Author: Humair Ahsan
Abstract
Grounding my research in theories of transnational cinema, this paper deconstructs the visual representation of modernity and globalization by conducting a narrative structure analysis of Urdu films of the 1960s. In analyzing filmic narratives of displacement, I establish a correlation between modernity and migration in conjunction with Ayub Khan’s educational reforms. I explore the influence of mid-century modernism on set design, with emphasis on furnishings, in Armaan (dir. Pervez Malik, 1966), Fasana-e-Dil (dir. Shabab Keranvi, 1969), Dil Mera Dharkan Teri (dir. M.A. Rasheed, 1968) and Naila (dir. Sharif Nayyar, 1965) and trace the aesthetic intersections and dissemination of recurring themes and styles that are subsumed by the local transculturation process. By examining the instrumental and musical composition of “Ko Ko Korina,” “Rakh Diya Qadmon Mein Dil Nazrana” and “Subhan Allah Ye Chehra,” I delineate the homogenization of global musical forms that engage with local cultures. This paper also establishes the role of Urdu cinema in diffusing popular culture and the simultaneous contribution of popular magazines in facilitating the flow of cultural products, images and information. In doing so, my research reviews the influence of transnationality and modernity on film style in Pakistan within the specified time frame and argues that Urdu films were a site of reflecting cultural and ideological changes that emerged in the Ayub Khan era in a moment of global interconnectedness that hybridized and localized transcultural exchanges.
Keywords:
Transnationality, Modernity, Style, Rural-Urban Migration, Mid-Century Modern, Popular Culture
