Prakash Raj and Chiranjeevi have appeared in8 films together: Hitler(1997), Choodalani Vundi (1998), Sneham Kosam(1999), Mruga Raju (2001), Indra(2002), Tagore(2003), Andarivaadu(2005), and Stalin(2006). I've watched them all, and am pleased to present "A Visual Guide to 10 Secrets to Successful Film Acting, Featuring Megastar Chiranjeevi and Gesturing Star Prakash Raj."
My final entry in the film festival is the Telugu film Devi (1999, directed by ), which I watched in the Hindi dub as Goddess. I first watched this about a year ago, and again for the fesssstival, and I actually liked it a bit better the second time.
From the back cover of the dvd:
Spectacular special effects and sumptuous musical numbers will take your breath away in this Bollywood fantasy-thriller! A rich and handsome man falls in love with a charming, beautiful woman... but he doesn't realize that she is the snake goddess Devi in disguise. Devi must battle to protect her lover from the vicious, evil snake deity Dantra in this classic Hindu story brought to vibrant life. In Hindi with English subtitles
Hmm, I'm not entirely sure about the "classic Hindu story" part, but this story did align nicely with some other mythological films, in that the divine characters were there to help and protect the faithful human characters.
Note: I'll be offline for a few days and will finish up with a few more posts next week.
For the Hindi portion of the Film Fessssstival, I decided to see if I could track down some of the earliest filmi snakes. Although I didn't have the time to find and watch the whole film (next year!), I did locate videos of some of the songs.
From Nagin (1954), we have "Man Dole Tan Dole", in which Mala (Vyjayanthimala) the daughter of the Nagi tribe's chief, is mesmerized by music of a flute, only to learn that the singer (Pradeep Kumar) is the son of her family's sworn enemy.
From Nag Panchami (1953) here's "O Naag Kahin Jaa Basiyo Re Mere Piya Ko."
I believe that's Nirupa Roy getting all misty-eyed singing to the snakes and cuddling with Manohar Desai.
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If readers know of other early snake films or songs, please share them in the comments.
My quest to watch a Bangla snake film did not fully succeed (lack of subtitles, really poor video quality, and other things to do proved too much of a hurdle.) But I did end up slithering down some interesting paths of internet video, which I will share here:
At first I set my sights on Beshea Vora Nagin, but I was distracted at part 5, with this epic fight between the two snake-women:
It caught my attention because a) it's awesome, and b) my googling had found a youtube hit for "bangla nagin fight", so I was sure that it must be this scene from the movie. But NO! It's a different, but very, very similar snake fight, from another film:
Two immediate questions, which perhaps Jenni can answer in the Second Revised Edition of the Filmi Snake Spotters Guide:
-In the first video the snake ladies writhe around head-to-head (like the snakes), but in the second they are feet-to-feet. Which is the correct snake-fighting method?
-In the second video, it seems that one of the ladies is sometimes a snake, sometimes a mongoose. Are mongoose-nagin-ladies a unique subspecies of Bangla films?
More searching turned up this song in which a child sings soulfully to a snake:
And this song, which is a more traditional "snake couple in love" song:
I also found Dui Nagini, which is posted in full on google video, in which an awesome lady, who I assume is the Nagini, sports a snakey-patterned blazer, hotpants, and headband combo and rescues maidens from guys with bullwhips:
Looking for images from Dui Nagini led me to a small image of the dvd cover of Naach Nagini Naach Re--love the nagin/naach combination!
