Mr. Natwarlal

Mr. Natwarlal is a 1979 Indian Hindi-language action comedy film produced by Tony Glaad (as "Tony") and directed by Rakesh Kumar. The film stars Amitabh Bachchan, Rekha, Ajit, Kader Khan, Amjad Khan and the music is by Rajesh Roshan, the songs are written by Anand Bakshi. The highlight of the film was a children's song sung by Amitabh Bachchan. Tony Glaad decided to take them as the writers of the film. The film was shot in Kashmir with most of the shooting done in Beerwah, Jammu and Kashmir. Film and music expert Rajesh Subramanian revealed, that the vocals for "Mere Paas Aao" were to be recorded by Kishore Kumar, but since Amitabh Bachchan was planning a mega live concert abroad, he wanted to sing a song in his voice to perform live at the concerts, hence it was sung by Bachchan. The name of the film and lead character were inspired by a notorious Indian conman, Natwarlal. Getting Amitabh to sing was a gimmick that was tried for the first time in this film. Kabhi Kabhie earlier had Amitabh use spoken verse within a melodic song, but this was the first time he sang in a film. This was subsequently copied by other filmmakers in films like Laawaris, Silsila and Pukar. As per a trade guide, which was premium box-office publication in the 1970s and 1980s, Mr. Natwarlal was a "Super Hit". In today's lenient classification system, Mr. Natwarlal is easily a blockbuster.