Paapi

Vintage movie poster art for sale: Paapi (1977).

Featured here is an actual surviving vintage Bollywood poster of the old 1977 Hindi film written, produced and directed by O.P. Ralhan that starred Zeenat Aman, Sunil Dutt and Sanjeev Kumar in key roles.

Presented under the Ralhan Productions banner, Paapi (1977) also starred Reena Roy, Prem Chopra, Amrish Puri, Padma Khanna, Madan Puri, Iftekhar, Durga Khote, Jagdish Raj, Tun Tun, Rajan Kapoor, O.P. Ralhan, Alka and Kamaldeep in supporting roles. Danny Denzongpa, Hina Kausar, Manmohan Krishna, Kamal Kapoor, Nana Palsikar and Sudhir made guest appearances in the film.

Paapi (1977) told the story of siblings Raj and Rano who are separated during childhood during the violent rape and murder of their elder sister. Left to fend for herself on the streets, Rano (Zeenat Aman) is drawn into a world of crime and grows up to become a burglar called Rani. Meanwhile, Rani’s brother, now named Kumar (Sunil Dutt) has grown up to become an honest CID officer after being adopted and raised by a police inspector (Iftekhar). In order to loot a wealthy businessman of his diamonds, she assumes the identity of his former employer’s only daughter and begins to live in his mansion where she meets his doctor Ashok (Sanjeev Kumar). Ashok is smitten by Rani despite learning the fact that she is a criminal. Dr. Ashok and Kumar are good friends, with opposing views. Ashok is a left idealist who believes love can reform criminals and not punishment. Kumar on the other hand is a realist who believes criminals deserve no mercy and should be incarcerated to rid society of crime. Desperately seeking to find his lost sister, Kumar despite being in love with Dr. Ashok’s friend (Reena Roy), refuses to marry her until he finds Rano. Thief Vikram (Prem Chopra) blackmails Rani into working for his crime boss (Amrish Puri) and the syndicate pulls of a sensational jewelry heist with her help. CID officer Kumar is assigned to the case and he manages to catch Rani but Dr. Ashok pleads with him to let her go as the two are in love and want to get married. However, Kumar refuses to relent and proceeds to arrest Rani but Ashok helps her escape. For obstructing police work and being an accessory to a fugitive’s run from the law, Kumar arrests Ashok. Rani is furious as Ashok has been defamed in the media because of her and vows to kill Kumar for arresting him. However, she learns that Kumar is her long lost brother and decides to end her life as she doesn’t want her brother’s spotless reputation to be sullied. One of her gang members (Padma Khanna) stops her from committing suicide and convinces her to use her life instead to eliminate their mob boss and help her brother Kumar in bringing down the entire cartel.

Printed and circulated during a subsequent release of the film (somewhere in the 1980s), this old Bollywood poster was originally designed for publicity of the film in north Indian theaters but never ended up being used.

This Paapi poster was originally designed in hand painted oil on canvas format by a Bollywood poster art studio in Delhi and is a striking example of vintage movie poster art .

Actress Zeenat Aman is seen in a quirky hand painted portrait on the left pointing a gun. Sunil Dutt appears in the background on the right holding his oversized hand dangling a pair of handcuffs over her head. The large hand is representative of the long arm of the law reaching out to catch the criminal.

A large close up portrait of Sanjeev Kumar’s face is seen on the bottom right, along with smaller illustrations of villain Danny Denzongpa, Padma Khanna and comedian Rajan Kapoor. A small full figure portrait of the actress is seen on the bottom left of this vintage movie poster.

The background is a mix of red on the top half and minimal white on the bottom, making the lettering stand out. Typography used in this stunning movie poster is a mix of both Devanagari Hindi as well as English. An adult A rating symbol is seen at the center in red inside small a green circle. The main Devanagari Hindi title appears in red with a yellow border in a cinemascope font at the bottom. A subtitle on the top in English reads, “Drama of the Underworld of Crims (Crime) Lust & Sin.”

The soundtrack album of Paapi (1977) was composed by “Disco King” Bappi Lahiri. The song Aa Jane Jaan Aa Meherban sung by melody queen Lata Mangeshkar was popular at the time of the film’s release.