... And here's the proof!
This is probably the first sound sample on the
Timepass pages!
One of the FIRST movies I EVER saw (I was 3, maybe 4 years old at the
time, and that was before we had our good old Tesla TV at home) was Ek
Duje Ke Liye. (1979 or 1980??) I remember very clearly that my
aunt sneaked idlis into the theater but the
usher shone his torch on us and asked us not to eat outside food in the
theater. What a ripoff. But - before I digress.
I only remember snapshots from the first time I saw this movie. Yes,
friends and neighbours, I DID watch it a second time, millions of years
later, in bits and pieces. It was after I knew that Kamal Haasan was a
giant douche, and wanted to watch him make a complete ham ass out of
himself once again in the TV room at PD Block in IISc. That was ONE
reason I saw a bit of this movie. A minor reason was to watch the ultra
hot Rati Agnihotri for a bit, but the most important reason I wanted
to watch this movie for the second time was the title song, Hum Bane,
sung by SPB and Lata. (I think? Who else has that eldritch shrill
voice?) SPB has always been a source of entertainment for us, because
of his awesomely bad southie accent when he sings Hindi songs. But he
really really went over the top in the title song to Ek Duje Ke
Liye.
A little background: the movie story is as follows. In this Romeo
and Juliet ripoff, Kamal Haasan is a southie who doesn't know
much Hindi and goes to the same college as his neighbour-cum-lover Rati
Agnihotri
who of course is a meat-eating northie. Of course, their
families don't approve of their love, so they do whatever they can to
separate them. Kamal goes away for a while, and comes back all
well-versed in all kinds of Hindi (He gives her family a demonstration,
even uses some Bambhaiyya Hindi - at least that's what the
stereotypical naukrani bai says - "Aai ga, Bambhaiyya bolto"
- which is bullshit, of course. Any half-assed dipshit who lives in
Bombay for more than a year will talk BETTER than Kemel saar did in
this film. And NO ONE, repeat, no one will ever say "Aai ga, Bambhaiyya bolto!") which
he learnt, for some bizzare
reason, while learning Bharatnatyam under Madhavi (Gult actress). So
there are two awesomely bad nuggets of Hindi movie songs before he
becomes the "language expert". One of them is the title song, the other
one, almost as good as the former, is of course the elevator love song,
Mere Jeevan Sathi. It took me a while to understand that it was
funny because he was actually reciting names of (then) famous
Hindi movies. I know, I'm dumb. Anyway, that song is awesome. It not
only features an awesomely bad SPB, it also is made up of, as I said,
Hindi movie names from the late 70s, AND it features Anuradha Paudwal
in one of her first songs. Of course, she has very little to do in this
song other than giggle and say a couple of words now and then. It took
her at least five more years to find Gulshan Kumar's ass so she could
kiss it. But once again, I digress.
Since KH's Hindi isn't so perfect at the beginning of the movie,
they probably told SPB - "Try as much as possible to make your accent
really bad" (Which I'm sure wasn't too difficult for SPB anyway!)
And here's the result:
Link to Hum
Bane, Tum Bane Ek Duje Ke Liye.
Not only is SPB's accent to credit for this awesome sound clip, the
lyricist has to be showered with gold and jewelry and milk and honey
and all that stuff. Cum fast, cum fast, don't be slow, indeed!
One day I will gather enough courage to visit SPB and wash his feet
with rose water.
Afterthought
I have mentioned the following incident in another
Timepass article. A conversation with Subroto that went something
like this:
Sundar:
I once read something in a newspaper about how many couples in
Ahmedabad were inspired by Ek Duje Ke Liye
and committed suicide by drowning themselves in Kankaria Lake.
Subroto:
Saala aisa picture rahega to suicide
nahin karega to aur kya karega!