Goodies on youtube - Helen Queen of Nautch Girls (1973)

I sometimes wonder how we bloggers would survive without youtube. Take me, for example. I had a hectic week and then a super hectic weekend watching James Garner, Doris Day, Fred MacMurray, et al, over at TCM, leaving me with no time to write up a review! So, I decided to go fishing in the youtube seas for some interesting videos to talk about and guess what I found - a 1973 documentary on Bollywood's beloved twinkletoes Helen. The film was directed and narrated by Anthony Korner for Merchant-Ivory Productions and can also be found in the DVD extra features of Bombay Talkies. The documentary tells us a little something about Helen from her difficult beginnings to her climb as Bollywood's most graceful and prolific dancer. And here it is for your viewing pleasure.

Bombay Talkie (1970)

I read about the movie at Merchant-Ivory Productions' website and couldnt wait to see it. The cast included my favorite Shashi Kapoor, playing the role that he was born to play - a successful, womanising, film star. Shashi in a negative role - that was something I had never seen before! Consequently my expectations were rather high when I began watching and it might be argued that I was doomed to disappointment!

The movie began very promisingly with Helen dancing on a giant typewriter. A song was being shot for a Hindi movie starring the successful actor Vikram (Shashi Kapoor). Come to watch the shooting was Lucia Lane (Jennifer Kendall) a famous American writer. Now, Lucia is the archetypal American writer - she is much married, middle aged, hungry for romance and utterly shallow, selfish and self-centred. (Did she have to be such a stereotype?) She also has a British accent that puzzled me until it was explained away later in the movie - she was actually English but settled down in USA.