Sholay

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Sholay (1975)

After three hours of mesmerised, and tense, involvement in the film the audience suddenly realises what the Thakur’s game plan is. They see the metal spikes on the soles of the Thakur’s shoes and, for the first time after relentless tension, they relax. They know that good will finally prevail over evil. The entire theatre breaks into an excited cheer, people leaning forward in their seats, as in a tense sporting match where ‘our’ team, after taking a lot of beating, is finally posed to an exciting, entertaining victory.

The Thakur leaps in the air. (Sholay (1975): Scene deleted by the censors in 1975.)

The Thakur’s feet are about to hit Gabbar

The Thakur does what the entire audience—nay, almost all filmgoers across India wanted him to do. He crushes Gabbar’s forearm to avenge the loss of his own arms.

The Thakur kicks Gabbar into the cauldron behind him.

The Thakur crushes Gabbar’s hand in a prolonged scene.

But, as Thakur discovers, it is not the spiked shoes that kill Gabbar. Thakur's assault on Gabbar's chest had made him fall on a sharp iron spike embedded in the pillar behind him. (Till the 1980s or '90s the good guys were not alllowed to kill even murderous screen villains, on the ground that death sentences were something best left to the judiciary. Therefore, during the fight sequence in the climax the haresd villain, whom the audience wanted dead,would stumble off a cliff, get bitten by a snake or die of his own bullet, so that the hero could not be accused of taking the law into his own hands.) (Sholay (1975): Scene deleted by the censors in 1975.)

The dying Gabbar falls down. (Sholay (1975): Scene deleted by the censors in 1975.)

Veeru (centre) brings the shawl that the armless Thakur (left) generally uses to conceal his armlessness. Gabbar lies dead on the right. (Sholay (1975): Scene deleted by the censors in 1975.)

Crew

Director: Ramesh Sippy

Writers: Salim-Javed (Salim Khan, Javed Akhtar)

Produced by G.P. Sippy

Director of photography: Dwarka Divecha ...

Sound re-recording: Mangesh Desai ...

Film Editor: M.S. Shinde

Production Company: United Producers, Sippy Films

Cast

Dharmendra: Veeru

Sanjeev Kumar: Thakur Baldev Singh

Hema Malini : Basanti

Amitabh Bachchan : Jai

Jaya Bhaduri: Radha

Amjad Khan : Gabbar Singh

A.K. Hangal : Imam Saheb

Satyen Kappu : Ramlal

Iftekhar : Narmala ji (Radha's father)

Leela Mishra : Mausi

Vikas Anand: Jailor

Mac Mohan: Saamba

Keshto Mukherjee: Hariram

SachinV Ahmed

Master Alankar Joshi: Deepak

Viju Khote: Kaalia

Major Anand and Bihari: The two dacoits whom Gabbar kills because they were funks (jo dar gaya)

Asrani: The 'British-era Jailor'

Gita Siddharth: Deepak's mother

Helen: ‘Mehbooba,’ the gypsy dancer

P. Jairaj: Police chief

Jagdeep: Soorma Bhopali

Jalal Agha: The one who sings ‘Mahbooba’

Om Shivpuri: Inspector Saheb

Sharad Kumar: Ninni

Technical Specifications

Runtime: 188 min/3:08 hrs (version released in 1975); 204 minutes/ 3:24 hours (3D version released in 2014).

Sound Mix: 6-Track stereophonic (on 70 mm prints)| Mono (on 35 mm prints)|

Color: EastmanColor

Aspect Ratio: 1.37 : 1 (original negative) / 2.20 : 1 (70 mm prints)

Country: India

Language: Hindi

Release Date: 15 August 1975 (India)

Outdoor shooting at: ‘Sippyvaram’/ Ramnagram village on the Mysore-Bangalore highway, Karnataka, India

Songs

All lyrics by Anand Bakshi

All music credited to Rahul Dev Burman, including a song not composed by him.

Holi Ke Din Sung byKishore Kumar & Lata Mangeshkar

Jab Tak Hain Jaan Sung byLata Mangeshkar

Koi Haseena Sung byKishore Kumar

Mehbooba O Mehbooba Sung byRahul Dev Burman (based on Demis Roussos’ Say you love me)

Sholay Title Theme

Yeh Dosti (happy version) sung by Kishore Kumar & Manna Dey

Yeh Dosti (Sad Version) Sung by Kishore Kumar

"Chaand Sa Koi Chehra": the song not used in Sholay

In addition, a qawwali, "Chaand Sa Koi Chehra," had been recorded for the film (and sung by Kishore Kumar, Manna Dey, Bhupendra Singh and, above all, lyricist Anand Bakshi) but never used. In the film it was supposed to be sung by Jai, Veeru and fellow inmates during their stint in jail. The song was never shot because it would have added to the already considerable length of the film, director Ramesh Sippy told an online channel. G9 Premiers, on which you can hear roughly 40 seconds, from 2.00 to 2.40. You can hear 5:49 minutes (i.e. almost the entire song) juxtaposed quite cleverly on a 'fake' video [1]. The lip--synching is nowhere near perfect, but still quite good. The 'fake' video is a qawwali filmed on Dharmendra and Amitabh Bachchan in the 1977 film Charandas.

See also

The page 70mm films in India/ South Asia, among other things, has two photographs that show how Sholay was blown up from 35mm to 70mm.