100 years of Guru Dutt: The movie maestro who was never bothered about critics

Time of India

a day ago

Guru Dutt was born on July 9, 1925. He made his film debut in 1951.
'That rare thing of commercially successful films that engage you intellectually, too — that was
Guru Dutt
's cinema,' Yasser Usman, author of Guru Dutt: An Unfinished Story, once said.
His words ring true for anyone who has watched Pyaasa (1957), Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam (1962), Kaagaz Ke Phool (1959), Mr & Mrs 55 (1955), or Chaudhvin Ka Chand (1960).
Born on July 9, 1925, Guru Dutt - whose birth centenary is being marked today - emerged in the early 1950s and quickly found a deep connect with his audience.
I
n a 1956 interview, at the peak of his early success, Dutt had said, 'I don't want what they call the Guru Dutt style story anymore. I want new themes, daring themes. Hitherto, I preferred to stick to insubstantial themes, in order to perfect a screen style of my own.'
He meant it. With Pyaasa, he shattered conventions, asking the haunting question: What is the meaning of art and life itself? In Dutt's world, love didn't always triumph - because it didn't always in life.
On his 100th birth anniversary, many echo what his close friend Dev Anand once said, 'He should have made more films.'
Guru Dutt died at just 39, but his cinema endures - lyrical, melancholic, and ahead of its time. As his mother Vasanthi Padukone recalled in the documentary 'In Search of Guru Dutt', 'He had an inquisitive mind...
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He never listened to anyone and would do what pleased his heart.'
In a short period of time, Guru Dutt became a master filmmaker and actor.
WHAT GURU DUTT'S CONTEMPORARIES SAID ABOUT HIM
He was his own critic:
Raj Khosla
It is one thing to love and another to say I love you. Guru Dutt loved but could never express it. That was his enigma. The whole thing came out in his films. You couldn't read through him but I read one thing, he was really lost: Lost in filmmaking, lost to life. It's his skill that I learnt, the use of the face, the eyes more than body movements.
And the use of close-ups – they tell the main story. He never bothered about critics.
He was his own critic and knew where he was going wrong.
He was a man of few words: Abrar Alvi
Guru Dutt was a man of few words. He was not a very communicative person. But very early on I realised that he had a habit of changing a scene even when he was in the process of shooting it. He was the sort of director who was never happy with his writers.
Guru Dutt gave Indian cinema masterpieces like Pyaasa and Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam.
He was a master of self-criticism: VK Murthy
He was an ordinary man from a middle class family.
He was a master of self-criticism. If he didn't like a scene, he would re-shoot even after the rushes, which is unheard of even today. Like all creative people, he was very demanding of his co-workers.
He was particular about his songs: Majrooh Sultanpuri
Dutt was particular about a few things. One was the vocabulary, the language and the manner in which a character speaks is present in the lyrics too or not. He would also see that it isn't dull and that the opening music is not too long.
He would cut to songs from dialogues directly.
He was my only friend: Dev Anand
So many people came into my life, but Guru and I shared something different. Our journey began together. I've always said he was my only friend.
'
A master of cinematic art'
Guru Dutt didn't just inspire his contemporaries—his influence has rippled through generations of filmmakers and actors.
Remembering the maestro on his 100th birth anniversary, filmmaker Mani Ratnam said, 'For me, Guru Dutt is the master who first blended mainstream cinema with aesthetics and sensibility.
He brought poetry into popular cinema with outstanding music and song picturisation. His language of cinema remains a great source of inspiration till today.'
I can watch Pyaasa anytime because it's a timeless film. I just loved Pyaasa – the way it is shot, performed, and edited is brilliant. It's one of those timeless films that I can watch anytime. I have always been inspired by his films due to the complexity of the characters and layered narratives.
– Pratik Gandhi, actor
MK Raina, theatre actor and director, added, "Guru Dutt was a master of cinematic art, who crafted a filmmaking tradition that stands as a school in itself. Along with cinematographer VK Murthy, he created an imagery on screen defined by a remarkable play of light – whether it was the lyrical framing in Jaane Kya Tune Kahi from Pyaasa or Waqt Ne Kiya Kya Haseen Sitam in Kaagaz Ke Phool.
His background in dance, his training in theatre and sense of rhythm translated into a cinematic language that was uniquely his own.
There was maturity in every dialogue, movement, every track and in the panning of the camera."
In Pyaasa, he makes the point that this world only remembers you after you die:
Imtiaz Ali
Imtiaz Ali said that Guru Dutt, "created masterpiece moments of Indian cinema."
Film director Imtiaz Ali praised the late filmmaker, saying, "I love Guru Dutt's depiction of poetry in films. He was a true artiste because he would take poetry from great poets like Sahir Ludhianvi and Kaifi Azmi and translate them into magnificent and unforgettable cinematic moments like Yeh duniya agar mil bhi jaaye toh kya hai or Waqt ne kiya kya haseen sitam.
He created masterpiece moments of Indian cinema, and this is the highest achievement for any filmmaker and pinnacle of Dutt's contribution to cinema.
In Pyaasa, I cannot get over the moment when he stands in the doorway as people commemorate his poetry in a big hall allegedly posthumously thinking that he's dead. He makes the point that this world only remembers you after you die and when you are alive, you are never appreciated.
'Yeh mehlon, yeh takhton, yeh taajon ki duniya' inspires this moment. I try to imbibe that quality of his in my films, to translate poetry into cinematic moments.
At that time this sort of conceptualisation was not done, Guru Dutt made that possible.
As a director, he taught filmmakers how to write using the camera: Sudhir Mishra
Sudhir Mishra's favourite films of Guru Dutt include Pyaasa, Kagaz Ke Phool, Chaudvin Ka Chand, and Baaz.
Filmmaker Sudhir Mishra expressed his fondness for Guru Dutt film Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam. "My grandmother could relate to Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam because my grandfather left her and remarried.
So she took me along to watch the film each time it re-released. I must have been 12 or 13 years old and watched it at least 20 times. Abrar Alvi is credited as director, but it has the Guru Dutt stamp all over it. It's a personal film yet a historical epic, a story of trapped desires, sensuality, betrayal and human condition.
Everytime I watch the film, I discover something new. Everything is so poetically expressed," he said.
"Guru Dutt as a director taught us filmmakers how to write using the camera. Filmmaking is not just shooting a scene multiple times and going to the editor too, it's much beyond that," concluded Mishra.
'Nothing could have saved him, he did not want to be saved'
Guru Dutt and Waheeda Rehman in a film still.
Waheeda Rehman
once reflected on Dutt's untimely death. She said that while God had given him everything, contentment was the one thing he was denied. 'He was never satisfied, and I think he knew he would never be satisfied – that life would remain for him nothing more than a chain of successes and failures,' she said.
Waheeda was unsure whether his death was accidental or intentional, but she had a haunting feeling that 'nothing could have saved him, he did not want to be saved.
' Dutt died on October 10, 1964. 'In his death,' Waheeda said, 'the film industry has lost a great director, humanity has lost a man of compassion, and I have lost a great friend.'
Guru Dutt's Timeless Tracks
"In the 1950s, Guru Dutt pioneered a new language of cinema that gave film songs the artistic respect they deserved.
From a small streak of light and heavy shadows to the movement as minute as that of an eyelid to the wide panning shot on the tracks, each frame was immaculate. Together with cinematographer VK Murthy, he elevated the songs in films to an art form, which became the signature of Guru Dutt's storytelling ," said Professor Milind Damle, FTII.
He recently took a course on appreciating Guru Dutt's songs at Triveni Kala Sangam.
Tadbeer se bigdi hui taqdeer bana de (Baazi)
Waqt ne kiya, kya haseen sitam/ Tum rahe na tum, hum rahe na hum (Kaagaz Ke Phool)
Jaane wo kaise log the jinke pyar ko pyar mila (Pyaasa)
Jaane kahan mera jigar gaya ji (Mr & Mrs 55)
Yeh duniya agar mil bhi jaye toh (Pyaasa)
A nationwide retrospective showcasing Dutt's timeless classics, meticulously restored in 4K by National Film Development Corporation Ltd. (NFDC) and National Film Archive of India (NFAI), will be screened at theatres from August 8 to 10. The centrepiece of this tribute is the premiere of the 4K restored version of Dutt's iconic film Pyaasa, to be held on August 6, commemorating the maestro's 100th birth anniversary.
– Inputs from Shivika Manchanda, Soumitra Das, Roopa Radhakrishnan, Renuka Vyavahare and Natasha Coutinho