Johny Mera Naam

In one of my earlier posts titled 'Jhonny Gaddar', I have reflected my lack of knowledge about Vijay Anand (as a thriller maestro) to whom the film was dedicated. Now, after watching Jhony Mera Naam and reading a few articles on him from different sources and knowing about his other films, I have understood why he is called thriller maestro.
Anyways, Johny Mera Naam is a suspense thriller released in 1970, a time when such movies were losing their postition in bollywood to the romantic Rajesh Khanna films. The late half of 60s saw many thriller dramas that are always remembered for their art. Johny Mera Naam is one amongst them, the other notables include Waqt, Gumnaam, Teesri Manzil, Mera Saaya, Humraaz, An Evening in Paris, Jewel Thief, Ittefaq and others. This film could also be kept under the other hit genre of hindi movies, the 'lost and found' ones which became a regular feature in indian cinemas in the mid and late 70s with the upsurge of Amitabh Bachchan.
Johny Mera Naam is a crime movie with revenge, romance, comedy, suspense every single thing that a movie needs to be a hit. I think it must be one of the very first occasions where a femme fatale gets a place in hindi cinema. The song 'Husn ke Lakhon rang' has a charecteristic essence of Vijay Anand's style with a most possible seductive voice of Asha Bhonsle.
Talking about the songs, Kalyanji-Anandji's music is good, the singing better and the picturisation special. Nothing about the film is complete without mentioning the extremely interesting type of picturisation of the song 'Pal Bhar ke liye'. Dev Anand running from one window to the other and Hema Malini closing each one of that and while all this camera rolling without cuts is beautiful, you really got to expect such unique song picturisation while watching Vijay Anand's movie. I can't resist myself from mentioning about 'Dil ka bhanwar kare pukar' being picturised wholly inside the Qutub Minar.
I.S. Johar also needs a mention here for his award winning triple role as comedian in this film. He comes in the film with packages and never fails to bring smile to the audience. For Hema Malini, being her 2nd film, it was very important and with her strong show here she deservedly made her place in bollywood and also in everyone's heart. Pran is as usual great and Prem Nath has looked as ferocious as he could rightly for his character.
All in all, a great movie to enjoy.............a must watch.......