Life Goes On (King Lear)

Datta, Sangeeta 2009

A contemporary film adaptation of King Lear, set in modern-day London, centred on the life of three generations of immigrants of a Hindu family from Bengal. Read More

Samrat Lear (King Lear)

Brown, John Russell 1997

Samrat Lear, a March 1997 Hindi-language adaptation of King Lear by the National School of Drama in New Delhi. Directed by John R. Brown from a script by Harivansh Rai Bachchan. Read More

Dil Chahta Hai (The Heart Wants)

Akhtar, Farhan 2001

Dil Chahta Hai (The Heart Wants) is a 2001 film set in Mumbai, India and Sydney, Australia. Directed by Farhan Akhtar, the movie features a scene of an opera performance of Troilus and Cressida. Read More

36 Chowringhee Lane

Sen, Arpana 1981

In post-independence India an Anglo-Indian teacher, Violet Stoneham (Jennifer Kendal), lives a quiet and uneventful life at 36 Chowringhee Lane in Calcutta, now Kolkata. Her brother Eddie (Geoffrey Kendal, Jennifer’s father in real life) is senile and ailing in a nursing home. After the marriage of her niece Rosemary (Soni Razdan), she is alone except for her cat, Sir Toby. Her only joy in life is teaching Shakespeare, despite the lack of interest from her students. Read More

Shakespeare Wallah

Ivory, James 1965

Shakespeare Wallah is a 1965 Merchant Ivory Productions film. The story and screenplay are by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, about a travelling family theatre troupe of English actors in India, who perform Shakespeare plays in towns across India, amidst a dwindling demand for their work and the rise of Bollywood. Madhur Jaffrey won the Silver Bear for Best Actress at the 15th Berlin International Film Festival for her performance. The music was composed by Satyajit Ray. Read More

Bobby

Kapoor, Raj 1973

Bobby is a Bollywood adaptation of Romeo and Juliet. Raj, the son of strict, wealthy parents, falls in love with Bobby, the daughter of a poor Christian fisherman — a romance his parents oppose. Read More

Mr. Romeo

Mukherjee, Subhash 1974

When Pal’s son kills a police constable, his best friend, Saxena, the only witness to this murder, comes forward and as a result Pal’s son is arrested and charged with murder. Pal pleads with Saxena to change his witness statement, but Saxena refuses to do so, and as a result Pal’s son gets convicted and is sentenced to death. Pal swears to avenge his son’s death. Years later, Saxena’s sons, Ramesh and Suresh, have grown up. While Suresh, the younger son, is serious, studious, and business-minded, Ramesh is quite the opposite. Pal’s son, Prem, befriends Suresh and gets him hooked-up with a gorgeous looking girl, and drugs his drinks, thus making him an addict. He falls in love with this girl and wants to get married to her. His parents and Ramesh are opposed to this, and Ramesh goes to the extent of threatening to kill her. Shortly thereafter, the girl is killed, and a drug-induced Suresh immediately believes that Ramesh is the killer. He abducts Ramesh’s to-be bride, Sheetal Batra, and takes her with him to his hideout. Now the climax is set between the two brothers – with Pal and Prem watching delightedly – as they know only one will survive, and the other will be arrested by the police, and get the death sentence, thus leaving the Saxena family childless and without any heir.

rAjOo (gunwanti@hotmail.com)

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Reshma Aur Shera

Dutt, Sunil 1971

Reshma Aur Shera (Hindi: रेशमा और शेरा; translation: Reshma and Shera) is a 1971 Hindi crime drama film produced and directed by Sunil Dutt and starring Waheeda Rehman as Reshma and Sunil Dutt as Shera. It also stars Vinod Khanna, Amitabh Bachchan, Raakhee and Amrish Puri in supporting roles. Sunil Dutt’s son Sanjay Dutt, who was 12 years at the time, appears briefly as a Qawwali singer in his first film appearance. Read More

Josh

Khan, Mansoor 2000

Josh was a 2000 film directed and co-written by Mansoor Khan and inspired by Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. The movie takes place in 1980 and is set in Goa, India. The story is centered around two rival gangs. The younger brother of one gang leader falls in love with the twin sister of the other gang leader. Read More

Omkara

Bharadwaj, Vishal 2006

In this adaptation of Shakespeare’s “Othello” set in India, half-caste bandit Omkara Shukla (Ajay Devgan) abducts his lady love, Dolly Mishra (Kareena Kapoor), from her family. Thanks to his cleverness, he gets away with the kidnapping. A conspiracy, however, forms against him when he denies his right-hand man, Langda Tyagi (Saif Ali Khan), a promotion. Ultimately, this plot threatens not only his relationship with Dolly, but their lives and those of their associates as well. Read More

Maqbool (Macbeth)

Bharadwaj, Vishal 2003

Maqbool is based on William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, with the Mumbai underworld as its backdrop. Maqbool (Irrfan Khan) is the right-hand man of Jahangir Khan (alias Abba Ji) (Pankaj Kapoor), a powerful underworld don. Maqbool is grateful and feels a close connection and personal indebtedness to Abba Ji. Seeing their close relationship, but also sensing Maqbool’s ambition, two corrupt policemen (Om Puri and Naseeruddin Shah) predict that Maqbool will soon take over the reins of the Mumbai Underworld from Abba Ji. Read More

Macbeth

Chandradasan 2002

An eco political performance based on the play by William Shakespeare for Lokadharmi, 2002. Read More

Angoor

Gulzar 1982

Based on Shakespeare’s ‘A Comedy of Errors’, this is a story of identical twins (2 pairs) and mistaken identities. Read More