Madhumati

Director: Bimal Roy
Starring: Dilip Kumar, Vyjayanthimala
Music Director: Salil Chaudhury
Singers: Gulam Mohammed, Asha Bhonsle, Mubarak Begum, Mukesh, Dwijen Mukherjee, Sabita Banerjee, Manna Dey, Lata Mangeshkar

Devendra (Dilip Kumar) shelters from a storm in a deserted house and believes he hears a woman crying. Exploring the house,he finds a painting of its former owner, Raja Ugranarayan (Pran). Devendra feels he must have painted the portrait in a previous life when he was called Anand. This cues a flashback to Anand's life when he worked as a foreman on a plantation and loved a woman from the village, Madhumati (Vyjayanthimala), who died escaping from the libidinous Raja Ugranarayan (Pran). Then a trap is set for the Raja by means of another woman,Madhavi (Vyayanthimala again),who looks like the dead Madhumati and could be her reincarnation....

After high-minded and serious films like Do Bigha Zameen and socially relevant movies like Naukri, Madhumati was seen as a come-down for director Bimal Roy and a surrender to commercial cinema. But it turned out to be his biggest ever hit. Salil Chaudhary’s music is haunting, mischievous, wistful – and always melodious. Even the lesser hummed ones like Mubarak Begum’s ‘Hum Haal-E_Dil Sunayenge’ and Rafi’s ‘Toote Hue Khwabon Ne’ are gems. Lata’s ‘Aajaa Re Pardesi’ was used more than a decade later, by Hrishikesh Mukherjee, in the climax of his film Guddi.

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