Dancer Sadhona Bose made her feature debut in Modhu Bose's acclaimed musical. Vidyavinode's play, first staged in 1897 by the Classic Theatre with Nripen Basu and Kusum Kumari, remained one of the most popular pre-WW1 Bengali plays. It tells of the Baghdadi woodcutter Alibaba (M. Bose) and his magic 'Open Sesame' formula; of the hero's jealous brother Kasim and of the slave girl Marjina (S. Bose). The film adapts the Calcutta Art Player's orientalist stage version, giving it a Hollywood-derived exotic flavour. An improvised 'modern' dance is inserted, Sadhona Bose's trademark due to her theatrical work with composer Timir Baran. The slow mannered acting and the frontally framed tableau shots are enlivened by the dance scenes, esp. the Marjina-Abdallah sequence which long set the standard for film musicals (cf. Lila Desai's dance in <a href="http://indiancine.ma/CGY/info">Bidyapati, 1937</a>). The surviving copy is probably incomplete.
Cast: Modhu Bose
Crew: Modhu Bose (Director), Bibhati Das (Director of Photography), Geeta Ghosh (Director of Photography), Nagardas Nayak (Music Director)
Release Dates: 01 Jan 1937 (India)
Bengali Name: আলিবাবা
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as Abdullah
as Alibaba
as Sakina
as Baba Mustafa
as Marjina
as Fatima
Direction
Director
Production
Production Company
Distribution
Distributor
Camera and Electrical
Director of Photography
Music
Music Director
Art
Art Director
Choreography
Choreographer
Editorial
Editor
Makeup and Hair
Makeup Artist
Film Type:
Feature
Language:
Bengali
Colour Info:
Black & White
Sound Mix:
Mono
Frame Rate:
24 fps
Aspect Ratio:
2.35:1
Stereoscopy:
No
