mohan joshi haazir ho ... and the rd connection

I must consider myself fortunate to have been able to catch Saeed Mirza's underrated biting social satire Mohan Joshi Haazir Ho at the NFAI while in Pune. There's the underrated Bhisham Sahni and a host of people that will be familiar to faithful viewers of out-of-band counter-stream movies (eg Chashme Baddoor) and fans of Nukkad. And the technical crew boasts names familiar to fans of the Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro stream of films. Caught it again on VHS and despite the print quality (read: not digitally remastered or restored for its strong filmic merit and complete lack of mainstream commercial value), the film still rocks. It's a worthy cousin to JDBY. Now to see if I can grab the other members of Mirza's ouevre of social satires with long titles.

The RD connection: the film has two songs, the second of which (haa_e re muqadamaa) begins with zoom-out shots of two movie billboards: the first for Coolie (yes, Harish, you can smile) and the other, visible only partially for a Dharam paajii starrer called Qayamat -- a forgotten movie with a not-so-forgettable soundtrack by the late great RD Burman.