My last post about the discovery of Birju Maharaj dancing Kathak on screen in the art film Khayal Gatha inspired me to go watch all of his film choreographies that I've heard bits and pieces about over the years.
I haven't featured much Kathak (or Hindi film dances) on this blog to date because, from what I've seen, the way it is presented and drawn from in Indian cinema rarely excites or engages me. Kathak is by far the most dominant dance inspiration in Hindi cinema when something a bit "classical" is desired, whether in standard song-and-dance numbers or the ever popular courtesan mujras and court dances. Pallabi Chakravorty in her excellent book Bells of Change: Kathak Dance, Women and Modernity in India contextualizes further, noting that "Kathak is so deeply enmeshed in the cultural ethos of North India that its motifs subtly encapsulate the amorphous notion of ‘Indian-ness’ within the dominant forces of Westernization in commercial cinema."
I love explosive nritta (pure dance) and rhythmic wizardry when done well, so my favorite instances of Kathak in Indian cinema are Kathak danseuse Roshan Kumari's spellbinding nritta in Jalsaghar (1958, Bengali) and fast-paced spins in Mirza Ghalib (1954, Hindi) that I featured in my post about her, but I also appreciate slower emotive dance when it connects with me, most notably the second dancer in the Kathak sequence in Khudito Pashan (1960, Bengali) which to this day holds my gaze in rapture. But most other "Kathak" that I've seen in Indian films, Hindi or other languages, feel like pretty posturing with lots of what I like to call "generalized waving and flailing ones arms about" that looks vaguely like Kathak. Easy it would be to up the showmanship and show off some impressive foot slapping and ghungroo bell patterns, or even throw in a stylized hand gesture, but film Kathak usually seems to go for messy spins and wavey arm movements as its main focus. Edit: And even when film Kathak borrows traditional movements and hand gestures (most often seen in mujras and court dances), it's just not my cup of tea in ways I can't quite articulate.
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With Birju (I will leave out honorifics and refer to him simply as "Birju" from now on for brevity and clarity) being such a respected figure of Kathak dance, I had hoped his participation in film choreography would mean I'd finally get to see some more traditional and difficult Kathak movements and emoting being reflected on screen. In interviews Birju has said that he sees directing dance in films as a fun diversion but that he is selective with his film choreographies, getting many requests but declining most of them [11, 12]. He claims his film choreography is "pure to the core without any dilution [and] highly refined," and that he endeavors to get the actress he trains up to a level to show off the dance form [15].
