The Coronavirus pandemic is looking to be the biggest shutdown ever for Hindi cinema with the worst seen before being in 2009 when there was no major release for around 2 months though small films did release on limited screens. This is going to be a longer shutdown if we go by China where cinemas have some chance of opening in a few weeks time which would mean a 3 month shutdown. It is being reported that the biggest theatre in Wuhan where the pandemic started was disinfected yesterday getting ready to open up.

So with the huge problems in US and Europe, the 3 month period looks a minimum for this shutdown and its not that too if everything goes back to normal as soon as cinemas open up. There is fear in the industry that this will change cinema forever for the worse but that's an unlikely scenario. The only horrible scenario is that a vaccine for this pandemic proves hard to find as that will for sure change cinema forever. But considering where medical science is around the world today, you would expect someone somewhere to find one.

Obviously the industry in this scenario takes the negative side as they see films with lower budgets and stars cutting fees to help out when that is not probably the need of the hour as the audience that was there has not run away. However, there is a huge global pandemic which does not allow socializing and eventually things will come back to how it was before. However, there is no time frame as to when that'll happen. Its always weird the industry always expected stars to cut prices in bad times but that has never really happened. It is all supply and demand and these prices are not forced. Also its a totally star driven industry and until you find the technique or content to drive the industry, then star prices will only go one way and that is up.

The last shutdown in 2009 did see higher occupancy at multiplexes and that was even though 2009 did not have huge event films. But that was not a health scare also so the likely scenario is that the higher occupancy will come this time as well due to pent up demand. But it will not be straight away and may take some time but eventually they will be higher as the health risks diminish.

There have been four major shutdowns in the last fifty years or so and after each one, there has been an uptick in average box office occupancy for a period. In March 1968 there was a shutdown of releases and shoots for 19 days due to high rental charges in North and CP, CI, Rajasthan. The mega BLOCKBUSTER RAM AUR SHYAM was one week away from a silver jubilee in many theatres when this shutdown came. Post the shutdown there was a line of big HITS and successful films.

In October 1986, there was a halt of releases in Mumbai due to huge taxes which were around 170% in Maharashtra. Films did continue to release in other circuits and DOSTI DUSHMANI and INSAAF KI AWAAZ proved to be HITS during the strike while NAGINA, which released a week after the strike was halted, was a blockbuster. The tax was so bad that there were some films having a 10 lakh total GROSS collections and the share to the distributor was just one lakh. This bandh lasted 31 days.

The tax problem in Maharashtra returned in January 1997 and there was a shutdown for a month with no major releases. The state government had bought down entertainment tax to 50% in September 1984 and it was going back to 100% from January 1997 which led to cinemas shutting in Maharashtra and no big releases. The casualty was AJAY which only had a one week run in Maharashtra. When the cinemas opened up in February, there was a flood of grossers like JUDWAA, HERO NO 1, ZIDDI and KOYLA.

Then in 2009, there was the longest strike due to a revenue sharing issue between multiplexes and distributors/producers. The cinemas did remain open so there was no causalities but there was not a major release for almost 3 months. All the chains saw better average occupancy for six months after the strike then what they saw for six months prior to the strike.

So there is hope that cinema will come back stronger when the things are back to normal though it will take time as all the other closures were industry problems and here its a huge global issue. A good result will be if things get going sometime in the third quarter but due to westerns countries having the worst of the pandemic, the fourth quarter may be when the bigger films come and there could be a line of them.

Roshmila Bhattacharya (MUMBAI MIRROR; December 7, 2017)

He was always racing against time. In September 2011, when I dropped in at his office, Dev Anand, who’d just turned 88, told me in his inimitable style, “The mind never grows old but always urges you to surge ahead.” He was all charged about Chargesheet, his banner Navketan’s 37th release, and was planning to return to Nepal for a sequel to Hare Rama Hare Krishna. But his plans of romancing life and cinema came to an abrupt halt two months later when, on December 3, death tiptoed into his hotel room in London and snatched him away while he was asleep.

Six years later, I still can’t imagine Dev saab lying peacefully somewhere, but I can see him sprinting down Churchgate station to catch a local. He’d missed a train in the ‘40s, but the mad dash had caught the eye of Shahid Latif sitting in another train. Latif was directing Ziddi based on his wife Ismat Chughtai’s short story and suggested Dev who’d just wrapped up three films with Prabhat, drop by the Bombay Talkies studio to meet the “boss”, Ashok Kumar. To his delight, his idol not only offered him the Ziddi role supposedly written with him in mind, but also took a shine to him and would sometimes drop him home in his two-seater MG.

Ziddi was a surprise hit and made the struggling actor an overnight star. Dev saab bought himself a Hillman Minx and drove it down to the studio to show it off to Ashok Kumar. To his surprise, though the boss’s car was in the parking lot, the studio was shut. “It was January 30, 1948, and Mahatma Gandhi had been assassinated. The country was in mourning,” reminisces his close associate Mohan Churiwala.

Almost two decades later, he repaid his debt to Ashok Kumar by casting him in a role contrary to his established image in a spy thriller based on a K A Narayan story revolving around a ‘jewel thief’ whose identity is unmasked only towards the end. “Both Dev saab and Goldie saab (director-brother Vijay Anand) were looking for an actor with a ‘clean’ image to enhance the suspense, which is why they thought of Ashok Kumar. But when Goldie saab met Dadamoni who had just recovered from a heart surgery, he was far from excited about playing a baddie even though the film revolved around him. Goldie saab assured him that he wouldn’t be required to do any action and the schedule would be planned around him so he could report late, break for lunch at 1 pm, enjoy a siesta before shooting again till 5 pm. It was only then that he gave his nod,” informs Churiwala. On the first day, Goldie made his priorities clear by announcing lunch break half an hour before schedule, minutes after Vyjayanthimala had pulled into the studio fashionably late, because he did not want to inconvenience an ailing Dadamoni. His concern paid off. Jewel Thief was one of Ashok Kumar’s most memorable acts and with puckish humour, Goldie saab threw his audience a clue by not clubbing him with the other actors in the ‘cast’ category, but putting him at the top of the credits which read ‘Ashok Kumar in Dev Anand’s Jewel Thief’. Few got the hint.

Churiwala recalls a dialogue from the film’s climax in which Ashok Kumar lauds Dev Anand’s character, Vinay/Prince Amar, who he’d believed to be dead, saying, “Tum acting bahut achcha kar lete ho,” to which Dev saab responds, “Badhiya badhiya actor ki sohbat mein rekhar thodi bahut acting to insaan seekh hi jaata hai.” His reply was a tribute to the master actor from whom he had picked up his craft. “Dev saab idolised Dadamoni to whom he owed his big break and regretted he hadn’t responded to his last call, a couple of days before his demise (December 10, 2001) requesting him to drop by. A busy Dev saab thought he had time and lived to rue his decision,” sighs Churiwala.

Today, both the legends are gone but their Jewel Thief which opened on October 27, 1967, remains unforgettable even after 50 years. One still remembers Dadamoni’s ‘invisible’ baddie and its hero who despite his mental torment, was the picture of sartorial elegance in checkered shirts, corduroy suits and the trademark Jewel Thief cap. “The cap he picked up in Copenhagen, the rest of his wardrobe in London. To the end Dev saab was a style icon, making sure even his handkerchief was one of its kind, like Dadamoni and him,” Churiwala concludes.

Roshmila Bhattacharya (MUMBAI MIRROR; January 5, 2015)

Ashok Kumar who was expected to follow in the footsteps of his greatgrandfather, grandfather, father and uncles, was studying law in Kolkata. But after seeing films like Chandidas and Puran Bhagat, he admitted to his college principal that he'd rather be a director than the sixth lawyer in the Ganguly family. When his brother-in-law, Shashadhar Mukherjee, who was working at Bombay Talkies Studio, promised to set up a meeting with his "boss", Himanshu Rai, Kumudlal as he was called then, used the Rs 36 his father had sent him for the second year law exams, to buy a train ticket and landed in Mumbai on January 28, 1934.

He didn't impress Rai's German director, Franz Osten, and was put to work in the camera department. He quickly progressed to editing and then became lab assistant. One day, while taking a cigarette break, he looked up to find Rai staring at him and was abruptly told to walk across the room. Just when he was expecting to be fired, he was informed that he would be replacing Najam-ul-Hasan who had eloped with Rai's actress-wife Devika Rani till she was convinced to come back. Jeevan Naiya was followed by Achhut Kanya, Savitri, Kangan, Bandhan, Jhoola and Kismet, and the reluctant actor was suddenly a superstar.

But after Rai's death, a conflict with Devika Rani lead to him walking out of the studio with Shashadhar who founded his own studio, Filmistan. When Bombay Talkies came up for sale, Ashok Kumar wanted to buy it. "But baba didn't have the money, having already bought an entire building in Kala Ghoda from an English gentleman. It came with a music shop, S Rose & Company. After the accounts were audited, he ended up with an unexpected bounty of fifteen thousand pounds from the shop with which he bought the studio and turned producer," reminisces his daughter Bharti.

Shaheed Latif's 1948 film, Ziddi, based on his wife, Ismat Chughtai's short story, was adapted with the actor-producer in mind but a mad dash down Churchgate Station landed Dev Anand his first break. He was running to catch a train which was just pulling out when he heard someone call out to him. It was Shaheed sitting with Ismat in a waiting train. He asked him what he was doing and Dev who had just wrapped up three films with Prabhat Studio, admitted that he was now looking for work. After a pointed nudge from his begum, the director told him to stop by Bombay Talkies the next day. He was taken to meet the "boss" whom Dev Anand idolised. He had been heart-broken when he couldn't catch a show of Kismet despite waiting in an endless queue.

"Dev saab told Dadamoni that since he was his fan, he wouldn't address him as boss or sir but would call him by his name," informs Mohan Churiwala, a close associate of the late actor.

Ashok Kumar liked the young man's confidence and on the spur of the moment, offered him Ziddi, asking him how much he wanted as his remuneration to which Dev Anand replied, "My fee will be people saying that you have given the industry a star." That answer sealed the deal for him.

On his way out, he ran into Nasir Khan, Dilip Kumar's younger brother who also lived on Pali Hill and whom he'd often bump into at the bus stop. The two had quickly become friends. Nasir was surprised to find Dev at the studio. "Without alluding to the meeting with Ashok Kumar, Dev saab told him that he had come for some work. Later he learnt that Nasir had been in contention for the same role. They never spoke about it," says Churiwala.

The small budget, black-and-white film, released a year after Independence, was a surprise hit. It launched Dev Anand's career and he never forgot it.

Two decades later, he approached Ashok Kumar to play the title role in Navketan's Jewel Thief. Director Vijay Anand wanted him because he didn't look like a typical villain. He jumped at the prospect of playing a negative role and the rest is box-office history. "The original print was lost but MM Video in Karachi had a VHS from which a print was made. En route to London, I showed Dev saab a clipping of the song, 'Marne Ki Duayen Kyun Maangun' from the film and he was thrilled," recalls Churiwala.

It was Kishore Kumar's first break as a playback singer. He'd been rejected several times till Ziddi's composer, Khemchand Prakash, heard him and offered him "Marne Ki Duayen". He sang in his idol, KL Saigal's style and lived up to Khemchand's prophecy that one day he would rule the music world.

Roshmilla Bhattacharya (MUMBAI MIRROR; March 10, 2015)