Throughout all of my posts on classical dance, one thing that has bothered me is the lack of representation from Kannada movies. Tamil and Telugu films seem to dominate the landscape of filmi classical dance offerings with Malayalam films in a distant third likely due to Kerala's rich classical dance traditions. But finding native Kannada films (not dubbings) with classical dance content has been difficult.
There is a relative lack of information about Sandalwood (the Kannada film industry) online compared to other southern industries which means an outsider like me has put forth extra effort to unearth anything useful. When I first pondered why I had so few Kannada songs in my blog posts, I wondered if the film industry's obscurity relative to its southern counterparts had simply hidden songs from my view. Or was it the industry's recent struggles compared to its earlier golden years? I even started to wonder if Karnataka had less of an engrained classical dance tradition that would be reflected in film compared to, say, Tamil Nadu, but I suspect I'm ignorant on the subject. In any case, here's what I've been able to find about classical-inspired dances in Kannada cinema.
Thanks to the efforts of Tom Daniel and Mr. Naidu, the legendary dance-off between Vyjayantimala and Padmini in the 1958 Tamil film Vanjikottai Valiban (and it's Hindi remake Raj Tilak) are now available for viewing in excellent quality! I did not know there was a Hindi remake of "Kannum Kannum Kalandhu" until last week, and once I watched it the idea of doing another comparison like Bhookailasa/Bhookailas popped into my head. When the idea was suggested to me I figured I should go for it! Another nerdeshi pardesi enterprise, yay! (And I really nerded it up, see below.) I'm so happy that Tom and Mr. Naidu made these videos available because such a detailed comparison wouldn't be possible without this quality. Without further ado, here is the finished product:
Unlike Bhookailasa, these dances were incredibly difficult to sync together. The Tamil version runs a minute less in length because the Hindi version extends the verses in the middle (and often changes the melody to a minor-key which changes the whole "fun" atmosphere of the song). This is why you'll notice the Tamil version periodically freezes and dims while the Hindi version does it's thing for a moment (and during those times I bring in the Hindi music for a moment as well). Another frustrating roadblock is that the Hindi version is at a slightly-different tempo at various points of the song, so I had to compress or extend the time as necessary to match it to the rhythm of the Tamil version. The key to note is that the Tamil version and its music were not altered at all (except for the pauses) while the Hindi version has been altered slightly.
(2021 Update: I am no longer updating this blog but hope you enjoy my older posts!) Bringing light to classical and traditional Indian dances in the cinema of India; unearthing rare archival clips and academic research on South Asian dance!
