Down memory lane

“I have people who come from Paris and pick up some specific prints every year. Like last time when they came they picked all the originals of Guru Dutt movies. Every time they pick up one movie icon and work and research around him or her,” he says of a group of researchers from a Paris museum.

The price for these classics ranges from Rs 100 for “not so familiar movies” to Rs 1,000 for popular movies. Customers need to pay a special price for collector’s items like Sholay,Deewar and Mughal-e-Azam.

“Price varies for every movie,” he says. Then there are “lobby cards” that are usually used by theaters. These also come with a price tag starting at Rs 500.

Up for grabs at his shop right now are two original posters from Pakeezah. “It’s priceless. There is a charm in the beauty of yesteryears’ women,” he says.

Third prints of the Raja Ravi Verma Press and Shakuntala also have a faithful customer base. A German picked up a collection of 17 frames of Verma last month for an exhibition back home. Black and white photographs of actresses from the bygone era are equally coveted.

“These days,the only people who come to pick the posters are those who are renovating restaurants or those who are doing up parlours or studios,” he says. The prints,that often reach him through distributors and theatres,sometimes find a strange way to get to his shop. Once he got a call from an unknown person in New Delhi who found a poster of Mera Naam Joker in the scrap market.

Among his other prized collections is a poster of House No 44. “The only other copy of its kind is with Dev Anand in his studio,” he claims. As for the smiling Suraiyya “the original went last month. I fell in love with her and made a copy for myself.”