Chandralekha 1948

Chandralekha is a 1948 Indian Bollywood costume film released on 1948. The film is directed by S. S. Vasan, produced by S. S. Vasan under banner named Gemini.
One of Indias most famous films. started in 1943 and costing a masive Rs 3m this was the first major effort of a Tamil studio to attempt an all-India distribution. The films nationwide success encouraged many others, e.g. AVM and Prasad, to follow suit. It is a period adventure film sometimes compared with The Prisoner of Zenda (1922, 1937). The basic plot is one of sibling rivalry between two princes, the good Veer Singh (Radha) and the bad Shashank (Ranjan). The object of desire and bone of contention between them is state power equated with the possession of the village maiden Chandralekha (Rajkumar). In the process, the hero and the heroine become circus artistes. The villain grabs the girl and enforces a wedding. She agrees provided there be an elaborae drum dance; the enormous drums, in the Indian Cinemas most anthologised sequence, contain the heros soldiers who burst out of the drums after the dance overwhelming the baddies followed by the longest sword duel in Indian cinema. Although the genreitself was not new to the Tamil cinema, its aggressive redifinition of entertainment ideology after Independence. Many of the spectacular dance sequences can be seen as continuations of the choreography in Uday Shankars Kalpana (1948), shot earlier that year Gemini by many of the same techinicians. The choreography was arranged by Jaya Shankar, Mrs Rainbird, Natanam Nataraj and Niranjala Devi. T.G. Raghavacharya started directing the film and probably shot most of it. Vasan took over direction later. According to Randor Guy, the intial plot stem from G.M.W.Reynolds novel Robert Maccaire, or The French Bandit in England (1848). V.A.K. Ranga Rao notes that the films music shows influences from Carnatic, Hindustani, Bharatanatyam Latin American and Portugese folk music as well as Strauss waltz. The chours by the circus members apparently adapts the Donkey Secrnade from R.Z. Leonards film The Firefly (1937). Check out this page for more updates on Chandralekha.