Before Barbie vs Oppenheimer there was Karz vs Qurbani. This was back in 1980, when Subhash Ghai and Feroz Khan released their romance thrillers within a week of each other. Karz lost the box office battle, dismally. The film plumbed the depths of melodrama; used every trope in Bollywood’s playbook from reincarnation to the teary-eyed mother; and pitted the young ingenue against the evil temptress.
A copy of the 1975 Hollywood movie The Reincarnation of Peter Proud, the plot follows the transformation of Monty Oberoi (Rishi Kapoor) from a carefree singer to a man driven by vengeance for his murder in his previous life. Audiences rejected it. For one, Ghai did not follow the double-role casting norm for reincarnation-themed movies. He chose actor Raj Kiran to play Ravi Varma who is born again as Monty. It wasn’t promoted heavily even though Karz was the banner film for Ghai’s new production house, Mukta Art.
Kapoor couldn’t stomach the failure. He “lost his nerve” and went into a spiral of depression, which he recounted in his autobiography, Khullam Khulla: Rishi Kapoor Uncensored (2015).
“I would tremble on the sets and feel faint. I’d sink into my chair, go to the makeup room and ask for water,” he said.
But like the ugly duckling that turned into a swan, Karz’ fan base grew with each passing year. Today, for all its schmaltz and shtik, it enjoys cult classic status.
Hero, vamp and mother
Karz gave us 25–year-old Rishi Kapoor in a silver jumpsuit prancing around on a stage and courting a young Tina Munim. It gave us Laxmikant-Pyarelal hit songs, Om Shanti Om and Ek Hasina Thi, which inspired two movies of the same name—the first by Farah Khan, and the second by Sriram Raghavan. Unfortunately, the movie also inspired Himesh Reshamia to make Karzzzz (2008).
But above all, it gave us Kamini Verma, Bollywood’s finest villain whom Simi Garewal brought to life with panache.
Kamini’s quest for money and power, and her penchant for murder does not take away from Garewal’s innate sense of style. She initially was reluctant to take on the role. The woman who runs over her new husband and drives him off a cliff during their honeymoon is destined to be hated. Only a statue of Kali by a roadside shrine is witness to the murder.
According to Ghai, getting Simi Garewal to sign on was the “greatest difficulty”. In an interview early this year, he recalled her telling him: “Subhash this story is good but I cannot play the role because I would be shown like a vamp.” The director joked that he had to eat at her place five times before she finally agreed.
It takes a certain amount of chutzpah to play such a hated character who ages 20 years on screen. Her baser instincts never change —as a young wife who murders her husband during their honeymoon, and years later, as an older woman who makes no bones of her attraction to a younger man. She’s a refined Lady Macbeth not too concerned with the bloody spot on her hand. That is until, Monty and Tina trick her into believing that she’s seeing her husband’s ghost.
Kapoor as Monty was on point, the antithesis to Bollywood’s angry young man. He eschews guns and knives for the piano, guitar and trumpet. His performance in Om Shanti Om, on a revolving gramophone stage, is an iconic moment in Bollywood history. But then the memories of the past start to invade the present. Flashes of dissonance set him on the path to truth, love and vengeance. He goes to Ooty, near the Coonoor home in his previous life where he was murdered by Kamini.
It’s where he meets Tina (Munim) who at the time was not a well-known name. Her innocence and naivety is a foil to Kamini’s sophistication. And it’s also where he slowly learns what happened to him in his past life.
The arch villain Sir Judah (Prem Nath) set the ball rolling for the revenge drama 20 years ago when he directed Kamini to murder Ravi. He’s mute,but executes his evil plans by tapping his long-painted fingernails. Morse code for villains interpreted by his sidekick Mac Mohan.
Tina’s uncle Pran (Kabira), who only speaks in verse, adds to the chaos. But it’s Durga Khote who takes her role as Shanta Prasad Verma, Ravi’s mother, to new melodramatic heights. Her calls to the Hindu goddess Kali for vengeance and her insistence that the goddess return her son so that he can pay the “debt for milk” (dudh ka karz) is melodrama at its best. Her instant recognition that Monty is her beloved son Ravi is another case in point.
“The thought that a mother can recognise her child’s soul haunted me and I wanted to explore that in Karz,” Ghai later said in an interview.
Youth anthem
Without the music, Karz would have been forgotten. Laxmikant-Pyarelal outdid themselves with chart-toppers like Om Shanti Om, Ek hasina thi, Dard-E-Dil and Paisa Yeh Paisa, which was remade for the comedy Total Dhamaal (2019) starring Madhuri Dixit and Anil Kapoor.
It’s no surprise that Laxmikant-Pyarelal duo won the Filmfare Award for Best Music Director.
But the way the music and songs are integrated seamlessly into the movie is a masterclass in itself. The songs themselves are a premonition of what is to come. The flashy disco number Paisa Yeh Paisa is an acknowledgement of greed and lust for power and money that drives the movie’s villains. The strains of Ek Haseena Thi playing in the background at key moments is chilling. It’s used to good effect early in the movie when Kamini and Ravi are driving the jeep through the Verma tea estate, just before she runs him over—while he’s showing her the proper way to greet his mother.
In Om Shanti Om, Monty shouts: Hey, tumne kabhi kisi se pyaar kiya? kabhi kisi ko dil diya? Have you ever loved anybody, lost your heart to anybody? It’s Kishore Kumar’s voice that comes back to life. The song became the youth anthem of the time.
“All I can say is, ‘Kya zamana tha! Ek haseena thi, ek deewana tha,” Ghai said 43 years later.
(Edited by Ratan Priya)