DEV ANAND’S MEGA FILM CENSOR

‘DEV’ INSPIRES DEV TO CREATE ENLIGHTENING MUSIC FOR A STORMY SUBJECT
I knew Dev was deeply involved in the final stages of completing his most ambitious film, Censor, a film certain to raise eye-brows all over soon and may be major controversies in the time to come. I know Dev doesn’t like being disturbed when he is working eighteen hours a day on an average at the ‘young’ age of seventy-seven, thinking, walking, singing, swaying and day-dreaming (besides all his fascinating dreams every night) only about Censor which he is making the way he wants come what may or whatever the world may say. There was another small but very practical reason why I couldn’t see Dev the man I love and admire the most on earth (absolutely no exaggeration) the only man I admire on this earth, the one man I am gifted with the privilege to know so closely - the unreasonably high rates of those three-wheelers which take me right from the troubles and turmoils of the world to ‘Anand’, Dev’s recording studio and his office which is one of the most exquisite pent houses in Mumbai which once even tempted the King of Nepal who was his guest to ask if his office was his home. I don’t think any other filmmaker has an office like Dev’s office, his office where he sits all by himself and rules.

That evening something within me kept pushing me towards ‘Anand’. I had very little money but a very strong urge to meet ‘Dev’ I had not been there for a month which was a crime according to my self-made commandments. Yes, it was just the way I had thought he would be. He was busy editing some of his songs of Censor. He had just recovered from some mysterious pain in his back which couldn’t be cured by some of the best doctors but was cured within minutes by a doctor who the greatest doctors would have called a quack. That rare doctor not only cured Dev but made him do double the work, double his energy, double his enthusiasm to work, to make Censor one of the most talked-about films of our times. The rare doctor came in at the right time because Dev had to catch up with the time he had lost. It was the first time I had to seek an appointment with Dev and keeping an appointment with him in an incredible city with its maddening population and its traffic, a city like Mumbai, is not a very easy thing to do for a normal man like me. Dev was waiting for me at six, anxious, restless, pacing the floor.....

Dev is still working, editing the songs of Censor. He has not shown his songs to anyone. I don’t know why he jumps up from his chair in excitement and asks me to join him in seeing “just three of my songs, I will not show you all of them”. I am the first “outsider” to see his songs. How many privileges will you give me, Dev Sahab?

What are songs and dances doing in a serious title like Censor, I ask Dev. “It’s a serious film, no doubt, but you know I don’t believe in making serious films seriously. If you look back most of my films have been serious films but music, good music, has always been an integral part of any film of mine. There is enlightenment plus entertainment in every song in my film and Censor is no exception,” Dev says. I see the songs, all of them rich and with that stamp and style of Navketan and the enthusiasm, energy and excitement of the man and maker known for the class, the rhythm and his moving with the times. All the three songs which I heard that evening and the other three songs which he has kept as surprise have been written by his old friend, the poet Neeraj and a new poet called Venu.

The first two songs Sun meri gall and Kal to jo hum tum kal hum wahan rahenge, are picturised on Dev’s four new discoveries Hennee Kaushik, Mohini Sharma, Raja and Vinay Anand (Govinda’s nephew). The third song, Hum jo rang me aa gaye is picturised as a surprise item on Govinda who went out of his way to find time to perform an entire song and dance number “just for the love of Dev”. And Dev says” “That boy, Govinda, went out of his way to put both his time and energy into my song inspite of his very very tight schedule. I am grateful to him.” The songs like all Navketan songs are appealing, they look good on the screen, they make the actors look good, and they say so much which is the hallmark of Navketan’s songs, Dev’s music.

Dev and his unit have gone all out to make the music of his film the music that always goes with his name. The kind of music that never lets music lovers down. Negotiations are already going on with some of the top music companies and the results will be out very soon. Filmmakers are already talking about Dev’s Censor and how he has gone about making it. He started it in February 1999 and he is all ready to release the film either in July or during his birthday in the last week of September, September 26 to be precise. This film, Censor is the need of the time. Dev says, “We need to give censorship one big think before we go on with the millennium. We should be aware of the rapid changes that are taking place all around the world and in our country particularly which will force us to go with the world or get lost in some jungle where civilisation and culture will have no place. I have given expression to all these thoughts and other thoughts which are all my original thoughts about censorship after fifty years of my experience as a filmmaker and my dealing with censors and censorship. The rest, let’s see,” the ever-so-optimistic Dev says.

The pictures on this page, except for Dev, may give you an idea that Dev is making a small film with new artistes but Dev hastens to add that this is his most ambitious mega-film made at a cost of crores and with 29 major stars who are not only doing bit roles but major roles which will make the film an opus, one of the biggest films of the millennium. “That’s the feeling with which I am living day and night. That’s the feeling I always have whenever any of my films has to be released. But this time that feeling has doubled up like never before”.

That evening I went home and was caught in a sudden downpour. I was drenched to the skin. I knew I was going to be set for all that goes with “the royal flu” but again something within me made me ask “Dev” (God) to accept all my troubles as a prayer for the success of Censor. Dev, the eternal, energetic, optimist deserves a very big success at this stage of his life and career. One success and it will see the birth of a new Dev. A Dev with some more optimism, some more energy, some more life, the Dev we have been seeing for the last fifty years will have. One Dev is such a wonder. What will two Devs be? Are you listening, my dear “Dev” above? For your Dev down, your chosen one swears that CENSOR is his most ambitious and enlightened entertainers made at a cost at which he has never made any other film under the banner of Navketan. He calls it Dev’s magnum-opus and a magnum-opus not just in words but in deeds. Something so big has never been touched or tried by Dev. The last fifty years.

Samjha karo, O mere ‘Dev’. Aap ke Dev ko bachana hai aapko, kaamyaab banana hai aapko kyonki agar aapne apne hi logon ko nahin bachaya to aapke dushman uska faida uthayenge. Yeh sach aapko aapse zyadah koi nahin jaanta. Aapke Dev ko aap ek baar kaamyaabi dekar dekhiye kaise aapke kitne doosre logon ko faida hota hai. Aapne Dev Sahab ko aise hi nahi banaya. Aapka unke liye PLAN abhi poora nahi hua hai, mujhe maloom hai. Abhi aapko aur unko milkar bahut kuch karna baaki hai. Hum dekhte rahenge kyonki is baar hum chamatkar dekhna chahte hai. Dikha de ‘chamatkar’ O ‘Dev’, sirf Dev ke liye.

Ali Peter John