Story, Synopsis, Trivia, Dialogues for Paagal (1940)

Paagal is a 1940 Indian Bollywood film released on 1940. Kardar went against the studios usual brand of family melodrama with this story about a psychotic doctor in an asylum. Tricked into marry- ing Chhaya (Khatoon), believing he is to marry her more beautiful sister Parvati (Madhuri), Dr.Vasant (Kapoor), becomes a sexually obsessed maniac who injects Parvati with a drug that renders her insane. He then keeps her in his asylum where he continues to brutalise her. Intended as a critique of resurgent neo-traditionalism among the educated younger generation, the grotesque depiction of masculinity associated with modern medicine severely undercuts the implied critiqe of the methods used ot arrange marriages, while women simply remain victims. In fact, the victimisation of women is portrayed with such gusto that the film ends up raising more disturbing questions about the way grotesque maschuline sexuality pervades the very fabric of the film. Kardars Pooja (also 1940) offers a more considered treatiment of the ravages wrought by feudal sexual codes. Check out this page for more updates on Paagal.