Revisiting Sridevi's 'Chandni', Which Came as a Saviour For Yash Chopra

On Sridevi's death anniversary, here's looking at how Chandni prevented Yash Chopra from shutting shop.

Chandni hit the silver screen in 1989, at a time when filmmaker Yash Chopra was reeling from back-to-back flops. The Sridevi starrer was Chopra's one last gamble, an ode to romance and his first heroine-oriented film. The enormous box-office success of Chandni breathed new life into Yash Raj Film's future.

On Sridevi's 5th death anniversary, let's revisit Chandni, which came as a saviour for Yash Chopra.

For Chopra, the 1980s was a tough decade. Most of his endeavours, including the highly anticipated Silsila (1981) and Vijay (1988), did not perform as expected.

The 1980s, on the other hand, was Sridevi's decade. After delivering blockbusters like Himmatwala (1983), Sadma (1983), Nagina (1986), and Mr India (1987), Sridevi was ruling Hindi cinema at the time.

Netflix's new docuseries, The Romantics celebrates the filmmaker's legacy and also gives us an insight into YRF's journey.

Rishi Kapoor, who had worked with the filmmaker in Vijay, shared in The Romantics that after the film's box office failure, Chopra had approached him with another film, and it was a love story.

"I know for a fact that Yashji knew that if Chandni doesn't work, he was going to close shop. Because this was his last bullet," Rishi shared in the docuseries.

Chandni was filmed during the action era. And Chopra was now about to stake his last bit of success on Sridevi's stardom. He created Chandni, hoping that it would bring an end to his dark era.

"Our industry reached a saturation point of violence. I said okay. Now I'll do the biggest gamble of my life. Whatever happens. I won't make a film with formula, with calculation, with this one, that one. I'll make a film which touches my heart. I started Chandni," Chopra had shared in an old interview.

Talking about how Sridevi was cast in the film, Anil Kapoor shared in The Romantics that it was his brother who helped Chopra get in touch with Sridevi.

In an old interview, Chopra had shared, "I had never worked with Sridevi. I had seen one film which impressed me very much. Amit ji (Amitabh Bachchan) showed me the movie and I was very much impressed by her performance."

Chandni was a beautiful ode to Sridevi's charm and elegance, who enchanted the audience with her on-screen presence.

It was a classic Yash Chopra romance that featured two very different heroes, one who is romantic and the other who is quiet and supportive, while the heroine is a strong, independent woman who takes charge of her destiny.

Written by Kamna Chandra, the film follows Sridevi as Chandni, who finds herself at the centre of a love triangle with Rishi Kapoor (as Rohit) and Vinod Khanna (as Lalit), who plays second fiddle.

Chandni opened doors for romance as a genre in Hindi cinema. It was in some ways even more revolutionary because it compelled the audience to focus solely on our heroine, overlooking the heroes.

Despite everything, the film received a lukewarm response when it was first released. In fact, Chopra had shared that one of the distributors did not even want to release the film initially.

Talking about Chandni's screening, filmmaker Karan Johar shared in The Romantics, "At the end of the film's screening, I was taking leaps of love. Like, at my reaction. I had gone crazy. I was already ready to watch the film all seven days of the next week. But I walked out to such a tepid and such a lukewarm reaction. 'It's too long, there are too many songs. What's it really about? Who's gonna get it? This is not a commercial film.' And I was like, 'Why aren't people getting it?'"

Soon, mixed reports were heard, some people had liked the film, while others did not. But as Rishi Kapoor says in The Romantics, "As destiny has it, Chandni had worked. And then there was no looking back for Yash Chopra."

The filmmaker and his production house were rising from the ashes. People were coming back to the cinema to see romantic films. Switzerland was reintroduced to the Indian screens.

From Chandni's songs to Sridevi's ethereal white outfits, everything was a hit. Leena Daru, who designed the simple white Churidar and Kurta with the Leheriya Dupatta for Sridevi, established a fashion trend in the country. Every woman aspired to be Sridevi. The stores in Delhi's Chandni Chowk hit the jackpot with thousands of replica Chandni outfits.

Johar revealed in The Romantics that Chopra often used to read the Vogue Magazine, from where he would reference costumes for his heroines. He would always dress them beautifully.

Talking about the iconic white outfits of Chandni, Chopra had shared in an old interview, "I sometime cancel 50, 60 costumes if they don't come in my vision. I wanted to dress her very simply. 'Chandni' means purity, means whiteness, means innocence."

Johar further shared in the docuseries, "Chandni had just picked up, and gone crazy. The north had taken to it. The music had become a blockbuster album. It had gone against what the entire trade had predicted."

According to Yash Raj Films, Chandni's soundtrack was a massive hit in India and sold more than 10 million copies, becoming the best-selling soundtrack album of that year as well as the decade.

The songs from the film are so popular that 'Mere Hathon Mein' is often performed at Indian weddings even to this day.

Chopra has also received numerous honours for the film. The filmmaker won his first National Film Award for Chandni at the 37th National Film Awards, in the Best Popular Picture Offering Healthful Entertainment category.

Due to its wild popularity and public demand, Chandni also had a theatrical release in Canada in the summer of 1992.

Chandni was a film made from the heart that touched every romantic. Needless to say, Chandni will go down in history as one of Sridevi's most iconic performances.