New Delhi: An icon in the world of film making, Vijay Anand was more than just a name in Indian cinema. He was an institution.
Known for films such as “Jewel Thief”, “Guide”, “Teesri Manzil”, ”Kala Bazar”, Johnny Mera Naam” etc, today marks the legendary film maker’s 88th birth anniversary.
A man who sought to be as limitless as he could in the scope of film making, Vijay Anand was a special personality indeed. A master of his art and craft, he moved beyond merely the commercial aspect and delved further into the more creative and artistic aspect of film making, thus making him a director with a wide vision and great creativity.
Throughout his lifetime, Vijay Anand worked with a bunch of great artists such as Dharmendra, Hema Malini, Prem Chopra, Waheeda Rehman, S.D Burman, Kalyanji – Anandji, though the biggest ones he worked with were his brothers Dev Anand and Chetan Anand, with whom he frequently collaborated with for some of his biggest and most famous productions.
Vijay Anand is primarily remembered as a noir director for films such as “Jewel Thief”, and “Johnny Mera Naam”. It would be however highly unfair to classify him as that alone, for Vijay Anand was far more than that. Extremely diverse, Vijay Anand was able to cut across the barriers of genres, his ideas flowed like water and in a time when film making followed linear patterns he chose an alternative method, of experimentation.
Whether it was noir, romance, drama, musical, Vijay Anand was a masterful director who simply could not be emulated. An expressive and sensitive storyteller, his direction followed a nuanced technical finesse which followed different modes of expression. With the usage of stellar cinematography, unique screenplay and meticulous camerawork in regards to cuts, shoots and angles, Vijay Anand let the screenplay speak for itself.
Another feature was the music. While his films always had great music to accompany the plot, what really enriched and spiced it up was the fact that Vijay Anand let the music be a tool for enriching storytelling rather than simply a sonic device for entertainment. He also knew just what he wanted in terms of his aesthetics.
Furthermore, Vijay Anand was meticulous in recording the videos for his songs, taking extensive cuts and long shots to really bring out the poetry of his songs and merge the landscape and the actors into one, thus bringing to life the characters in the songs and the film alike.
Taking all of these facts together, Vijay Anand was a man who was truly ahead of his time, and is thus still remembered till date and will be continued to do so.
He won four Filmfare awards, including for Best Director and Best Dialogue for “Guide” in 1965.
Vijay Anand died on February 23, 2004 in Mumbai due to a heart attack. He was 70 years old.
UNI ANV RN
