961), too, had a B-cast and a B-director, Babubhai Mistri. However, it was a hit because it encapsulated the most popular Hindu epic, The Ramayan, into 183 minutes, had lavish sets, special effects considered good at the time and some hit songs. True to the traditions of Old India, it was produced by a Parsi, Homi Wadia.
By then Eastmancolor had arrived with Junglee (1961). It was more expensive than GevaColor, more suitable for A list films than GevaColor and much cheaper than Technicolor.
Eastmancolor
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Internationally
Eastman Kodak launched Eastmancolor, a colour print film that recorded colours better than any of its lower-priced competitors,in 1952. Apart from costs and quality, Eastmancolor offered convenience. Technicolor films had to be sent to Technicolor's own laboratories for the dye imbibition process. Eastmancolor let studios make prints using normal photographic processes.
In India
Junglee (1961) was the first Indian film in Eastmancolor, a colour technology that was less complex and, therefore, less expensive gthan Technicolor. On the other hand Eastmancolor was vastly more satisfying than the even cheaper Gevacolor and Orwocolor. (Fujicolor was the choppy and downmarket colour negative of the 1970s and early '80s. It was Souten [1983] that introduced India to the lavish, new Fujicolor, though Yeh Nazdeekiyan (1982), the year before, too, had indicated that Fujicolor had changed.)
Eastmancolor films after Junglee included Professor and Taj Mahal (both 1963).
'Songs and dances in colour' vs. 'Tamaam rangeen'
In the 1950s,1960s and early 1970s many black and white films--including respected films by Satyajit Ray. K. Asif and Mrinal Sen of India, and A Tarkovsky of the USSR--had a few reels in colour. If such a film was Indian or Pakistani and of the commercial kind its posters would read 'Songs and dances in colour.'
If an Indian/ Pakistani film were 'entirely in colour' its local-level posters would, till even the late 1970s, mention this, even though by then B&W films had been gone for years. In North India the reassurance would read 'Tamaam rangeen' (entirely in colour).
‘Partly in colour’(colour inserts)
Moguls like Mehboob Khan, V. Shantaram and Sohrab Modi (who made films in Technicolor) and producers of the next rung like Subodh Mukherji (Junglee/ 1961), FC Mehra (Professor/ 1962) and Shakti Samanta (Kashmir ki Kali/ 1964), all of who used Eastmancolor, had set a bold example. Almost all their colour films were enormously successful.
And yet even top budget films continued to be made in B&W till the mid-1960s. It is known that producer K. Asif made Mughal e Azam mostly in B&W because he could not afford a greater number of colour sequences. In the early 1960s the economics of colour films do not seem to have been very attractive, even though very few colour films had flopped. (The only colour flops were Jhansi ki Rani and Leader—both commercial; and Kisan Kanya, Pardesi, Pyar ki Pyas and Son of India—all arthouse.)
Obviously because of high costs two of the Big Three stars, Raj Kapoor and Dev Anand, had their first entirely-in-colour films released as late as in 1964 and 1966 respectively. (In most of the 1960s Rajendra Kumar was arguably no.4 and Shammi Kapoor perhaps no.5, though by 1966 or so Rajendra ‘Jubilee’ Kumar was reportedly the highest paid star and remained so for a few years.)
Interestingly, even as Raj Kapoor and Dev Anand were soldiering on with B&W, not just Rajendra Kumar and Shammi Kapoor, but other A-list actors further down the pecking order had starred in major Eastmancolour films. Notable were Joy Mukherjee (also Phir Wohi Dil Laya Hoon/ 1963, Ziddi/1964), Biswajit (Shehnai/ 1964; Mere Sanam/ 1965) and Sunil Dutt (Khandan/1965, in addition to the multi-starrer Mother India), Mahipal ( Navrang/ 1959), Pradeep Kumar (Taj Mahal) and debutant Jeetendra (Geet Gaaya Pattharon Ne/ 1964) do not count because in their case the opulence of the film, and not their presence, justified the colour.
A few reels in colour was, thus, the compromise. These normally were reels with songs, dances and/ or spectacle. Even the Dev Anand-starrer Teen Devian (1965) included only some colour sequences. Pakistan’s superstar Waheed Murad’s Eid Mubarak (1965) was Pakistan's first film with a few colour scenes, even though (East) Pakistan had made an entirely-in-colour film the year before. (The same had happened in India: the ‘partly in colour’ trend came after films had been made entirely in colour.)
Nasir Hussain, a major producer-director, was one of the first to use colour. Phir Wohi Dil Laya Hoon (1963) was India’s fourth Eastmancolor film, and a hit. Teesri Manzil (1966), another success, followed in Eastmancolor. And yet as late as in 1967 he made Baharon Ke Sapne in B&W (with two sequences in colour) because it was a serious film about educated unemployed youths, and hence not likely to attract mass audiences.
In India the ‘partly in colour’ trend goes back at least as far back as Nagin (1954), an superhit B&W fantasy film with a few reels in Gevacolor. Nadodi Mannan (Tamil/ 1958), also a costume drama and fantasy film, included a colour sequence. Mughal e Azam (1960), the biggest-budget film of its time, had to include colour for the same reason: it was a historical spectacular and costume drama with ornate sets encrusted with faux gems.
Thus the ‘fantasy’ element was almost important as costs when it came to shooting a film in colour. It is notable that four of the first five Technicolor films in Hindi-Urdu; the first Technicolor film in Tamil and the first colour film in Telugu were all period films and costume dramas.
By the early 1960s the correlation between the budget of the film and colour weakened further. Bombay Ka Chor (1962) was a B&W, B-plus film. However, because audiences wanted colour its producers gratuitously included a colour sequence, quite unrelated to the film’s plot, called ‘Holiday on Ice.’ Such an unrelated insert would be billed as an "added attraction." Hawa Mahal (1962), a C-budget fantasy, was partly in colour.
When maestro Satyajit Ray made Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne (1969/ Bengali), a fantasy film, he included some colour sequences. Left-leaning Mrinal Sen's Padatik (1973/ B&W/ Bengali) had one colour sequence about glitzy consmerism followed by and contrasted with shots of monochrome poverty.
Black and white films gradually lose out to colour
The megastar of the 1950s and the early ’60s, Dilip Kumar, did not act in a black and white film after 1961; the highest paid star of the mid-1960s, Rajendra Kumar, followed suit.
Increasingly the hits were all in colour and B&W films were seen as dull. Dosti (1964), a low budget weepie that touched the nation’s hearts, Haqeeqat (1964) and Shaheed (1965), both being patriotic films that stirred patriotic youths, were arguably the last Hindi-Urdu commercial successes in B&W. Dosti was a superhit.
Films delayed in the making
By the late 1960s the only black and white films featuring major actors were serious films meant for arthouses (e.g. the Raj Kapoor starrer Teesri Qasam (1967) and the Nargis-starrer Raat Aur Din/ 1967) or those that had got delayed in the making.
Shammi Kapoor was the actor associated with the introduction of Eastmancolor in India, and the star of first, second and fifth Eastmancolor films, but even he had an A-category commercial black and white film Budtameez as late as in 1966. If the film received attention at all it was because of some great songs (Haseen ho tum, and Ooh lal la).
The Dev Anand starrer Kahin Aur Chal (1968) was perhaps the last A-list commercial Hindi-Urdu film in black and white. Even serious Dev Anand fans have not heard of Kahin Aur Chal.
The last commercial B&W films
Saraswatichandra (also 1968: famous for its songs), claimed on Wikipedia as the last B&W film in Hindi-Urdu, was a relatively low budget film and a literary, almost arthouse film. (See ‘Internet bloopers’ in this article.) Like Teesri Qasam and Raat aur Din before it, it took the better part of a year for Saraswatichandra to get a theatrical release--partly because all three films were unrelentingly serious and partly because they were in B&W.
Commercial 'Bollywood movies,' albeit B-budget ones, continued to be made in B&W well after Saraswatichandra, which was not an A-budget film either. Bandish (1969: famous for Rafi’s classic song Abhi to raat baaqi hai), Simla Road (1969) and Priya (1970: starring Tanuja, famous songs: ‘She’s very pretty’ and ‘Garry Joe/ Gaye ja’) were all commercial entertainers, but in B&W.
B&W continues in arthouse films till the early 1970s
In the world of art films black and white continued into the early 1970s.
Even Dastak (1970), the last B&W film in Hindi-Urdu to make some money (by the micro-budget standards of art films), was not the last 'Bollywood movie' to be made in black and white, either. Art films like Sara Akash (1969), Uski Roti (1970), Khamoshi (1970: with an all-star cast from the world of commercial cinema--Dharmendra, Waheeda Rehman and Rajesh Khanna), Ashad Ka Ek Din (1971) and Ek Adhuri Kahani (1972) continued to be made in B&W well into the 1970s.
The great Satyajit Ray and Mrinal Sen were making B&W films in Bengali till the mid-1970s.
Art films have been in colour since at least Satyajit Ray’s Kanchanjangha (1962/ Bengali/ Eastmancolor), but then India’s greatest maestro had the world as his market. However, even he did not get back to an entirely-in-colour film for another 11 years, till 1973 (Ashani Sanket), after which he never went back to black and white. (Kanchanjangha is the spelling used on the cover of the DVD, but Kanchanjungha is the subtitle when the film's name, which is given only in Bengali, appears in the film itself.)
In Hindi-Urdu cinema, too, art films had been made in colour since Chetna (1970). However, it was Blaze films’ Eastmancolor Ankur (The Seedling) (1974), lavishly produced by the standards of Indian art cinema, that announced that art films need not be micro-budget. After that no Hindi-Urdu film, not even an art film, was made in black and white.
Colour films and success at the box office (1951-1970)
1951 was the year when India’s first commercially successful colour film was released. 1966 was the last year in the history of Hindi-Urdu cinema when there was a B&W film among the 20 highest grossing Hindi-Urdu films of the year.
Given below are the names of colour and ‘partly in colour’ films made between 1951 and 1964 and their performance at the box office relative to other Hindi Urdu films released that year. For 1965 and 1966 it is the names of B&W films that made it to the Top 20 that have been mentioned. The number shown after the name of each film denotes its rank in terms of box office success among the films released that year.
Figures and ranks for the 1950s have been taken fromIbos and for the 1960s from Boxofficeindia.
The box office rank of colour films (1951-1965)
1951 Aan 1 (the no. 1 hit of the year)
1952 No colour film released
1953 No colour film released
1954 Nagin (partly in colour) 1
1955 Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baje 5
1956 No colour film in Top 20 though Jhansi ki Rani was released that year.
1957 Mother India 1
1958 No colour film released
1959 Navrang 4
1960 Mughal E Azam 1 (partly in colour), Chaudvin Ka Chand 4 (partly in colour), Hum Hindustani 12 (entirely in colour)
1961 Ganga Jumna 1, Junglee 2
1962 Professor 2 (ibos)/ 3 (boi)(Bees Saal Baad, B&W, was no.1)
1963 Mere Mehboob 1, Taj Mahal 2, Phir Bhi Wohi Dil Laya Hoon 3, Shikari 7 (a ‘B film’ did better than a major ‘A film’ like Mujhe Jeene Do mainly because it was in colour), Parasmani 17 (also a B or C film)
1964 Sangam 1, Ayee Milan Ki Bela 2, (Dosti, B&W, was no. 3), Ziddi 4, Rajkumar 5, Kashmir Ki Kali 6 (Haqeeqat 7, Zindagi 8, both B&W). April Fool 9. By 1964 colour had become commonplace, so colour films started doing badly, too: Leader was at no. 11 (below average earnings), Jahan Ara 16 (flop), Chitralekha 17 (flop: not only did it have colour but cheesecake, too, but audiences found it too serious).
The box office rank of B&W films (1965-1970)
1965 By 1965 the top 10 films were all in colour. And yet the B&W Shaheed was at 11 and the B&W Johar Mehmood in Goa at 13.
1966 Aasra 11 (B&W) was a ‘semi-hit,’ arguably the last commercial Hindi-Urdu film to make a profit at the box office.
1967 No B&W film in the Top 20.
1968 No B&W film made it to the Top 20.
1969 No B&W film made it to the Top 20.
1970 No B&W film made it to the Top 20.
Is there a relationship colour and box office success?
The relationship between a film being in colour and its success at the box office, it will be seen, is very strong, but not one hundred per cent. Well-made B&W films have, in a few cases, done better than colour films that were not equally good. And yet such films have been few and far between.
It is possible that colour films that did well were interesting films anyway. However, the correlation between colour and box office success in the initial years is so close to around 90 per cent that it would be too much of coincidence if colour films were also the best-made ones. This is seen from the fact that in the beginning colour was a bigger guarantor of success than after colour became commonplace. this is also seen from the fact that after 1966, when B&W films continued to be made in substantial numbers, no B&W film in Hindi-Urdu was in the Top 20.
Chaudhvin Ka Chand (1960) proves both points: a good film will do well anyway, even if not in colour, but colour improves whatever prospects it had anyway. It was initially released entirely in B&W and was a hit. Prints released later had two colour sequences (The Encyclopedia of Indian Cinema). Colour certainly enhanced the film’s appeal and prolonged its box office success, but the film would have done well anyway. [In the DVD of the film released by Yash Raj, only the title song is in colour. In the Eros DVD the title song as well as the mujra song “Kabhi Raaz e Muhabbat” are in colour. A B&W version of even the title song is available on YouTube.)
V. Shantaram’s Technicolor blockbusters Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baje and Navrang also prove both points. Had either film been in B&W, mass audiences would never have paid money to see a film without stars, without commercial entertainment and about something as serious as classical music and dance. They were clearly there for the colour and spectavle, but neither film let them down in terms of story either.
Shikari was a ‘B film’ or even a ‘C film’ but it did better than a major ‘A film’ like Mujhe Jeene Do mainly because it was in colour. Similarly, Parasmani, also a B or C film, entered the Top 20 partly because of hit music (it was music director-duo Laxmikant-Pyarelal’s debut film) and partly because of its few colour scenes.
Internet bloopers about Hindi-Urdu cinema
A crowdsourced article (Wikipedia) claims that Saraswatichandra (1968) was ‘the last Bollywood movie to be made in black and white.’ This is as untrue as other crowdsourced Internet myths such as that Kagaz ke phool was India’s first CinemaScope film (no, Pardesi was), or Sholay was India’s first 70mm film (Around the World was) or that Dev Anand’s Guide was released in 1965 (the summer of 1966 is the correct date) or that 'Jhansi ki Rani' was India's first Technicolor film (Aan was).
See also
Colour films in South Asia: 1—South Asia as a whole.
Colour films in South Asia: 2 (Indian Cinema)—India as a whole.
Colour films in South Asia: 3-- Hindi-Urdu films.
CinemaScope and 70mm films Part 1: CinemaScope films
70mm films in India/ South Asia I.e. Part 2 of the above article
