Pukar

In my lifetime no actor will topple Amitabh as my favorite actor. But keeping things in perspective, this movie is not one of his better movies by far. 80s was the era where the stardom, style of Amitabh overshadowed the actor. Movie makers made movies with him less for the content and more to take advantage of his super stardom. His co stars were just there as part of the ambiance. Randhir Kapoor to a lesser extent but Zeenat Aman and Tina Munim's presence were barely felt in the movie, except for a couple of songs. This movie like others was made as a one man show. Back in the days nobody thought twice of it, but today when we watch this and many like it movies, we roll our eyes and change the channel. Not surprisingly, this signified the beginning of the end of Amitabh's superstardom status. I wouldn't put this movie on the top of my must watch list.

Pukar directed by Ramesh Behl is a time-pass movie.

It does not have anything new or extra-ordinary to offer.

Story: Although India obtained freedom from the British in 1947, Goa and it's territories are still ruled by the Portuguese. A group of revolutionaries want a free Goa and are thus wanted by the Portuguese administration. Amongst them are Purandare, Narvekar, and Dinanath, and when Dinanath's whereabouts are known to the police, he escapes with his young son, Ramdas(Amitabh Bachchan), and goes to their hideout. With the assistance of Purandare they do manage to escape but are shot. A horrified Ramdas watches as his dad is shot dead by Purandare. This is how Ramdas starts hating revolutionaries. Ramdas changes his name to Ronnie, befriends a girl named Julie, and grows up taking to crime as his career. He soon prospers and lets the villagers also prosper with him. Then when the Police Commissioner is shot dead, Ronnie helps the authorities to apprehend his killer, who is a young man named Shekhar(Randhir Kapor), who is arrested, tried in Court, and sentenced to be hanged. It is at this point Ronnie will find out that the people he had assisted in the past are all against him and sympathize with the revolutionaries. Angered, he grabs a gun to kill Shekhar's parents - and it is here that Ronnie will find out who they really are - and why Purandare shot his dad.

The story is good.

The direction is average.

The music is okay.

The dialogs are well-worded.

Performances: Amitabh Bachchan is superb.Randhir Kapoor is very good.Tina Munim and Parveen Babi are wasted.Prem Chopra excels in a small role.Pinchoo Kapoor and Sharat Saxena are fine in supporting roles.

All in all Pukar is a time-pass movie!

It's generally held that we learn something every day, and my piece of education for today consisted of the fact that the Portugese occupied Goa from the 16th century to 1961, when it was reclaimed by the people of Goa with assistance from the Indian Navy. I learnt this largely from the film PUKAR (1983).

Ramdas is a young boy whose father is a member of the Goa liberation party (terrorists or freedom fighters, depending on your perspective), and whose name means something like "Patriotism". One night he witnesses his father being shot by another member of the revolutionary party... but he doesn't realise that it was at his father's request, since he was wounded running from the police and preferred to die than be captured and tortured. Blaming them for his father's death, Ramdas grows up hating all people that call themselves "Patriots"... he changes his name to "Ronnie" to avoid association with them. As he gets older he goes into the smuggling business, and his lust for wealth and power drive him up the ladders until he is a very powerful crime boss. He is a benign enough crime boss, and puts some of his profits from smuggling back into the community... however, he still has a burning anger towards the Goan patriots, and uses all his power and influence to have them killed and captured when he can.

The little boy who witnesses his father's death, grows up to be a bigshot gangster and hides a deep anger towards his father's killers is pretty much the archetypal Amitabh Bachchan character, and one he'd played many times previously to PUKAR. What makes PUKAR unusual is that the killers are not totally immoral crooks for once - they're considered by most of the population of Goa to be heroes. Ronnie is still an angry young (ish) man, but his anger is not necessarily well directed. Although he's still the main character, we're not meant to agree with Amitabh's beliefs or actions... in fact, in many ways he is the villain and we're supposed to actively dislike him. Given that Amitabh is one of my personal heroes, this made me feel rather uncomfortable

One thing that many a Hindi movie teaches, however, is that a man can never escape the destiny given to him by his name. Even though Ramdas refuses to acknowledge his name, the viewer feels fairly certain it will catch up with him... or will it?

Films about revolutions and revolutionaries are pretty rare for Hollywood (does THE MATRIX count?), and as far as I know for most of the world's cinema. It's only really through Indian cinema that I've had any real exposure to them except perhaps as villainous terrorists. Patriotism is a word even more venerated in India than it is in America, and people fighting and dying to liberate their country from foreign occupation are generally well considered... after all, it's not that long since India gained independence from long British occupation. Hearing India's popular entertainment king Amitabh denounce patriotism and collaborate with the Portugese occupiers/oppressors is particularly strange!

Although PUKAR was a big hit and has a very high score at IMDB, I don't consider it to be one of Amitabh's better films. Even though he's always played the "Dark Hero", his role in Pukar isn't one that fits him too well, though he still gives a good performance. Perhaps if it was the first Amitabh film I'd seen I'd have appreciated it more, but I think the problems are more than just discomfort in seeing Amitabh in an unfamiliar role. The story telling is not handled as well as in his better films such as SHOLAY or MUQADDAR KA SIKANDAR, with several jumps and holes that left me a little confused as to exactly what was going on. The film didn't bring out the wide range of emotions in me that I'd hoped, either - perhaps because of the slightly clumsy story telling, or because the quality of acting on display wasn't all that high (notably, Zeenat Aman is thoroughly beautiful but not a good actress). Perhaps if I'd been more familiar with Goa's history I'd have appreciated/understood more.

The film is still quite enjoyable, with a pretty good balance of drama and action. Although it doesn't rank amongst Amitabh's great films, it must be noted that those films are so great that not being one of them is hardly a major failing. Taken as a part of Amitabh's career it's clearly placed on the downswing, but taken as a film in it's own right it's a pretty watchable 160 minutes.

7/10

Pukar review :

One of the few Bollywood films based on Goa Liberation; Pukar was produced by Ramesh Behl who repeated his hit jodi - Amitabh Bachchan and Randhir Kapoor - from Kasme Vaade (1978) and roped in Pancham RD Burman to compose the music which turned out to be a huge hit.

"Tu maiko mat jaiyyo" sung by Bachchan himself, was a Binaca Geetmala chartbuster while the sexy Zeenat Aman scorched up the Goa beach in "Samundar mein nahake aur bhi namkeen ho gayee ho". Yes, indeed!!

Amitabh Bachchan was cast in an anti-hero role of Ramdas, a son of a Goan freedom fighter, who despises fellow Indians and turns Ronnie owing allegiance to Portuguese after a childhood misunderstanding. Randhir was miscast as the brave 'sipahi' of Goan Liberation party and appeared out of place in most action sequences. Zeenat looked absolutely marvelous as Amitabh's amour while Tina Munim was shortchanged in a blink and miss role.

Prem Chopra played the Portuguese baddie efficiently. In one scene, Amitabh hoodwinks him in a comic scene inspired from Lone Ranger. Bachchan was in his element here and the film is watchable only for him and Pancham da's awesome score.

Being a Goenkar, Pukar holds a special place in my heart for its depiction of Goa independence. While British left India in 1947, Goa got liberated from the Portuguese rule only on December 19, 1961. The film's climax recreates this glorious moment when Indian army rushed in to the province and made the Portuguese flee forever.

A parting trivia : The original climax had Bachchan die after killing Prem Chopra but was changed to a happy ending after he suffered a near fatal accident during the shooting of Manmohan Desai's Coolie (1983). The audience just couldn't see their hero pass away even in the reel world after this incident. Obviously!!

Regards, Sumeet Nadkarni.

This is indeed one of the worst movies of Amitabh Bachchan. Not because he acted bad in this. On the contarary, he gave justice to the role he was provided. However, the movie script and direction of the movie so pathetic you feel cringe while watching the movie. Even in the days when people were crazy by Amitabh's stardom this movie flopped in the box office. If you watch it now your mind will not be able to accept any of the illogical and irrational actions and activities and numerous loopholes present in it. So unless you intend to watch the entire collection of Amitabh, avoid this movie. And watch one of the good ones. As Amitabh surely has numerous masterpieces in his collection.