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| Important Films
Earlier films List of all films Post Baiju Bawra Meena Kumari After Parineeta Saheb Biwi aur Ghulam Pakeezah Leatherface |
Meena Kumari and films - Perhaps the film journey of Meena Kumari started very early in her life when she started in her first movie in 1939 at the age of six. She was too young to work in films but she had to do the work due to severe financial problems in the family. And that is where she learnt her the ABCs of life - with Mahesh Bhatt's Leatherface in 1939. The fortune and future of this star was not imaginable at that time. The same Baby Meena grew into Meena Kuamri and was a super star with the movie calles Baiju Bawra which brought her the first ever best actress filmfare award of India. She was flooded with films and a bit richer also. Life had given its fruits of hard work. Interestingly in her later life she chose to work in serious and sad roles in films and that is difficult to understand for many. Perhaps a lost childhood was in the subconscious and after her separation she finally resigned and submitted to the sadness given by life. The same feeling is very clearly visible in her films. But this does not mean that she was not good at light hearted roles and fact is that she was excellent in her lighter movies as well. Perhaps we can classify roughly half her movies as sad but that is what gave her fame and recognition and she slowly and steadily changed into the famous "tragedy queen". So famous that today the name Meena Kumari and tragedy are synonymous in the Indian heart and mind. There was reason for this and she was in fact capable of crying at any moment without any artificial aids and that is not for all. She has projected tragedy in a way no other one can in ages to come. And today every actress wants to be a Meena Kumari at any cost. Such was the magic of tragedy and Meena Kumari. But she could smile equally well and her smiles, though rare in her later films, are a sunshine. She is really radiant even her smiles. And even one smile in a film was sufficient for the viewer. I do not advocate the synonym tragedy queen but I would rather say that she was excellent at tragedy roles and she was good at many many many roles. That is what is Meena Kumari. That she did and chose tragedy roles gives us no right to give a new name to her and I would rather her be the beautiful Meena Kumari who was a beautiful actress. It is very difficult to separate the real life of Meena Kumari due to the same fact as films have apparently "followed her" since she started to just speak properly. It is known that she did not want to work in films and she did not want to work even in her first film when she was just six but the question raised by father was simple - "what else?" Life was dictated by poverty and she had to work. Talented as she was, she refined the art very much and after Baiju Bawra, was a super star and a legendary actress later on. As a person she has been a very dear person in the film industry and films saw every aspect of Meena Kumari. They saw her young, they saw her growing, they saw her marry, they saw her life and they saw her sorrows. They were her most faithful companions which gave her name, fame, money as well as company and Meena Kumari could not do without them. And they seem to have assimilated her greatness for all times! Yet her relation with films was a love hate one and she could not come out of films nor she could fully assimilate the idea though films liked her too much. The love hate relationship continued since her first film at the age of six. |