In the 1960s, the influence of Western cultures was there in all spheres of life and English movies were no exception because, firstly, the duration would be short – usually all movies would end in one and half-hour’ time maximum. In rare cases would the duration go up to two hours. And – there would be a story that would be held together tautly by the actors who excelled in their spheres. In contrast Indian movies, especially the Hindi ones, would have heroines running around trees.
Addition attractions were the beautiful locales and the carefree lifestyles that were a far cry from the rigid rules that had to be followed in the Indian context.
A pet genre for me was the Westerns with cowboys riding horses with guns in their holsters, sharp shooters who could shoot by just observing movements in the overhead mirrors installed in the bars and knife throwers who could hit a target blindfolded.
Some of the best were Four for Texas with Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Ursula Andress, the Magnificent Seven, Gunfight at the OK Corral, For a few Dollars More, Cat Ballou etcetera. Each of these was a movie that I would want to see again and again. (to be continued …)
No comments:
Post a Comment