Baghdad Ka Jadoo, aka Magic of Baghdad (India, 1956)

Despite the contributions of Indian special effects wizard Babubhai Mistry, Baghdad Ka Jadoo's title is something of a misnomer. For the most part, the only magic that the film alludes to is that of star Fearless Nadia's 1930s heyday, the recapturing of which seems to have been at least a tertiary goal. And, in that, Baghdad Ka Jadoo appears to have been largely successful. For present here are all those fabled elements that second hand knowledge has taught us were the hallmarks of Nadia's -- sadly, now largely unseen and unseeable -- classic stunt films:  our heroine's lusty laughter in the face of danger, the wall-to-wall acts of daredevilry punctuated by the frequent trademark "HEEYY!"; the men hoisted up on shoulders and gleefully tossed, etc. We even see that Nadia can still do the splits!

Of course, alongside this are telltale concessions to Nadia's age, among them the cutaways to stunt doubles that were a rare occurrence in her salad days, as well as a scene where a dance started by Nadia is quickly taken up by another, younger female star. But the tone of Baghdad Ka Jadoo is so jaunty and good natured that it's hard to see much pathos in any of that, as, overall, one gets a sense of a past that is being celebrated every bit as much as it is being relived.

At the time of making Baghdad Ka Jadoo, Nadia had been with longtime lover Homi Wadia's Basant Pictures for fourteen years. Though it was under the Wadia Brothers/Movietone banner that she had first achieved fame, her career continued at full steam following the split that lead to Basant's formation. Still, by 1956, public enthusiasm for the stunt film formula was on the wain, and the regular release of Nadia's trademark actioners would trickle to a stop within just a couple of years. Given that, it's hard not to see something elegiac in a later film like Baghdad Ka Jadoo, whether it was intentional or not. For instance, along with the aforementioned return of many narrative elements warmly familiar to Nadia's fans, we also have a return by Nadia's frequent costar, John Cavas, here not only taking his customary place at  her side, but also directing.

Given its stunt film framework, the plot of Baghdad Ka Jadoo is impressively convoluted (the original program booklet's synopsis, reprinted over at Indian Film Trade,  manages to go on at dizzying length without even touching upon the whole "lost and found" aspect of the story). Suffice it to say that Nadia and Cavas play a pair of merrily thieving gypsies who fall on the wrong side of a corrupt sultan, thus necessitating their repeated breach of the castle walls in order to free members of their band who have been wrongly imprisoned, not to mention cause other varying forms of righteous trouble. This scenario provides the opportunity for all manner of showy leaping up and down parapets and onto the backs of charging horses, much of which is thrillingly impressive regardless of who was actually doing it.

One such episode involves Nadia entering the palace in the guise of a visiting prince -- such gender bending masquerades being another signature aspect of her classic screen adventures -- and meeting with the unintended consequence that the young princess' heart is set aflutter by her dashingly bearded visage. Nadia then goes so far as to woo the young girl, even performing a romantic duet with her in which a concealed Cavas, in the tradition of Cyrano, acts as her personal on-site playback singer. And while these scenes are played for laughs, they nonetheless can't help but carry a racy, transgressive charge; all told a pointed demonstration of how, when it came to Fearless Nadia, Bollywood's normally rigid gender boundaries somehow found themselves helplessly crashing in on themselves.

Baghdad Ka Jadoo ultimately fulfills its titular promise during its final minutes, folding in elements of the Arabian Nights style fantasies that were, at the time, Basant's bread and butter. This episode sees Nadia sidetracked on an abbreviated magical quest that ends with her riding to the rescue on a flying chariot as, meanwhile, Cavas leads a rousing peasant revolt against the palace. In the spirit of Baghdad Ka Jadoo overall, it's gloriously, triumphantly silly. And if throughout Nadia and Cavas aren't having the absolute time of their lives, they're certainly doing an uncannily good job of acting it.

Jungle Ka Jawahar (India, 1952)

Let’s face it: Jungle Adventure Month hasn’t been easy on any of us. That’s why, after suffering through the stubborn just-there-ness of Jungle King, I thought I’d turn myself over to the professionals. And that brings us to Jungle Ka Jawahar. It was produced and directed by the king of Indian stunt films himself, Homi Wadia, and stars his queen -- and wife -- the Australian-born Mary Evans, more legendarily known as Fearless Nadia. But, wait, that’s not all! The film also benefits from the set design and special effects work of the great Babhubai Mistry, who was not only a pioneer of Indian special effects, but also the director of a number of captivating Bollywood fantasy and mythological films in his own right.

Granted, the forty-something Nadia looks a bit matronly here, but she’s still game enough that I think we can extrapolate from Jungle Ka Jawahar what those stunt films from her 1930s heyday might have been like. (Which, sadly, is all that we can do for the moment, as none of those films are currently available for our viewing.) While some of her feats of daredevilry are filmed from a safe enough distance that they could conceivably have been performed by a double -- or are aided in part by rear-projection trickery -- in the film’s many acrobatic fights scenes we can clearly see, for the most part, that it’s Nadia getting down and dirty in the thick of things. She even pulls off one of those Dara Singh moves where she twirls a guy over her head before tossing him back at her opponents. (Which, now that I think about it, could just as easily have been an original Fearless Nadia move that Dara Singh later borrowed.) Hers is definitely a commitment to hands-on, sweaty, rough-and-tumble action that is very far indeed from what we’d expect to see from the typical Indian film heroine of this, or any previous, era -- which is another way of saying that Nadia indeed delivers in full on her reputation here.

The film’s story concerns a perpetually pissed-off jungle queen called Sheena -- played with fiery-eyed petulance by Leela Kumari -- who is scheming to return to her tribe a sacred scepter that has somehow fallen into the hands of a kindly jungle doctor played by Aga Shapoor. Aiding her in her scheming is one of those awful big city fortune hunters who so often arrive in the jungle to stir things up, in this case played by Dalpat.

What these two hadn’t counted on, however, is the facility that the doctor’s daughter, Mala (Nadia), has with swinging from vines, high diving, leaping from her perch high atop the backs of elephants, and generally kicking ass in the name of keeping things in the jungle status quo. And, by the way, I love the switch-up that Jungle Ka Jawahar pulls by having a fur-clad character named Sheena who, despite being -- like the famous comic book character from whom she takes her name -- the Queen of the Jungle, spends the whole of the movie stomping ineffectually around her cave lair in a big snit, while it is the dowdy Nadia, in her sensible safari wear, who takes part in all of the traditional jungle heroics.

Aside from that, however, Jungle Ka Jawahar doesn’t throw much at us that’s not covered in Jungle Adventure 101. Present are all those elements that have seemed to become part of the very air we breath here at 4DK over the past month: Pith-helmeted explorers tied to elaborately carved posts as natives dance in supplication to a creepy giant idol, one of their number eagerly stirring a giant stew pot in anticipation of the meal to come; someone wrestling with an uproariously fake looking stuffed lion; the outrageously phony gorilla costume; and, of course, the climactic elephant charge. What Jungle Ka Jawahar brings to this stew of familiar elements is an enthusiasm that works somewhat toward belying their not-so-freshness, as if this oft told tale was instead being told for -- well, maybe not the first, but perhaps only the hundredth time, rather than the thousandth.

The film also benefits from a sort of antique charm, even by the standards of Bollywood circa 1952. Take away the abundance of novelty musical numbers and comic relief sequences, and what you have is almost indistinguishable from a Hollywood movie serial from the 30s, complete with all of the last minute escapes, diabolical traps and rowdy physical stunts that entails. Even the film’s music, with all of its big band dynamics and whimsical clarinet leads, seems anachronistic, often coming across as a sort of Cab Calloway take on jungle exotica. All of this works together to instill the movie with an appropriately “gee whiz” kind of breathlessness, granting it just enough of an air of innocence and sincerity to keep the reeling out of its tropes from becoming tiresome.

Babhubai Mistry’s work here also goes a long way toward weaving a little bit of old fashioned magic around Jungle Ka Jawahar’s otherwise modest presentation. While clearly some location shooting was involved, the film is largely a backlot affair, and Mistry’s fancifully stylized sets -- from the jungle environs to Sheena’s expressionistic, idol-adorned cave lair -- conjure happy associations with set-bound Hollywood jungle adventures from the 30s and 40s like The Most Dangerous Game and King Kong. (I also couldn’t help thinking of the recent Filipino film Independencia, whose self-consciously artificial jungle sets were designed as an homage to such films.) It also has to be said that Mistry’s miniature work here is top-notch, and definitely on par with what was being done elsewhere in the world, Hollywood included -- which leads me to wonder again what the hell happened to Bollywood special effects, and why in later years they fell so dramatically (and hilariously!) behind pace with what was being done in the field elsewhere.

Most importantly, perhaps, Jungle Ka Jawahar manages to let us know that it doesn’t take itself all that seriously without lapsing into complete parody. Intermittent winks toward the audience cumulatively serve as a good natured invitation for us to check our incredulity at the door and simply thrill along as god and Homi Wadia intended. A parting shot, in which even the ridiculous looking man-in-suit gorilla waves goodbye to the triumphant Nadia as she speeds off in her plane, lets the viewer know in no uncertain terms that, if he or she spent the previous two hours worrying over Jungle Ka Jawahar’s general silliness or crudeness of construction, he or she just missed out on a whole lot of fun.

This review is part of "Stranded in the Jungle", a month of jungle adventure themed posts at 4DK.