Infotainment

It touched upon untouchability and rigorous caste system. The movie most faithfully depicted a Brahmin priest’s love for a low-caste washerwomen, and the opposition of the rich upper-caste village chieftain, Gopinath (Nawab). The film strikes at double standards. He wants to sexually exploit the washerwomen and gets her kidnapped by his henchmen. But she heroically frustrates his evil design. Himanshu Rai, another great visionary, in his Achhut Kanya (1936) raised the same issue of casteism with much success.

The movie pinpoints a problem of class and caste with respect to marriage. A blind singer comes across an orphan boy. To look after him, he takes up stage singing. The boy grows up to become a popular radio singer. A girl from a rich family falls in love with him and both agree on marriage but her social status comes in the way. But they are ready to face all odds. Surprisingly, the boy turns out to be the long-lost son of a millionaire.

The novel has been explored in both theatre and movies. The villainous social condition that came in the way of Devdas marrying Paro forms the backdrop. A shattered Devdas soon finds himself with Chandramukhi, a courtesan. The mental suffering of Devdas and Chandramukhi makes the movie an unforgettable piece of art.

Based on Sarat Chandra’s novel Grihdah, the plot revolves around two friends, one of them being married. The bachelor loves his friend’s wife and seduces her into eloping with him. But the love life with his friend’s wife is far from happy. He commits suicide and the girl is thrown into a pitiable predicament of excruciating sufferings.

A painter of delicate sensibilities and an introvert is married to an extrovert girl given to a life of pomp and show. The mismatched marriage creates knotty problems in their conjugal life, leading to the protagonist’s death. But the sufferings of the protagonist emotionalises the audience who are shocked to realise that mukti or freedom from the painful situation faced by the couple is not possible without a change in the basic concept of marriage and other social institutions.

This is the tale of a textile mill head who has sacrificed her all to the progress of the mill only to fulfil the wish of her dead father. She falls in love with a designer at the mill, who is soon gets promoted to the position of manager. But the manager meets the president’s younger sister and falls in love.

New Theatres turned to the saint-poet who dedicated his life to praising Lord Krishna. This made the king and queen fall in love with the imageries expressed in the poems. But the queen’s love for the poet created conflicting problems and ruined her family life, even though it was all platonic. Apparently Debaki Bose, the director took utmost care to lace the film with the choicest of the great poets’ creation to enhance the aesthetic experience of the audience.

In the movie of epic proportions, the protagonist with his childhood friend, a girl, rising from a very humble rural beginning to an exalted position of an ace singer, helplessly loses his friend and love to the greedy predations of city life. Disappointed in love and his life struggle, he is compelled to return to his rural roots.

The movie depicts the struggle of a poor illegitimate daughter of a rich businessman. The rich man has bequeathed his entire property to this legitimate daughter. The slum-dweller, by fair or foul means, disposes her half-sister of her father’s property, thereafter winning over her lover too. Tragically, she fails to get the love and sympathy she has ever hankered after. The result: unending mental suffering.

The protagonist is his own enemy. A tuberculosis patient, he decides to overwork against repeated advices of his doctor to earn enough to make his life with his lady-love comfortable. There is another fellow, a doctor from a rich background who, too, is a suitor to his lover’s hand.

The movie centres around two lovers, Rajat and Jayanti. The crux of the movie’s problem is that the boy, Rajat, through intensely in love with Jayanti, fails repeatedly to express his feeling to the beloved, resulting in many embarrassing situations. He is the only successor to his maternal uncle’s vast property. A greedy and cheat of a father and his villainous daughter try to force him into marriage. It is a wonderful experience to see PC Barua,the serious and melancholic hero of Devdas (1935) and the romantic protagonist of Vidyapati (1937), and Pahari Sanyal in comic roles.

PC Baruah’s last movie with New Theaters deals with live-in relationship. An unemployed but highly educated man has a chance meeting with a lady who is married but is ignored by her husband. They fall in love and develop sympathy for each other. In the long run, they fail to adjust with each other because of their divergent outlook and background.

The story of an ideal doctor dedicated more to his profession than to his family is still fresh. The Brahmin revolts against casteism and marries a girl of low-caste. Such is his dedication to the marginalized that he does not look after his wife who dies for want of medical attendance.

This is the tale of a poor poet and musician who teaches a girl.Once she gets married, she tries her best to help her teacher. He soon falls in love with her. New Theaters’ approach to handling this subject is quite appreciable.

An elder brother’s commitment and sacrifice to raise his younger brother to a higher status at any cost is a must watch effort.The film also highlights the evils of the dowry system.

The film focuses on an amnesiac (played by PC Baruah) struck between two women ~ one simple and innocent from rural background and the other highly educated and sophisticated. The protagonistis finally drawn to the simple village belle.

This is a technically sound film. In it, a simple village girl is torn between a village beau and high-status rich, her father’s choice for marriage. Similarly, her lover happens to be a servant under the rich boy to whom she is to marry.

Based on a famous Sarat Chandra novel, it finely delineates the interactions of a husband given to studies and “simple living and high thinking”, and a wife, a rich businessman’s daughter living a life of pomp and show.

The movie revolves around a poor brother committed to his younger sister than to living a happy married life with a rich man’s daughter. For his dear sister, he takes to vocations that create further problems. Finally, the pristine brother-sister love wins. Some sequences of the film against the backdrop of Japanese bombings in Calcutta during World War II are applaudable.

The adaptation of Sarat Chandra’s Ramer Sumati attempts to look at village problems through the eyes of a parentless boy, growing under the loving care of his sister-in-law. She treats him like his son. The villain comes in the form of the siter-in-law’s mother. Finally, Chhota Bhai proves to be an angel.

According to some film critics, the movie embodies of all that New Theatres stood for. The movie’s treatment of religious misconception and dogmas, and its depiction of so-called sanyasi or ascetic make it unforgettable.The study of some of the movies points to an important aspect of New Theaters ~ cinematic art which tries to highlight the universality of a character’s reaction to particular situations into which he is willy-nilly thrown.