Golden Era of Bollywood: 50 years of An evening In Paris

Tuesday 28 March 2017

50 years of An evening In Paris

An Evening In Paris was released on 1st Jan 1967.It was produced and directed by Shakti Samanta with story by Sachin Bhowmick. It revolves in the French capital city of Paris. The movie stars Shammi Kapoor, Sharmila Tagore in a double role, Pran as the villain, and Rajindernath in the comic subplot.The foreign locations and its music were the highlight of this film.Beside these the appearance of Sharmila Tagore in a Bikini was also the talking point.it was a first time the Hindi Cinegoers saw a heroine in Bikini in Hindi Films. Wearing a bikini put her name in the Indian press as one of Bollywood's ten hottest actresses of all time,The film was a big hit.

The film begins with a monologue on how a rich heiress who has been in love thrice, moves to Paris to find the true love which she feels she cannot find in India. On one of her outings, Deepa meets Shyam/Sam (Shammi Kapoor), who immediately falls in love with her and begins to follow her around. After some initial resistance, Deepa eventually gives in to his charms.

In Paris she meets Shyam (Pran) who is her father's secretary's son,Who needs money to clear his gambling debts,he plans to marry her.Since Deepa does not love him, she refuses telling him that she only loves Sam.

Shekher finds a girl Suzy who looks similar to Deepa and shows her Deepa with Sam, so that she can learn her mannerisms.Later he kidnaps Deepa then puts Suzy in her place at her home.
Deepa's father learns of Deepa's kidnapping and flies to Paris. He and Sam discover that Suzy is Deepa's lost twin sister, who had been kidnapped when she was very young and her real name is Roopa. Deepa's father is overjoyed that he has found his daughter, but Suzy refuses to accept herself as his daughter.

In the mean time Suzy also started loving Shyam,He tells her that he loves Deepa he needs her help to find Deepa.This angers Suzy at first but later she realises that she should not come between her sister and her love.
Near climax real Deepa (pretending to be Suzy) escapes from.the clutches of Shekher but Shekhar reaches the boat where Deepa is waiting for Sam and drives off with her. Sam also reaches just after Shekhar drives off. He jumps in the boat from a helicopter and beats Shekhar up. Sam throws him overboard where he floats over the waterfall. Deepa and Sam escape to a small rock in the middle of waterfall from where they are rescued by the helicopter.

Audiance really enjoyed the helicopter chase and the song aasman se aaya farishta.We’ve had a lot to look at, after all, and that’s really all Shammi and the filmmakers promised.