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{{Use Indian English|date=November 2015}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=November 2015}}
{{Infobox film
| name = Om Dar-B-Dar
| image = Avant Garde Omdarbadar Kamal Swaroop Poster.jpg
| caption = Theatrical Poster
| director = [[Kamal Swaroop]]
|producer = [[National Film Development Corporation of India]] (NFDC)
| starring = [[Anita Kanwar]] [[Lalit Tiwari]] [[Aditya Lakhia]] Gopi Desai Manish Gupta
|writer = Kuku (dialogue)
|music = [[Rajat Dholakia]]
| cinematography = Ashwin Kaul Milind Ranade
| editing = Ravi Gupta [[Priya Krishnaswamy]]
| distributor = [[PVR Pictures]] Director's Rare
| released = {{Film date|1988|02|12|[[Berlin International Film Festival|Berlin]]|2014|01|17|India|df=yes}}
| runtime = 101 minutes
| country = India
| language = Hindi
| budget = {{INR Convert|10|l}}<ref name=mint/>
| gross =
}}
'''''Om Dar-B-Dar''''' (Hindi: ओम-दर-ब-दर) is a 1988 Indian [[Hindi]]-language [[postmodernist film]] directed by [[Kamal Swaroop]] and starring [[Anita Kanwar]], [[Aditya Lakhia]] and Gopi Desai. The film, about the adventures of a school boy named Om along with his family, is set in [[Ajmer]] and [[Pushkar]] in Rajasthan, and employs [[nonlinear narrative]] and an [[Absurdist fiction|absurdist]] story line to satirise mythology, arts, politics and philosophy.<ref>{{cite web| title = Om Darbadar| url = http://www.sunday-guardian.com/masala-art/om-darbadar|publisher=The Sunday Guardian|date=22 Jan 2012| access-date = 2013-09-16}}</ref> The film won the [[Filmfare Critics Award for Best Movie]] in 1989.

It was never commercially released in India, though it achieved success in International Film Festivals, including [[Berlin International Film Festival|Berlin]] where it premiered, and it soon became a [[cult film]]. In 2013, [[National Film Development Corporation of India]] (NFDC) had planned an official national release of a digitally restored print of the film.<ref>{{cite web| title = Eating Oscar for Lunch? |publisher= Tehelka| url =http://www.tehelka.com/eating-oscar-for-lunch/|date=2013-09-21 |id= Issue 38 Volume 10| access-date = 2013-09-16}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title ='80s classic gets a new lease of life|publisher= Ahmedabad Mirror | url = http://www.ahmedabadmirror.com/printarticle.aspx?page=comments&action=translate&sectid=13&contentid=20130720201307200158589961d86823b&subsite= |date=20 July 2013| access-date = 2013-09-16 }}</ref> The film finally released in Indian theaters after 26 years, on 17 January 2014.<ref>{{cite web | title = Om-Dar-Ba-Dar to Finally Release | publisher = DearCinema | url = http://dearcinema.com/news/pvr-release-om-dar-ba-dar/3004 | date = 2014-01-14 | access-date = 2014-01-14 | url-status = dead | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20140116154158/http://dearcinema.com/news/pvr-release-om-dar-ba-dar/3004 | archive-date = 16 January 2014 | df = dmy-all }}</ref>

==Synopsis==
''Om-Dar-B-Dar'' is a portrait of life in [[Ajmer]] town, Rajasthan. The film tells the story of a young boy named Om in the period of his carefree adolescence and its harsh disillusions. The story starts as a comedy and ends as a thriller. Om has a rather strange family. His father, Babuji, a government employee, leaves his job so that he can dedicate himself to astrology; Om's older sister, Gayatri, is dating a good-for-nothing fellow. Om is involved in science but is also attracted to magic and religion. In all, it seems that he is really outstanding
in his skill and ability to hold his breath for a long time.

==Cast==
* [[Anita Kanwar]] as Phoolkumari
* Gopi Desai as Gayatri
* [[Lalit Tiwari]] as Jagdish
* Bhairavchandra Sharma
* Lakshminarayan Shastri as Om's Father
* Ramesh Mathur
* [[Aditya Lakhia]] as Om
* Manish Gupta as young Om
* Peter Morris Messe

==Release==
The film was made on a budget of Rs. 10 lakhs.<ref name=mint/> It had its premiere at the [[Berlin International Film Festival]] in 1988, and was played at the film festival circuit and even became a cult film. However, it was never commercially released in India, only as a video release. The film received renewed attention when it was screened at Experimenta, an experimental film festival in Mumbai in 2005. Thereafter, it went into a digital restoration project funded by the [[National Film Development Corporation of India]] (NFDC). Eventually, the digitally restored version was released on 17 January 2014, by [[PVR Cinemas]] in metro cities.<ref name=mint>{{cite web| title = Cult film Om-Dar-Ba-Dar finally comes up for air|publisher= Livemint | url = http://www.livemint.com/Leisure/7IQXc5RBNStQlX6W7u9mtO/Cult-film-OmDarBDar-finally-comes-up-for-air.html |date=25 November 2013| access-date = 2014-01-16 }}</ref>

==Themes==
The movie was described by its director [[Kamal Swaroop]] as a story of Lord [[Brahma]], and it sprouted from the idea that in Hinduism, although Lord Brahma was considered the father of the entire universe, strangely no one ever worshiped him.<ref name=dear>{{cite web|title = I Became Dadasaheb Phalke |publisher= DearCinema| url =http://dearcinema.com/interview/i-became-dadasaheb-phalke-myself-kamal-swaroop/1855|date=2014-01-14| access-date = 2014-01-14}}</ref> Swaroop also said that the film's script was written based solely on dreams and images that he had and claimed he "cannot think in words."<ref name=dear/>

==Soundtrack==
The songs by Swaroop's assistant, Kuku, are sporadic and choppy and don't make any logical sense, and are used tongue-in-cheek as mocking the tradition of spontaneous songs and [[Number (music)|musical numbers]] in [[Bollywood]] cinema, many of which don't do anything to move the story forward, but are instead used as an [[escapism|escapist]] "break" from the storyline.<ref name=flash>{{cite web| title = Flashback #63: Om Darbadar (1988)| url =http://theseventhart.info/2009/07/11/flashback-63/|publisher=The Seventh Art|date=11 July 2009| access-date = 2014-01-14}}</ref>

==Legacy ==
Although the film was never released or seen in India during its initial rounds at the film festivals, ''Om-Dar-B-Dar'' has in the past 30 years gained a huge cult following and fame amongst film critics, scholars, industry insiders and cinephiles alike. One of the first serious articles about the film was written on the film blog ''The Seventh Art''.<ref name=flash/> The blog stated, "Swaroop's film is an antithesis to whatever is recognized globally as Indian cinema – a reason good enough to make ''Om-Dar-B-Dar'' a must-see movie" and that the movie can be defined as many things, the most popular of them "the great Indian LSD trip."<ref name=flash/> The film can also be looked at as a jab at mainstream Indian cinema, and many of the themes and images in the film are direct satires of conventions of [[Bollywood]] film-making.<ref name=flash/>

Director [[Imtiaz Ali (director)|Imtiaz Ali]] mentioned the vast amount of influence that the film had on aspiring independent directors in Indian cinema, stating that ''Om-Dar-B-Dar'' is "like old wine" and "antiquated because of the 25-year delay in its release".<ref>{{cite web| title = Imtiaz Ali on Om Dar B Dar |publisher= [[YouTube]]| url =https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvmNrYAFalY&t=1m7s|date=2014-01-14| access-date = 2018-07-30}}</ref>

Director [[Anurag Kashyap]] also mentioned in his film blog that in his directorial venture ''[[Dev.D]]'', the song "Emotional Attyachar" was inspired in its music and staging from the song "Meri Jaan" in ''Om-Dar-B-Dar''.<ref>{{cite web| title = Dev.D- Emosional Atyachar |publisher= Passion for Cinema| url =https://passionforcinema-archive.blogspot.com/2016/06/devd-emosional-atyachar.html|date=2008-12-01| access-date = 2014-07-20}}</ref><ref>{{cite web| title = Anurag Kashyap on Om Dar B Dar |publisher= [[YouTube]]| url =https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WzF2MsP39c&t=0m38s|date=2014-01-20| access-date = 2018-07-30}}</ref>

Producer [[Kiran Rao]] recalled watching the film on a [[VCD]] which came with a bad print and poor sound quality, yet being able to somehow stitch the missing bits in her head, which she noted was also a great way to watch a film.<ref>{{cite web| title = Kiran Rao on Om Dar B Dar |publisher= [[YouTube]]| url =https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imSSy-AJ73c&t=0m31s|date=2014-01-16| access-date = 2018-07-30}}</ref>

This film has been categorized by [[Amrit Gangar]] as a Cinema of Prayoga film.<ref>{{Cite web|title = THEIR EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH « The Big Indian Picture|url = http://thebigindianpicture.com/2013/06/their-experiments-with-truth/|access-date = 2019-07-10}}</ref>

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
* {{IMDb title|0246825|Om Dar-Ba-Dar}}
* [http://www.indianauteur.com/?p=965/ Indian Auteur Master Series: Kamal Swaroop] Indianauteur
* [http://theseventhart.info/2009/07/11/flashback-63/ Om-Dar-Ba-Dar review]
* [https://madaboutmoviez.com/2012/07/08/dar-b-dar-pioneer-indian-avant-garde/ Om Dar Ba Dar : A Pioneer in Indian Avant-Garde]
{{FilmfareCriticsAwardBestMovie}}

[[Category:1988 films]]
[[Category:1980s Hindi-language films]]
[[Category:Indian avant-garde and experimental films]]
[[Category:Indian nonlinear narrative films]]
[[Category:Postmodern films]]
[[Category:Indian satirical films]]
[[Category:Films set in Rajasthan]]
[[Category:1980s avant-garde and experimental films]]
[[Category:1980s rediscovered films]]
[[Category:Rediscovered Indian films]]
[[Category:1988 directorial debut films]]

Om-Dar-B-Dar - Revision history

Ajay Kumar: Created a new article