Kagaz ke Phool (1959)
Film Poster
1959-1970s (made)
1959-1970s (made)
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| Place of origin |
This film looks at the film industry and the people within it who are 'like flowers of paper, beautiful to behold but artificial nevertheless and without fragrance.' Guru Dutt plays a film director who is shunned by his family because his profession has no social status. He becomes successful on discovering a new actress, Shanti, played by Waheeda Rehman, but his success is short lived when they are forced to separate because of pressure from his family. This design conveys the passion, anger and sorrow of the narrative.
Object details
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| Materials and techniques | Lithograph on paper |
| Brief description | Poster for the film 'Kagaz ke Phool' (1959).; Graphic, paper, printed, Bombay, India, C20 |
| Physical description | The poster is dominated by the image of a single large red rose which indicates beauty and fragility and alludes to the title 'Paper flowers'. The portraits of the actors Waheeda Rehman and Guru Dutt, both with expressions of anguish and sorrow are placed over the centre of the rose, they are embracing and are also depicted in red. This is a very simple and strong image indicating the anguished/romantic theme of the film. The English title in big red letters runs across the bottom of the poster and the Hindi and Urdu titles are much smaller in scale and are placed near the English title. |
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| Production type | Mass produced |
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| Summary | This film looks at the film industry and the people within it who are 'like flowers of paper, beautiful to behold but artificial nevertheless and without fragrance.' Guru Dutt plays a film director who is shunned by his family because his profession has no social status. He becomes successful on discovering a new actress, Shanti, played by Waheeda Rehman, but his success is short lived when they are forced to separate because of pressure from his family. This design conveys the passion, anger and sorrow of the narrative. |
| Associated object | |
| Bibliographic reference | Rachel Dwyer & Divia Patel, Cinema India: The Visual Culture of the Hindi Film, Reaktion Press, 2002. |
| Collection | |
| Accession number | IS.97-1986 |
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| Record created | October 1, 2002 |
| Record URL |
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