Barsaat Ki Raat (1960)
The story features a number of innovative themes while maintaining the basic form of a love story. It has particularly strong female characters who are independent-minded and choose their own loves and destiny. Conflicts are not so much between the wishes of the parents and children about whom the children will marry, as is a common theme in Indian movies, but on the more complex level of conflicts among the main characters and the duplicitous signals men and women send each other. The movie glorifies the lives of “singing girls” not often regarded highly in Indian society. Although it is set with Muslim characters, the movie seamlessly shows the universality of sensual love.
