Guide (1965)

Purely Joyful Movie!

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

As Good As It Gets

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Guide is based on the novel "The Guide". Very few Indian movies are based on novels. This is rather tragic given the fact that Indian languages have rich literature.Vijay Anand deserves full credit for picking up a great story and presenting it in an entertaining manner to the audience with songs and dance thrown in.Critics of the film deride it for not being true to the novel. However very few Indian movies are based on novels to begin with. This movie at least makes a brave attempt to move out of the mundane formula.Dev Anand and Waheeda excel in their roles. S.D Burman as usual renders a memorable score. Vijay Anand's direction is flawless. I give this movie a 10 out of 10 and recommend that it should be watched at least once. This features in my list of best movies and forms a part of my DVD collection.

SPOILERS POSSIBLEI rented this movie as I had heard it was an Indian classic. I was very impressed by the far superior MOTHER India and since GUIDE was one of the first Bollywood musicals to get an American release, I figured it was something special. The comments here on IMDb enforced the risk of the three hour investment, but they turned out to be strictly sentimental.What a disappointment! Previous reviewers acclaimed this as a pioneer musical and a consummate Indian film, but besides possibly establishing the absurd plot format of all future Bollywood films, (good prostitutes, distressed drunks, suffering mothers, silly uncles) the premise is strictly lifted from 1930's B level Hollywood musicals. This is a tale about a cheerful tour GUIDE with a Tin-Tin hairdo who falls on hard times when he encounters an unhappy bride. The Bride, a crude-mouthed prostitute's daughter, is in an unhappy marriage with a wealthy archaeologist who is older and has no time for her. She indeed wants to be a snake dancer in spite of having an enormous arse that would make dancing an improbable career choice. After many suicide attempts and melodramatic over-acted moments, she runs away with the GUIDE who alienates family, friends and neighbours in order to keep the bumble-bee-arsed dancer within his grips. Once there she melodramatically attempts to run away and spare him the anguish but seems unable to find the door and decides to practise her vulgar dancing there instead. After chasing away his beloved mother, he guides her career to incomprehensible international success (see every bad Hollywood musical from the early sound era) where, even in Europe, audiences reward her with enthusiastic applause apparently for running with bells on her ankles and spinning in place. She becomes his meal ticket and so he marries her and they revel in their new found "shared" wealth. Her estranged former husband, impressed with her success, sends her a copy of his new book and rewards her by sharing the family jewels. The GUIDE forges her signature on the agreement so as to avoid her contact with the man who once caused her so much pain. She rewards him by pressing charges against him and sending him to jail.The movie then goes on an extra journey of self discovery and plot filler (see THE RAZOR'S EDGE -1946 for more information of where that was blatantly stolen from)not worth going into, for a contrived ending that would allow for the required three hour running time to finally come to an end. The now seemingly typical Bollywood musical numbers feature people running across fields singing and dancing cannot help this movie from being mundane and badly dated even by 1950's Indian standards. Most modern Bollywood films steal from the best of Hollywood. GUIDE steals from the worse of the early Western sound films. (Satyajit Ray, why didn't you stop them!) Stick to MOTHER India and the modern Shah Rukh Khan films with beautiful and talented female leads and avoid this mess at all costs.

i presume that brian is not an Indian national or speaks Indian languages. his take on this movies is quite accurate. he has described it in perfect words. i congratulate him because it isn't easy for an American to understand the intricate details of a foreign film.also it is my all time fav movies by far ( Indian movie i.e.). a classical musical fest. brilliantly directed acted and edited. dev anand who is producer of this movies changed the end of the movie. in the novel Raju gets back with rosie and takes his mother and rosie to new town to start fresh life. but dev thought that a happy ending doesn't suit this story and decided to stick with mentality of Raju after getting out of jail. notably, i have read few other articles posted by fellow indians, which seem to have wrong interpretation of this movie. i at least saw 2 points, 1. they mention that Raju who is a guide on one hand and con-man on other. he is not depicted as con-man in the movie the only con he pulls is he forges a signature, that too to keep Rosie away from her ex husband who is trying to get back to her now that she is rich and famous. 2nd thing they say after getting out of the jail Raju goes in search of Rosie, wrong again !! he doesn't have to search for rosie if he wants to ! he decides to leave his past behind and start a new life, to search his soul, but now has no money and no goal and just wanders around. this is where the movies starts and during the titles, there is beautiful soulful song perfectly timed. this is the beauty of the movie. unlike other Hindi movies where a special situation is created for songs and songs rather seem pushed into movies. the songs in guide come with a flow and become part of the story.again brain u really have expressed the true heart of this movie. great work sir !

I saw this movie first time at the age of 10. Till then i saw it more than 250 times. It is simply great to comment about one of all time great & masterpiece movie called "GUIDE". The performance given by almost by all the actors was just simply matchless. Performance of "Dev Sahab" is tremendous. It was a very heroic step to make a film based on a novel by R.K. Narayanan. Guide, Dev Sahab & Goldy proved their mettle. Music given by "Sachin Da" is so Melodious, soulful & touching. Guide was released in the year of 1965. It begged so many awards. Guide not only have great music, great compositions, but it have great ethical, moral values too. The dialogue delivery of Dev Sahab was outstanding. I would like to repeat one of them. <<<<""""Har Sheeshe Se Dil Mein Ek Tasveer Hai, ek Sheesha-E-Dil Hamare Seene Mein Bhi Hai, Jo Hardam is Mohini Soorat Ko Chupaye Rakhta Hai"""">>>>>. Guide is a milestone in the Indian film industry. It is simply a must see film.