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Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam: From Real Life to Reel Life
Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam came out in 1999. Wow that was 13 years ago, seems unreal. It was such a massive hit. The whole nation fell head over hills in love with Aish. She looked out of this world. Although I am not a fan of her acting skills, she did act surprisingly well in that movie. The second half when her husband takes her back to her BF was kind of unreal and Salman over acted big time at the ending, but all in all a great movie. I never gave it a thought if it was a story SLB came out with all by himself or he had some creative writers. Turns out neither. Few days ago I was watching an appallingly bad movie on Netflix called 'The Bengali Night' or 'La Nuit Bengali' starring a young, lanky, fresh Hugh Grant (it was his first starring role) and a sweet and chirpy Supriya Pathak. The movie came out in 1988. Half way through I started to feel like I have heard this story before, the big palatial mansion the girl's family had, though much less ostentatious than SLB's sets, and the split level library...I instantly thought about Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam. A quick search later it all fell into place. SLB borrowed freely and heavily from one of the most under rated yet greatest love stories of the 20th century, a true life event and never gave credit to anyone. The love story happened in early 1930's in Bengal between a remarkably smart and sweet 16 year old girl named 'Maitreyi Devi' and a young Romanian writer and philosopher named Mircea Eliade. He came to study Philosophy with Maitreiyi's dad Surendranath Dasgupta, a renowned philosopher himself. These two young people fell deeply in love and carried on their secret affair behind the back of everyone. When found out, Eliade was thrown out of Devi's home. He went back to Europe and wrote a gut wrenching, semi-erotic love story named 'Maitreyi' or 'La Nuit Bengali' in French, a very thinly veiled account of their romance in 1933. What happened next was much more interesting than the movie Hum Dil..., in the movie Ajay Devgan's character tries to return his bride to her lover. In reality, after her heartbreak, Maitreyi picked herself up, grew up, got top notch education and became one of the most respected writer in Bengali literature. She also got married, no, not to Eliade. In fact they did not meet for more than 40 years. All this time, Devi was not aware of the existence of the book 'Maitreyi' or 'La Nuit Bengali'. It had not been translated to English yet. When she found out, she was kind of hurt by all the description of sexual intimacy between the lead characters in the book. So, she went ahead and wrote her own version of the book called 'Na Hanyate' or 'It does not Die' in the early 70's. In 1974, she went to University of Chicago as a visiting scholar where Eliade was a professor at that time. She went to his office and confronted him on this matter. He promised not to release his book in English in her life time, a promise which he kept. Now University of Chicago press offers these two books as a bundle, kind of a 'He said, she said' story so one gets the full picture. Both books are fascinating, available on amazon.com, or if you live in NYC, walk into Strand and get an english copy of 'La Nuit Bengali'. Shame on you SLB for borrowing and butchering a great love story with your cheesy ending and never giving credit where credit was definitely due.
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ZI664L Im grateful for the article post.Much thanks again. Fantastic.
This is an excellent thread. Both 'Mila_in_NY' and 'Femalequixote' write well. Do give us more threads like this!
I just finished my 10th grade exam when the movie was released. The sole reason, I went to watch the movie as my friend mentioned it is based on "Na hanyate" and it was one of my most favorite books. She also warned me HDDCS completely ruined the story and she was absolutely right. Although some of the events were directly lifted from the book eg Salman coming from abroad to study under Ash's father, Ash vacating her bedroom to accomodate Salman, the green chili eating scene, playing footsie under the table, betrayed by evil aunt (actually younger sister according to the book), taking marriage vows ( in happiness, in death..according to the book), I felt SLB ruined the film by it's cheesy typical bollywood movie ending. On top of that, he never bothered to give any credit to the original author and bagged a prize for best story. He gave credit to Devdas only because the novel is very well known. Even then he completely manage to butcher the story with his over the top bollywood masala.
nXnuis I loved your blog. Great.
Really enjoyed this article.Thanks Again. Fantastic.
great post!! Have you guys seen " Woh Saat Din" ?? You will love this movie more than HDDS! almost ditto!
Where have you been?!?! You have the most amazing posts! I love the tone, too.
wow..what a story and what post..please dont stop.DONT :)
May I add, to this article,
the celebration scene, where she's wearing all light pink costum and he is in black .... remember? Well in thz 11th grade, my litt. teacher projected in class, one of the oldest version of ROMEO & JULIET. (Maybe the oldest video version of it. don't know for sure, but it was in color)
And the set, dances, angles, SCENE, rythm, light .... everything was the same.
LIKE SAME TO SAME. I felt so betrayed!! Then with guzaarish, I read long ago, that he was actually inspire or copy as you want to call by a movie which was not very known. SOme of them said hugh jackman starr in it other said it was an Spanish movie. THe day before, switching channel I end up on the CHannel 5 ( FRANCE 5 ). THe synopsis ? A handicaped fighting for his last right : die . AAAAlll the characters where taken from there. the scenario. the movie. the story. the energy.
SO IT BOTHER Me that SLB do not express his inspiration or the original source of his VISUAL work ... but I said to myself ... his visual abilies are not deniable. he s truly an artist. but that doesn't excuse for sure. He have the duty of transparence when its works its heavily inspired ( copy..; he should mention this is an different visual version of that movie) but in the same time... none of his movie were selected to a festival or so. only devdas was.
THis being said it will not prevent me from looking forward any of his creation with excitement, the only thing it's that I'll know his prodige lay in only or most of it in the visual/energy of the set. Not the scenario, story ... or at least I'll have to check fiercly before trusting his work
Hddcs is copy of woh saat din..
A very interesting read I must confess. Mila, you have won me over.. Please keep posts like these coming rather than the usual crap we have on here.. thanks!
Fri, 2012-05-04 10:38 — femalequixote
i like what you said .........the post with the comments really interesting !!
i think these film was really special for aish not b/c it was her first hit ....but these the only film she was looking smart . jovial . vital . not only beautiful.shy with dramatic acting....
Thu, 2012-05-03 16:17 — Anonymous
I think hddcs shares a very similar story line with "woh Saat din" .
yes i was thinking the same.......Naseeruddin Shah was really cute !!
Thu, 2012-05-03 16:17 — Anonymous
I think hddcs shares a very similar story line with "woh Saat din" .
yes i was thinking the same........
Loved HDDCS, interesting fact!
SLB credits hellen keller in black btw.
I’m sorry to disappoint you, Mila, but the fact that HDDCS is based on Maitreyi Devi's novel is a well known fact among SLB’s fans. The movie is not a loyal adaptation, though. The story was narrated to him by one of his fans, Pratap Karwat. The script was written by 2 writers, including Pratap, and the dialogues by SLB. It’s not an adaptation after Eliade’s novel, which includes the fact that the love between Eliade/Allan and Maitreyi was consummated. The scriptwriters also added the fact that Nandini/Maitreyi goes after her first love in Europe, a fact which didn’t happen in reality, nor in Maitreyi’s novel. The bad auntie was also added by the scriptwriters. The Hugh Grant movie is a strict adaptation after Eliade’s novel.
Eliade was one of my intellectual role models while growing up and I’m familiar with both his philosophy of religion writings and novels, which are translated in many languages. When I first saw HDDCS, I instantly thought at Eliade’s novel, Maitreyi/Bengal Nights. In fact, on wiki it is mentioned that HDDCS is loosely based on Maitreyi Devi’s novel, It Does Not Die. SLB does not credit her probably because he was not familiar with her writing, but he does not credit himself with the story. The author of Devdas, the novel, is credited, though.
The problem with SLB is not when he bases his movies on novels and writings, but when he ”borrows” storylines and even entire scenes from other movies. That’s plagiarism. Black is not only the story of Helen Keller, but the first half of the movie is almost entirely lifted from the US movie, The Miracle Worker. And of course, Guzaarish is inspired from 2-3 Hollywood movies. As a Western movie buff, I found that really annoying. But the fact is that 90% of Bollywood movies are "inspired" from Western cinema. SLB is a great musician and an excellent director, though, no one can contest that, and his movies are a pleasure to watch. He’s working now at his next movie, Ram Leela which is based on Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet…Honestly, I think he could have adapted a nice Indian novel or something from the vast, rich Indian history/mythology.
SLB is a big chor...always takes credit for others work....he has never even mentioned those movies...big big chor....guzaarish was fully copied from the spanish movie...not even a single scene was different except songs...
you are wrong. when the movie came out, me and all other bongs knew it was inspired by "Na Hanyate". its commonly known.
whatever.....HDDCS was a great movie, thats all ! but i wud have loved it if she ended with salman !
Wow! this movie used to be favorite once upon a time. For once I thought SLB came out with his original idea, but apparently. Shame on him for giving credit to anyone. Now I am pretty sure he copied Khamoshi from some other movie/or novel as well.
Anyway, I look forward to reading the book! Both book sounds very interesting.
@ bebo_pclover20, I was thinking the same thing when I was reading this post!
WOW, thank you for this interesting information!
Yes this was a real story. SLB should have given credit because:
even though it's based on real life people, their love story only came to public knowledge because of their books. It was not floating in the public domain like Aish-Salman or Brangelina affair. SLB lifted the material from the book.
To the writer who said she was too young at 16 to have affair with a random white guy, well 16 was not that young in those times. By 16, most girls were married off and were handling domestic responsibilities. Her parents belonged to 'Brahmo Samaj', a society which counted some of the most liberal and educated Bengalis as its member. Maitreyi was an intellectual, she was a protegee of Tagore and loved a good intellectual banter. Eliade was a handsome young intellectual who was welcomed into their household like a son. I am sure it's the intellectual aspect as well as the physical attraction of two young people living in close quarters that drew them towards each other. But apparently, even for the liberal Bramho Samaj intellectuals, their affair was too much, with so much cultural and social divide in between.
i dont think hum dil de chuke sanam story was any new when it came out!! theire has been many movies based on this kind of love story line before but its the way SLB presentation made it so popular!!
Why Im I not surprised by the inspiration. This industry resembles in values the indian society. Such contradictions on so many levels; resilient and hard working and lazy;real spirituality and false pretence of religious values; pride, respect and honor are common words and hypocrisy is seldom used as a word, but many people are just that hypocrites. it basically comes down to this, if you are light skin colored, market yourself as traditional at heart but able to be a hard working independent individual, if none of these two are in your favor then a 'renowed' family will do just fine in getting you in the industry. As to the audience and long term success, cheesy movies, full blast make up and hair (tacky to the fullest), layers and layers of make up, act more than necessary, have a famous 'hero' in the movie you are starring in. Item songs are A must. One must be able to jiggle those curves in a tight saree and the occasional wet and transparent saree must not frighten you. Last but not least, attend all of those award shows out there for bollywood. These people really like to celebrate themselves a lot! If you can have all of the above, you are a star in Bollywood.
hey, good to know.
but like someone said in their posts before who gives credit these days? everyone is always stealing stories, songs, creative, scene etc.
ash totally overacted in the movie. hddcs worked because of the way it was presented. great music, beautiful ppl and sets. acting was subpar at best. slb pays more imortance ot the setting than acting/plot. result sabooriya.
How strange! I just found out about this largely unknown movie a few days ago and now you have a post about it. Lol! Keep it up, you are slowly turning into my new favourite poster!
Dear Mila...Thanks for providing an insight into the HDDCS saga and like you say, an even more interesting anecdote. I shall surely try to get these books, sound very interesting and fascinating. As the saying goes, truth is stranger than fiction!