The contrite admission….

This was a movie that brought Mumtaz into the top drawer. After spending almost the entire first part of her career languishing in B Grade movies or doing inconsequential roles of a Bimbette in big banner movies, her talent would perhaps have gone unnoticed. It took the discerning eye of a pioneering filmmaker like V Shantaram to pick her from the morass and adorn her with the lead role in his production.

Boond Jo Ban Gayee Moti was his movie. He had given Jumping Jack Jeetendra his break in films.

Jeetendra was born Ravi Kapoor, to Amarnath and Krishna Kapoor, in Amritsar, and his business dealt with imitation jewellery, supplied to the film industry. That was the first contact the family had with Bollywood.

He attended St. Sebastian’s Goan High School in Girgaum, Mumbai with his friend Rajesh Khanna and then studied at Siddharth College in Mumbai.

While supplying jewellery to V. Shantaram, he was cast as Sandhya’s character’s double in Navrang after which his career never turned back.

Jeetendra got his first major breaks with V. Shantaram’s Geet Gaya Patharon Ne and Boond Jo Ban Gayee Moti. However, it was Farz that served as his stepping stone to success and gave him the USP and branding for the first half of his career. The tee shirt and white shoes he picked up from a retail store for the Mast Baharon Ka Main Aashiq number in Farz, became his trademark. Many years later after all the rolling in the hay and jumping meaninglessly, Gulzar discovered the guy could actually act, made him stop jumping and rolling, stuck a moustache and a pair of thick rimmed glasses and unearthed an actor of substance.

When making Boond jo ban gayee moti, it was natural V Shantaram repeated Jeetendra. However the man had developed something of a turnip head and did his utmost to get Mumtaz thrown out of the project. Anna cracked the whip and showed him the door, making him relent. The song is really a lovely duet with Mukesh and Suman Kalyanpur on song (pun intended). https://youtu.be/o9EvWHAh5wo

I’ve written about Satish Bhatia the wonderful composer of this movie in a previous blog. https://abchandorkar.wordpress.com/2020/05/01/a-wondrous-amazement/

https://abchandorkar.wordpress.com/2020/05/01/a-wondrous-amazement/

Unfortunately Boond jo… inexplicably flopped and that had a severe repercussion on the composer’s stay in Bollywood, much like what would have happened to Roshan had Kidar Sharma not stood firmly behind him while making Baawre Nain.

Unfortunately that wasn’t to be.

C’est la vie.

Bollywood lost a great talent. That was to be the Punjabi Film and Theater’s gain.

Stay away from the heat and hydrate yourself well, folks. The summer is well and truly here.

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