Digitally-Restored 1951 Raj Kapoor Classic ‘Awara’ Set For World Premiere

New Delhi: The birth centenary of the legendary Raj Kapoor is coming up in just over three months.

The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) will mark the special occasion with a world premiere of a digital restoration of one of his all-time classics ‘Awara’.

The 1951 crime drama film, produced and directed by Raj Kapoor, featured Prithviraj Kapoor, Nargis, Shashi Kapoor besides Raj himself.

The digitally restored print will be screened during the 49th edition of North America’s largest film festival, which will be held from September 5 to 15.

The National Film Development Corporation (NFDC) and National Film Archive took up the high-quality 4K restoration of the film’s original print as part of the Indian government’s National Film Heritage Mission.

TIFF was contacted about the screening by NFDC officials.

“It’s a gorgeous restoration and all of the songs that everybody’s familiar with will be there. So we just really wanted to have this as part of this year’s selection,” TIFF’s director of programming Robyn Citizen told Hindustan Times.

‘Awara’ will be part of the Classics segment at this year’s Toronto festival.

“A highly influential classic of Bollywood cinema, Awara has enjoyed international popularity (it was nominated for the Grand Prize at the 1953 Cannes Film Festival) and critical praise, this is a vibrant, sensuous, and casually progressive must-see,” TIFF said in its description of ‘Awara’.

Considered by many to be the greatest showman of Indian cinema, Raj was featured by TIFF in 2011 also, when a retrospective of his films was hosted under the title ‘Raj Kapoor and the Golden Age of Indian Cinema’.