Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak

There are now many books on past classics, so it is refreshing to read Gautam Chintamani’s chronicling of how a modern classic like Qayamat se Qayamat Tak came to be made. Writing with clarity and enthusiasm, Chintamanis research is thorough and brought alive by experience and memory. In addition, this book is as close we may come to a biography of the elusive and important director Mansoor Khan.’ – Nasreen Munni Kabir, author and film-maker

It’s the 1980s and Hindi cinema is going through the bleakest phase in its fifty-year history. The old guard is coming unstuck at the box office with alarming regularity and the new generation has failed to take off. Rampant video piracy has resulted in middle-class audiences abandoning the theatres for the comfort of their drawing rooms. Film-makers are making films replete with violence and crudity addressed to front-benchers. And the less said about the quality of music the better. Then, out of the blue, an unheralded film, boasting no stars and helmed by a first-time film-maker burst on to the screens, bringing audiences back, resurrecting Hindi cinema and its music, while giving it two of its most enduring stars. That film was Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak. Gautam Chintamani goes behind the scenes to record how QSQT (as it has come to be known) made the choices it did, brought the love story back into reckoning, revived Hindi film music and revitalized Hindi cinema. His in-depth interviews with people associated with the film – director Mansoor Khan, stars Aamir Khan and Juhi Chawla, cinematographer Kiran Deohans and music composers Anand-Milind, among others – make Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak: The Film That Revived Hindi Cinema a comprehensive study of a trendsetter that provided Hindi cinema a new direction. It is, equally, an intimate, fun-filled account of a beloved classic.