Pothey Holo Deri – Bengali

Pothey Holo Deri, 1957
Director: Agradoot (a collective of film technicians)
Music: Robin Chatterjee
Lyrics: Gouri Prasanna Majumdar
Playback: Sandya Mukherjee, Alpana Banerjee
Cast: Uttam Kumar, Suchitra Sen, Shishir Batabyal, Anil Bhattacharya, Mihir Bhattacharya, Chhabi Biswas, Bharati Devi, Chandrabati Devi, Jahar Ganguli, Anup Kumar, Shyam Laha

English subtitles provided.

Jayanta, a poor doctor, falls in love with the rich Mallika who gives him her mother’s jewelry to study medicine in Europe However, her grandfather, who is against their relationship, creates misunderstandings between the two and plans to wed Mallika off to a rich doctor. Jayanta comes back to find Mallika in a psychotic vegetative state resulting out of the anxiety and depression of being estranged from Jayanta. He sets out on a mission to devote all his life to cure her.

This was Bengali cinema’s first color film. But the Gevacolor process used deteriorated and only black and white copies remain.

Here’s a playlist of the 5 songs in the film:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLA_A9T_Uj7Iy2QV7OwjyB859dHSNXR2P1