Baiju Bawra (1952) :
Brief Review -
Baiju Bawra tumbles due to supernatural events and serveral flaws in writing but Immortal Music and Meena Kumari & Bharat Bhushan's performances sails it safely to the shore. Baiju Bawra often known as first big musical in Bollywood to recieve immense praise and commercial success is based on myths and historical refrences from Mughal era. In Mughal Emperor Akbar's court, young musician Baiju challenges maestro Tansen to a musical duel in order to avenge the death of his father, which he holds Tansen responsible for. But this anger is often forgotten by him because of love interest of his life, Gauri. His mind battles with two opposite aims of his life love and revenge and it leads him towards tragic incidents. The film is set in Mughal Era and therefore follows very outdated story, i mean even for its time i.e 16th century. It often misbehaves with its own target and so the character looks completely clueless. However, the immortal music and ornamental lyrics keeps it interesting. Even after that, it was supposed to loose some sense sooner or later but sadly it happens just when it starts looking reasonable and the well built scenario gets spoiled. Nevertheless, the tragic ending and decent melodrama still gives it enough space to show us brilliant outing of musical battles. Meena Kumari and Bharat Bhushan makes a solid chemistry that can be enjoyed every single time you watch the film. Supporting cast is fantastic too. The music album composed by Naushad is truly legendary. Vijay Bhatt's direction is pretty good but could have been better, especially in the ending portion. Those last 40 minutes goes over the top, otherwise Baiju Bawra would have been an outstanding film. I'm not sure but lacking historical accuracies might be the issue here.
RATING - 7/10*
By - #samthebestest.
