Shammi Kapoor lost to Rajendra Kumar by a thumping majority of one that sunny morning in 1963, when a bunch of us decided upon the first-run Hamrahi rather than the umpteenth rerun of Ujala! (1959). I gloated my best I-told-you-so at my classmates as we all came out of the Lotus (or was it the Swastik?~time's taking its toll!), cursing that milksop of a movie and vowing never again to waste hard-earned pocket-money over a Rajendra Kumar feature! We caught up with Ujala a few weeks later and emerged from the theatre praising Shankar-Jaikishan, Raj Kumar and Shammi Kapoor (with Mala Sinha and Kum Kum supplying the oomph!)~in that order. The film was a rehash of any number of Hollywood crime films of that era, with Raj Kumar hamming the crime boss to the hilt! Immensely laughable at that or any age, but thrilling: and great black and white photography, as I recall, especially during the climactic sequence with Raj Kumar on the rooftops. They had a lot of fun doing that film with the fun loving Naresh Saigal (who had another hit that same year in Main Nashemein Hoon) as director. The Lata-Manna Dey duet 'jhoomta mausam mast mahina', set new records in popularity. Impossible to sing and difficult to emulate, it could only be mimicked. The song was written by Hasrat Jaipuri and literally reverberated elsewhere in the world because, from what YouTube tells me, even the Greeks were ecstatic over it.
He was not younger brother Shashi and certainly not older brother Raj Kapoor, but Shammi-saab was finally turning the corner away from the silly dramatic-role cloaks that he had heretofore donned. It took him a few years to find his niche from the undramatic entry he made into films with dramatic vehicles like Rail Ka Dibba (1953-opposite Madhubala), Laila Majnu (once again 1953 with the emerging Nutan), Shama Parwana (1954-opposite the then-fading but still beautiful Suraiya), Miss Cocacola (1955-opposite future wife Geeta Bali). And there were other films like Thokar (1953) and Chor Darwaza (1954)all of which, I am aware, were eminently forgettable. While I have only billboard memories of all these films, I do recall viewing at least a badly-mutilated print of Laila Majnu and an intact copy of Shama-Parwana. Bad films both but colossal music by the great Ghulam Mohammad in the first and the equally great Husnlal-Bhagatram in the second.
A startling clip has surfaced on YouTube of a Talat song that we have loved down the years. The solo was originally intended for the moody-brooding Laila Majnu but for one of those inexplicable reasons that often put a song out of context, was removed from that film and appended to Chor Darwaza. And I say startling because what is essentially a reflective musing on tormented love (what else!) has been picturised upon a smiling Shammi Kapoor flirting with a stoic, stony-faced Sumitra Devi! Either a different mood or a different song was definitely called for here, unless I'm missing director Prakash Arora's intent. It should have remained, more logically, with Laila Majnu. Shammi is close to a laugh-burst and the only reason I have included the track here is because the penning of it by Shakeel Badayuni is so intense and memorable.
But that period was coming to an end, as I have stated, with Nasir Hussain's Tumsa Nahin Dekha (1957) roaring in and sowing the seeds of the 'Yahoo!' image that we came to associate with Shammi Kapoor. It was the turning point in his career and Shammi Kapoor never looked back for at least a decade and a half after that. His costar in the film was the very coy Ameeta who also, with this vehicle, came out into the mainstream of Hindi films. The songs in the film composed by the legendary OP Nayyar placed Shammi Kapoor on the map with the young crowd, although the older generation still shunned OP's compositions as being too 'unIndian'. But Shammi was ready to go and go he did....and there was no restraining him...watch him mouth Sahir Ludhianvi's exuberant....Yun to humne lakh haseen dekhe hain...
The next big hit was Dil Deke Dekho (1959)again directed by Nasir Hussain but the film did more for Asha Parekh and Usha Khanna than it did for Shammi Kapoor. The first debuted as leading lady while the second debuted as a music composer of note although where she went over the years is a different story. One must note, though, that she was only the second female music director in films, after Saraswati Devi of the 1930s/40s. There are great vocals by Mohammad Rafi and Asha Bhonsle on the tracks of this film, with one especially standing out as a blend of rural folksy in the first half and beat in the tandem. Here it is, penned by Majrooh Sultanpuri.
There came a slump in his career with nondescript films like Mujrim and Boyfriend and China Town (a double role, here), which despite fine music by OP Nayyar in the first and Shankar-Jaikishan in the other, and Ravi in the third did nothing much to boost Shammi's career until.....
.....producer-director Subodh Mukerji came in with 'Junglee' (1961), to place the final, finishing brush stroke to the 'Yahoo' image begun in Tumsa Nahin Dekha, four years earlier. The film was a maddening success and I say maddening because Shammi was falling all over Saira Banu (in her debut) when he was not all over himself as he played the spoiled, eccentric millionaire who finds love in the arms of a simple mountain belle. Colour was still spell bindingly new to the industry in 1961 and the only aspect of the song better than the Kashmir visuals, was the unbridled Mohammad Rafi, singing a much-derided Shankar-Jaikishan number penned by Shailendra. It is probably one of filmdom's best kept secrets that a lot of us still do not know who yelled the reverberating 'Yahoo' into the mountains!
Once when I was in Bombay I read an article written by Shammi Kapoor and something he said in it made me pen an email to him and I told him that the only better films than Junglee were 'Professor' (1962) and Manoranjan a fine adaptation of Irma La Douce which was released in 1971 (I think) after a 10-year wait in the cans. I was surpised when he actually wrote back to me explaining the delay in the release of Manoranjan.
To sit through a viewing of Professor is to understand one's helplessness in controlling an outburst of laughter in the movie house, long after a particular sequence has passed. It was a fine, hilarious role as Shammi Kapoor juggled the joint characters of the young lover (with Kalpana, another new find) and that of the old professor in his scenes with Lalita Pawar. His scenes with that old thespian are part of classic film lore~and so is the musical score, once again by Shankar-Jaikishan.
The movie went on to bag the FilmFare award for the best music of the year, with Rafi-saab, also walking away with the statuette for 'Ai Gulbadan'. Every song in the film is a classic from the joint batons of S-J setting to music the penmanship of Shailendra and Hasrat Jaipuri. 'Main Chali, main chali.....' the Shailendra-penned Lata-Rafi duet will, however, always remain my personal favourite, because the kind of day we see as the scene unfolds was exactly the kind of day I saw the film on with my buddies: bright blue with fleecy white clouds (sorry to bring myself in, like this). We don't see that kind of days anymore in Bombay.... And then there was Kashmir Ki Kali (1964) with composer OP Nayyar's creations the standout feature in a mediocre movie, whose only other significance was the introduction into Hindi films of the very young and talented Sharmila Tagore. The songs, especially the two Asha-Rafi inspired duets penned by the immortal SH Bihari 'Isharon, isharonemein dil lenewale' and 'diwana hua badal....' , were lyrically picturised by Shakti Samanta. It was the music that saved the day and made the film a runaway hit.....
...until 1965 came along and death claimed Geeta Bali his wife of 10 years. And we know he was never the same again, despite a remarriage. Teesri Manzil was released in this same year during which we saw Asha Bhonsle taking her first tentative steps away from OP Nayyar and moving towards RD Burman whom she later was to marry. This film, again, was more a comeback vehicle for Premnath from yester years (who donned the mantle of the 'bad' guy and went on to do some fine roles in the process) but more importantly it set RD Burman firmly in the saddle as a brilliant and innovative composer very much like his father, the immortal SD Burman.
The movie paired Shammi Kapoor with Asha Parekh and will always be remembered for Premnath's evil-as-evil-can be character but moreso, as I have stated, for RDB's unique music sounds, the likes of which had never been heard until then. He was the last of the three acknowledged mavericks in Hindi film music after Shankar-Jaikishan and Chitalkar Ramchandra during their heyday in the late 1940s. Once one gets past the first 40 seconds of verbalizing on this fine composition, the magic becomes inescapable.
Well, the times were a-changing: we still had a couple of more years of the film industry as we knew it: but slowly and surely it was moving towards becoming 'Bollywood' a term concocted by Nasir Hussain in 1971, symbolising the change in generation and the setting-in of a deplorable trend in film-making that does not seem to let up.
This was not the end of Shammi Kapoor's career, though. He had a few more films left among them the eminently forgettable Brahmachari and Latt Saheb and Prince and Janwar and Tumse Acchha Kaun Hai which do not deserve space here or anywhere else, although Pagla Kahin Ka and the long delayed Manoranjan did reveal his flair for genuine humour. In fact, Manoranjan marked a new phase in his career~that of a character artist and he did some good ones all through the 80s.
So, where does he stand? Right at the top? No, not as long as one has evergreen memories of his brother, the eloquent Raj Kapoor. But he will always be remembered as a performer who brought joy to the middleclass with his shenanigan's and gyrations and fisticuffs, although the better (sic!) class of filmgoers did not care much for him or his movies. He had a charm all his own: and he could be funny, without being vulgar like others I could name. Like Dev Anand it was difficult to watch him do serious roles. But, also like Dev Anand, he 'sang' any number of good, nay great, songs for us and that's what we went to the movies for in those days and at that age, anyway....
R.I.P.
