Putting up a good fight

Stunt films in the 1930s had become so important that even actresses like 'Sulochana', 'Durga Khote' and 'Glorious Gauhar' had started taking part in them.

May 21, 2016 01:45 am | Updated September 12, 2016 08:22 pm IST

21th_aditi

21th_aditi

In 1939, a film called Service Ltd. released in Imperial Cinema, Bombay. The protagonist of the film, a rich young woman, decides to use her wealth to start a private detective agency named Service Ltd. She quickly gains success in minor cases before getting involved with a gang of counterfeiters. She eventually leads the cops to the gang. Service Ltd. is significant for two reasons: first, it featured a female detective in the lead role; second, it marked the gradual waning of films with women action stars who dominated the 1930s. In the 1940s, action cinema started losing its popularity. When the genre surged back in the 1960s, women got marginalised and male stars, like wrestler-actor Dara Singh, came to dominate the field.

Popular but lowbrow Women detectives were rare, but not altogether new in Hindi cinema. Before Service Ltd. came another film called Double Cross, which was about a female quasi-detective who fights diamond thieves and fraudsters and saves her uncle from financial ruin. Unfortunately, these two films did not do very well at the box office: while Service Ltd. was dubbed mediocre, Double Cross was described as a “Western quickie…[a film where] only Fatty Prasad’s work is good” ( FilmIndia , Nov. 1939). Fatty Prasad was the name of the actor playing the comic relief.

It was from the late 1920s that action films with female leads had started gaining popularity. The trend reached its zenith in the mid-1930s, when Fearless Nadia’s Hunterwali became a major success. Most people know Fearless Nadia, an excellent action star who did most of her own stunts. Besides talent, there was another reason for Nadia’s stardom: there was a good demand for stunt films. Nevertheless, it is important to remember that the action scenario was still largely dominated by men like Master Vithal — also known as the Indian Douglas Fairbanks — and Raja Sandow and Inamdar, both of whom were reputed pehelvans (wrestlers). The success of women was certainly an anomaly against this male-dominated backdrop.

The earliest-known action star with several box office successes was Ermeline, but only two of her films stand out: Azad Abla and Insaan Aur Shaitaan. There were a few more action stars such as Miss Padma, Gulab, and Indurani whose films saw moderate success. Padma first appeared in Wadia Movietone’s Dilruba Daku . Later, her success in Amazon made J.B.H. Wadia realise the potential of action films with female leads, which eventually led to the discovery of Fearless Nadia. According to Valentina Vitali’s book Hindi Action Cinema: Industries, Narratives, Bodies , Gulab was first mentioned with Ermeline in a film called Veer Keshri (1928). Later, she did films like Black Heart and Hero No 1 where she played a gun-toting masked vigilante princess and a western gunslinger, respectively.

Mohan Pictures made several action thrillers right up to the mid-1940s, but their films were labelled as unintelligent and vulgar. They specialised in historical action films and among them Midnight Mail (1940) was a success. Many of their films had titles similar to HunterwaliChashmawali, Cyclewali, Taxiwali, and so on.

Stunt films in the 1930s had become so important that even actresses like Sulochana, Durga Khote, and Glorious Gauhar started taking part in them. The genre of action films, though popular, was not considered respectable. These films were always considered lowbrow. By 1939, stunt films were already described as “nothing but sheer ludicrousness and absurdities… In order to make things more nauseating, some ‘humour’ is thrown in, employing the services of haggard-looking buffoons.” ( Mirror , March 1939). Wadia Movietone’s film Jungle King was heavily criticised for incorrect information such as a land called Suryapur in Africa. Action films were even accused of lowering the intelligence of the masses, although the criticisms would not have mattered as long as the films continued to make money.

Decline of the genre The situation changed when stunt films and thrillers started failing at the box office. One of the reasons for the failure, perhaps, was overdoing the masked vigilante theme and the repetitive hackneyed plots. Stunt films have traditionally never been a feminine zone, but occasionally women have entered this space. Critics might have labelled them as “disgustingly immoral, and catering to sex-starved audiences” ( Mirror , December 1939), but these films are important reminders that women played a major role in early Indian cinema.

Aditi Sen is a historian.

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