Cinema brings to spotlight the issues that largely exist in our society. The 50s and 60s era of Filmmakers took upon themselves to make movies for a social regeneration. The filmmakers introduced a philosophy of reformist cinema that defined a nation building narrative with utmost responsibility. When we watch these movies, we open our eyes to a world that we are somewhat oblivious to or choose to ignore.
Right from the traumatic social upheavals post partition, to poverty and deprivation, unemployment, racial discrimination, caste system and hostile living conditions leading to crimes, the movies of the 50s and 60s era have comprehended these circumstances in a realistic fashion.
Here is a list of movies that highlight the stigma of our society that are still prevalent even after 6 decades of Independence:
Mother India & Do Bigha Zameen - Economic Inequality
Economic inequality like rich getting richer and poor getting poorer exist in our country ever since kings controlled India. Later the gap widened under the British rule and continued to be so even after they left us independent. Deep diving into the complications faced by the poor strata of our society especially our farmers, movies like Mother India and Do Bigha Zameen perfectly depicted the concept of poverty and deprivation of the hopeless Indian.
Devdas & Mughal-e-Azam – Caste, religion and society status mightier than love
Marriages are believed to be made in heaven but are sadly controlled on earth by orthodox ideologies like caste, religion and class. Depicting the struggles of lovers in our country are the two tragic love stories of Hindi Cinema Devdas and Mughal-e Azam. Even though both released 5 decades ago, not much has changed in our society.
Sujata – Untouchability
Dealing with sensitive issue like untouchability, Sujata displays the love story of an untouchable orphan girl and a Brahmin boy. They had to struggle to be together as society looked down upon them. While India has witnessed a cultural shift when it comes to untouchability as a concept, we are yet to see our society embracing it whole-heartedly.
Shree 420 and Awaara – poverty driving to crime
Poverty as an issue is been widely addressed in most of the movies of 50s and 60s. Awaara and Shree 420 were a couple of those few movies, which highlighted the side effects of poverty on youngsters.