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FILMINDI A
May, 1946
was a great clown, who attended to his moustache in the midst of bombs and treated the whole patriotic war as a huge joke. There is not in him the undying fervour of a patriot nor the intense passion of a man fighting to defend his country from heartless invaders. General Fong remains a comedian from the moment he struts across the screen till the time he pays his respects to the remains of Dr. Kotnis. No wonder the Chinese couldn't beat the Japs. How could they with comedians as generals? This portrayal of General Fong is the most insulting tribute ever paid to the brave Chinese nation.
Very little need be ;,aid about the other four doctors. They were stretcher-bearers who carried Dr. Kotnis and the story to China and quitted hurriedly. The artistes who played the roles Ullhas, Prof. Hudhkar, Salvi and Janki Dass, lost their self-respect with the release of the picture on the screen.
Winayak plays the role of Bundoo, the tongawalla, and in doing so carries the Kolhapur tradition of Hindustani accent, a little further. Cousin Winayak is no better than Brother Baburao and Cousin Shantaram. But he doesn't offend us much as his tiny role is more in the nature of a small birthday gift to his famous cousin than as a character portrayal.
Dewan Sharar plays the good Samaritan, Kaka Wong. He lives the part, though his role is inconsequential and hangs in mid-air like a balloon. Kaka Wong appears from ihin air every time and after unloading himself of some well-spoken dialogue, disappears again into thin air. In any case Dewan Saheb looks a Chinese Mandarin alright.
The best work in the picture is given by the talented Jayashree. Whatever other Indian critics may say, in our opinion, she looks a Chinese every inch and we ought to know having spent sometime in China and seen Chinese women. In the role of Ching Lan, Jayashree provides the muchsought-after relief in an otherwise boring picture. She gives an excellent portrayal and speaks her dialogue almost beautifully. She beats Shantaram hollow every time they meet, in the diction of the dialogue, in action and in portrayal. After her rather poor performance in "Shakuntala", Jayashree has improved beyond recognition as a screen artiste in "Dr. Kotnis."
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Technically, "Dr. Kotnis" is a very pleasant picture to see. Some atmospheric shots have been beautifully presented, though these shots have nothing to do with the drama proper. The human drama has been shot in a simple straight forward manner without any undue flourish of camera technique. Montage shots are well executed and the lab work is neatly done. Sound recording, however, is not as happy as the photography.
The music of the picture borders on the ridiculous. It is at best Kolhapuri and generally Maharashtrian. It is neither popular nor suitable. It is just unimaginative and stupid.
AN ARABIAN-NIGHT STORY
The dialogue of the picture is suitable but the extra emphasis on Hindi words, out of tune with the popular idiom, jars on the ears. We need not have a parade of Dewan Sharar's Hindi vocabulary at the expense of good expression. Nothing would have gone wrong if Dewan Sahab's usually beautiful colloquial language had been put into the picture, even though it has some simple Urdu words. Indians have not yet disowned Urdu.
The song compositions are generally poor — too poor for Dewan Sharar a poet of repute. The patrio
tic song (No. 6) is however well expressed and some glimpse of poetic beauty is revealed in song (No. 5) in the lines:
In short, no justice at all has been done to Basu's narration of the experiences of the Medical Mission in China.
Shantaram's "Dr. Kotnis" is cerlainly not the story based on Abbas' "And One Did Not Come Back". It is a fairy tale from modern Arabian Nights.
As it stands "Dr. Kotnis" insults two neighbourly nations India and China. The picture disowns the Indian National Congress, winks at great leaders like Gandhiji and Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and distorts out ot recognition the eloquent tragedy of Kotnis Senior who gave his life to make his son a doctor.
As a motion picture for entertainment "Dr. Kotnis" proves intensely boring throughout, except in those parts where Jayashree makes an appearance.
In fine, "Dr. Kotnis" is a picture which deserves to be burnt — in a public square — a privilege still denied to 400 million slaves of India.
In "Naiyya", a Mazhar Khan supervised picture, Munnawar Sultana has a moment of doubt about Anwar.