Guide - the film and its story through its music

In a lifetime, even if one is not an inveterate moviegoer, one ends watching perhaps hundreds of films. Of these films, I don't even remember the names of some today, others I may have enjoyed then but may find boring now, yet of others I would recall many scenes but these would not have really changed my life much. At the very top of my list are just about a handful of movies which have seeped into my consciousness and stayed there. In this elite lot is the 1965 Hindi film Guide, based on R K Narayan's eponymous novel. After the film was completed, R K Narayan dissociated himself from this project as he had major differences with the way a couple of seminal relationships were depicted, but that is not germane to this blog post.

I have also had a love affair with music of different genres for almost six decades with Hindi film music occupying the stellar position. Maybe my choice of film music is stuck in a time warp of the sixties and seventies - maybe, but I am of late trying to make myself au courant with film music of later years also. In my pantheon of music director stars, there are many notable composers - Shanker-Jaikishen, R D Burman, O P Nayyar, Laxmikant Pyarelal, Roshan, Madan Mohan, Naushad , to just name a few - but the numero uno composer for me has always been Sachin Dev Burman, the scion of the royal family of Tripura. Again, I could reel off, at any time, the names of at least fifteen films with S D Burman's mellifluous music but here again for me Guide is my first choice. I have read elsewhere that he himself considered this film to be his best and was sorely disappointed at it not getting any major awards. I think the very fact that we talk about its music and hum its songs even fifty five years after it made its debut is the best award  Sachinda could have got.

The best part of the music and songs of Guide, for me was that none of the songs was an add-on or a diversion from the main plot. Each song was integral to the story, blended perfectly with what happened before and after and helped to move the narrative along. This is due to the craft of both the film maker and the music director and the tremendous synergy between the two of them.

Let me now try to tell you the story of Guide through its songs. This sequence is not necessarily that in which the songs appeared in the film

*The film opens with 'Wahan Kaun hai tera'. As the credits roll, we see Raju the guide being released from jail and being undecided on his next step. Sachin Dev Burman's mocking tone and the almost haunting deep notes of the flute rub in Raju's dilemma clearly.

* Rosie, the dancer and progeny of a courtesan has had to sacrifice her love for dancing for respectability. When she gets an opportunity to dance, the flood of emotions breaks through the dam of her restraint and she breaks forth with lyricist Shailendra's apparent contradiction 'Aaj phir jeene ki tamanna hai, aaj phir marne ka irada hai'. The words are poignant and ironic at the same time as this is a short while after she has attempted suicide, in the film.

*Rosie and Raju spend a lot of time with each other and the almost inevitable happens. Raju falls in love with her and expresses his feelings with, what is to me, the most romantic love song filmed ever! The song .. Rafi's 'Tere Mere sapne ab ek rang hain' of course.

*Rosie takes time to reciprocate and she does do so later. singing along with Raju the ebullient, bouncy  'Gata rahe mera dil' . To convey this joie de vivre , the composer has used Kishore Kumar with Lata Mangeshkar here. Rosie and Raju now defy society, burn some bridges and set forth together as a joint venture.

*Rosie's career as a dancer is launched with the screen name of Nalini and the lovely Lata Mangeshkar number 'Piya tose naina laage re' shows her transition from a virtual nonentity to a star dancer, The device of showing different festivals in the song transports the story further.

* The beautifully soft, maudlin Rafi number 'Din dhal jaaye' shows Raju slowly taking to both drinking and gambling and also the widening of the crack in the relationship between Raju and Rosie.

*The next dance number 'Mose chhal kiye jaa' which is followed immediately by another Rafi hit 'Kya se kya ho gaya' jointly present the story of a crime and a betrayal, as at the end of the second song, a handcuffed Raju is seen being taken away. Raju forged Rosie's signature (and got caught) not only because he wanted Rosie's jewels but because he didn't want Marco, her estranged husband to meet her and take her away from him. He is not able to explain this to her, either, because by then their relationship has soured quite a bit.

* The other two songs in the films - 'Allah Megh De' and 'He Ram Hamare Ramchandra' are sung by the residents of the drought-hit village to which Raju stumbles when running away from the world on his release from jail. He reluctantly becomes a Swami and is dared into fasting for rains to save  the village. The film ends with the rains falling and the villagers celebrating. The camera then pans to a supine Raju, who has passed away.

This is my bit of the intertwining of the story line and the songs to explain the plot. I would love to hear from you what you think of this bit of story weaving from my end!

^^^^^^