“Mujhe behen ka pyaar nahin chahiye, mujhe aurat ka pyaar chahiye” - Dev Anand to Suchitra Sen in Bambai ka Babu. The timeless lament of every ardent young man, one supposes. But the line has a very specific resonance in this film, with its daring plot point of a man falling in love with the woman whose brother he has been masquerading as.

Bambai ka Babu was screened in an excellent restored print at India International Centre yesterday - part of a Raj Khosla tribute in his centenary year - and I thought it was splendid. So well shot by Jal Mistry, with some very notable use of dissolves. Also the way in which the shadowy noir aesthetic is used initially for the crime/impersonation plot, but more effectively later, in the depiction of the fake “brother” struggling with his romantic feelings (and the even more complex arc of the young woman as she slowly discovers the truth).

I enjoyed the sight of poor Dev being brother-zoned. And has there ever been such sinister background music used in a rakhi scene?

A few days earlier, at the same venue, there was a short but informative discussion about Raj Khosla (followed by the screening of the 1969 Do Raaste). The conversation, moderated by Shantanu Ray Chaudhuri and featuring Raj Khosla’s daughter Anita and the veteran Amit Khanna, also touched on Amborish Roychowdhury’s recent book about Khosla. Though I’m an admirer of Amborish’s writing, and just as importantly his work ethic, I haven’t read the book yet, the main reason being that I’d like to watch/revisit some of RK’s films first. (The ones I remember moderately well include Kala Pani, Mera Gaon Mera Desh, Sunny, Prem Kahani - and probably Mera Saaya too. Though as I told a friend at the event, I feel a cognitive dissonance of sorts when I see colour clips from that film: in my head Mera Saaya is firmly a black-and-white work, having watched it on a B&W TV on Doordarshan in the 1980s - and as a noirish story, it feels like it *should* be in black-and-white too.)

Back to Bambai ka Babu, though, which is Amborish's favourite among Raj Khosla's films. Suchitra making these puppy eyes at her “brother” is everything...