Hunterwali featured the film industry's first stunt queen Mary Evans aka Fearless Nadia
New Delhi:
Tent cinema has returned to theCapital thanks to the ongoing Indian cinema centenary festivalwhere the audience is enjoying the escapades of the legendaryHunterwali in a 1940s talkie and rare silent films likeDiler Jiger or Gallant Hearts (1931).
Propped up with the old tent paraphernalia, the woodenbenches and the floor mats, the audience aged from 5 to 75 arehaving a gala time 'living' the golden days of the beginning ofcinema in India.
Famous as Indian silver screen's first stunt queen,'Fearless Nadia' as Mary Evans became popularly known later,earned the nickname for her intrepid and swashbuckling trickson the screen as iconised in classics like Hunterwali (1935),Miss Frontier Mail (1936), Hurrican Hansa (1937),Hunterwali Ki Beti (1943) among others.
Hunterwali K Beti, screened at the tent facilityerected here in a homage to the pioneering days of Indiancinema, was quite a hit with the audience.
Gallant Hearts, a rare silent classic from 1931, thesame year the first Indian talkie Alam Ara was born, wasalso screened at the festival.
Septuagenarian and film collector O P Mago, who grew upin Lahore watching Punjabi films in tents and later afterPartition in Ludhiana and Delhi, was delighted to witness the"good old days" again.
"I have seen Punjabi films in tent cinema and later inLudhiana too. In Delhi, I remember seeing Dev Anand's TaxiDriver (1954). Among the silent films, I really liked theacting in Gallant Hearts as the action kept me hooked on toit," Mago told PTI.
Gallant Hearts, said to be inspired by Hollywood'sDouglas Fairbanks starrer silent Thief of Baghdad (1924), isalso one of the rare surviving prints of the early silent era,made by 'Agrawal Film Company of Poona'. The other being Fallof Slavery or Gulaminu Patan (1931) which was also screened.
Another audience member, Lyle Pearson, 72, who came toIndia first in the 1970s and befriended National Film Archivesof India's (NFAI) founder-director P K Nair, recalled the daysof tent cinema in south India with much glee.
"I have researched Indian cinema for the last 40 yearsafter I came here in the 70s. That time I saw Tamil films intent cinema in Madras (now Chennai) and though I couldn'tunderstand the language I still enjoyed it.
"And, I enjoyed watching Fall of Slavery and GallantHearts and Phalke's Kaliya Mardan. History must bepreserved and enjoyed by the next generation," Pearson toldPTI.
Film historian and curator Amrit Gangar, a core member ofthe team behind the centenary exhibition, recreated the sameatmosphere by calling everyone with "Come Come, see Indian of1920s and 1930s and feel the magic of silent era." Like theold days, the name of the films were written on a blackboardwith "Housh Full", misspelt intentionally to evoke the lostera.
In India, among the pioneers of tent cinema, the mostimportant name is that of J F Madan, a Parsi businessman whostarted 'Elphinstone Bioscope Company' in early 20th centuryin Calcutta (now Kolkata) and would do tent shows in theMaidan there. He later started the cinema halls by the name of'Elphinstone Picture Palaces'.
His 'Elphinstone' was also one of the few Indiancompanies, among other European production houses, whichfilmed the historic 1911 'Delhi Durbar' attended by KingGeorge V and Queen Mary.
His legend has survived today in the form of various'Elphinstone' theatres spread across India.
Propped up with the old tent paraphernalia, the woodenbenches and the floor mats, the audience aged from 5 to 75 arehaving a gala time 'living' the golden days of the beginning ofcinema in India.
Famous as Indian silver screen's first stunt queen,'Fearless Nadia' as Mary Evans became popularly known later,earned the nickname for her intrepid and swashbuckling trickson the screen as iconised in classics like Hunterwali (1935),Miss Frontier Mail (1936), Hurrican Hansa (1937),Hunterwali Ki Beti (1943) among others.
Hunterwali K Beti, screened at the tent facilityerected here in a homage to the pioneering days of Indiancinema, was quite a hit with the audience.
Gallant Hearts, a rare silent classic from 1931, thesame year the first Indian talkie Alam Ara was born, wasalso screened at the festival.
Septuagenarian and film collector O P Mago, who grew upin Lahore watching Punjabi films in tents and later afterPartition in Ludhiana and Delhi, was delighted to witness the"good old days" again.
"I have seen Punjabi films in tent cinema and later inLudhiana too. In Delhi, I remember seeing Dev Anand's TaxiDriver (1954). Among the silent films, I really liked theacting in Gallant Hearts as the action kept me hooked on toit," Mago told PTI.
Gallant Hearts, said to be inspired by Hollywood'sDouglas Fairbanks starrer silent Thief of Baghdad (1924), isalso one of the rare surviving prints of the early silent era,made by 'Agrawal Film Company of Poona'. The other being Fallof Slavery or Gulaminu Patan (1931) which was also screened.
Another audience member, Lyle Pearson, 72, who came toIndia first in the 1970s and befriended National Film Archivesof India's (NFAI) founder-director P K Nair, recalled the daysof tent cinema in south India with much glee.
"I have researched Indian cinema for the last 40 yearsafter I came here in the 70s. That time I saw Tamil films intent cinema in Madras (now Chennai) and though I couldn'tunderstand the language I still enjoyed it.
"And, I enjoyed watching Fall of Slavery and GallantHearts and Phalke's Kaliya Mardan. History must bepreserved and enjoyed by the next generation," Pearson toldPTI.
Film historian and curator Amrit Gangar, a core member ofthe team behind the centenary exhibition, recreated the sameatmosphere by calling everyone with "Come Come, see Indian of1920s and 1930s and feel the magic of silent era." Like theold days, the name of the films were written on a blackboardwith "Housh Full", misspelt intentionally to evoke the lostera.
In India, among the pioneers of tent cinema, the mostimportant name is that of J F Madan, a Parsi businessman whostarted 'Elphinstone Bioscope Company' in early 20th centuryin Calcutta (now Kolkata) and would do tent shows in theMaidan there. He later started the cinema halls by the name of'Elphinstone Picture Palaces'.
His 'Elphinstone' was also one of the few Indiancompanies, among other European production houses, whichfilmed the historic 1911 'Delhi Durbar' attended by KingGeorge V and Queen Mary.
His legend has survived today in the form of various'Elphinstone' theatres spread across India.
