Family Bonds

I've seen a lot of Bollywood Bond pastiches over the years, but The Great Gambler (1979) is one of the more interesting ones, because it takes advantage of the shift in cultural context, mixing Bond-style international intrigue, cool gadgets, secret lairs and a sultry femmes fatale with Bollywood's focus on family, fidelity, and the heroism of the common man.

The common man in question is Jai (Amitabh Bachchan), a streetwise gambler.  Jai may seem rough, but he comes equipped with the requisite heart of gold, and is devoted to his sister Madhu (Madhu Malhotra.)  Jai's amazing gambling skills attract the attention of wealthy casino owner Ratan Das (Madan Puri), who hires him to fleece wealthy patrons in exchange for a share of the winnings.

Ratan Das presents the scheme as practically a joke, but what he doesn't tell Jai is that he's actually seeking to blackmail the losers and sell the material to an international spy ring, a spy ring which communicates through coded messages hidden in dance routines performed by Monica (Helen.)  Though sometimes they just communicate by calling each other on the phone; these guys are dangerous but not especially competent at spying.

After a botched handover, the police get their hands on one of the film canisters, and Inspector Vijay (also Amitabh Bachchan) quickly tracks down Monica, but she's murdered by Sethi (Roopesh Kumar) before she can say anything.  And then the plot kicks into high gear.

Saxena (Utpal Dutt), the spy ring's ringleader, sends Sethi to Rome, along with the secret atomic death ray plans Ratan Das managed to extract from a hapless debtor.  The plan is for offensive Italian stereotype Marconi (Sujit Kumar) to kill Sethi, but Marconi is perhaps the biggest idiot in the gang and fails miserably.  An angry Sethi contacts Indian intelligence and offers to sell the plans back to them, so Vijay is sent to Venice to make the deal.  However, Saxena's gang find out and they send Monica's replacement, Shabnam (Zeenat Aman) to waylay Vijay.

Meanwhile, Ratan Das has a new scheme; his old and very wealthy friend Deepchand (Iftekhar) has a daughter, Mala (Neetu Singh), and wants her to marry Ratan Das's son.  Ratan Das has no son, however, so he sends Jai to marry the girl in order to get his hands on Deepchand's considerable fortune.  Deepchand and Mala live in Lisbon, so both Vijay and Jai have flights to Europe, and that means that Shabnam actually waylays Jai, while Mala meets Vijay at the airport.

There is a lot of plot in this movie, but there's no time to get confused, because something is happening all the time.  Sometimes it's a car chase through the streets of Rome, sometimes it's a romantic evening in Cairo, but there is always something, and it's always dripping with Seventies cool.

The Great Gambler's biggest departure from the Hollywood spy films that inspired it is in the character of the protagonists.  Jai cleans up well, but he's always a street kid at heart, a lovable scamp who follows his own code rather than a cool and collected agent.  Vijay is a cool and collected agent, but he is also a model of proper behavior; he doesn't drink, doesn't smoke, and absolutely refuses to take advantage of Mala when given the opportunity.

I don't think I've ever seen a Bollywood Bond homage put so much effort in balancing spy action with personal drama, but The Great Gambler does it with style.  It still needs more Helen, though.