Seema (1955) - Redemption should be this good…

I cant remember a time when I havent loved this film. As a child I shed buckets of tears over the heroine’s tale of woe, blissfully wallowed in her happily-ever-after, and of course, followed her lead to fall in love with Balraj Sahni’s sensitive, compassionate and oh-so-empathetic social worker. My grown up self sheds no more tears, but the rest of my reactions remain the same!

Gauri (Nutan) is an orphan brought up by her boozing-gambling Uncle Kashinath (Shivraj) and his shrewish wife (Praveen Paul). Like Cinderella, Gauri does all the housework while her Aunt verbally and physically abuses her. Gauri also earns money for the family by working in a rich household where the mistress abuses her.

Pocketmaar (1974)

A romance? An action movie? A 70's style masala blockbuster? A comedy? An out-and-out entertainer? Well, Pocketmaar tries to be all of these and fails miserably on each count! I have just spent a good portion of my precious weekend watching this movie and if I am acerbic in my criticism of this film, I hope you will take into account my wasted Saturday afternoon.

The plot: Shankar (Dharmendra) is a small-time pick-pocket and his partner in crime is the myopic Sundar (Mehmood). Together the two happily live off the pockets of Bombay commuters when Shankar happens to rescue the blind Ganga (Azra) from goons intent on raping her. He takes her home and cares for her and her new-born baby. Lest you doubt the poor woman's virtue, she did get married and then deserted by her husband. OK, now that we have all been assured of Ganga's purity, lets move on.