Indrasabha 1932

Indrasabha is a 1932 Indian Bollywood fantasy film released on 1932. The film is directed by J. J. Madan.
Big-budget adaptation of Sayed Aga Hasan Amanats Indrasabha written in 1853 for the Lucknow court of Nawab Wajid Ali shah. The often staged played had elaborated the Rahas Style, adapted from the Ras-Lila from of Hindi folk theatre and brought specific music and dance conventions into Urdu prose theatre. This new style gradually amalgamated, says Somnath Gupta (1969), The Hindi Devmala [Hindi Pantheon] with Islami Ravaiyat and crystallised into a plot structure revolving around a benevolent king whose moral fibre is tested by celestial powers as they cause an apsara (a fairy) to appear before him as a fallen woman begging for mercy. The language assimilated the Urdu ghazal, Hindustani, Brajbhasa and dialects usually spoken by women (zanani boli). As performed in the Parsee Theatre, this performance style also absorbed aspects of European opera, esp. its neo-classical visuals which already contained a measure of baroque Orientalism. The 70 songs, familiar from the stage productions, suggested an Indian equvalent of the Ziefield Follies. Madan also drew on his Italina connections (Savitri, 1923) and asked his Italian cinematographer to model the complex choral mise en scene on the venerable Italian epics. The film repeated the popular singing duo of Nissar and kajjan from Shririn Farhad (1931). Macroni later shot and probably directed the Tamil feature Vimochanam (1939). [Source: Encyclopeadia of Indian Cinema] Check out this page for more updates on Indrasabha.