Dev Anand - Career - Directorial Debut and The 70s

Directorial Debut and The 70s

His directorial debut, the espionage drama Prem Pujari, was a flop but has developed a cult following over the years. He tasted success with his 1971 directorial effort, Hare Rama Hare Krishna which talked about the prevalent hippie culture. His find Zeenat Aman, who played the mini-skirt sporting, pot-smoking Janice, became an overnight sensation. Dev also became known as a filmmaker of trenchantly topical themes. This same year, he starred with Mumtaz in Tere Mere Sapne, an adaptation of A. J. Cronin's novel, The Citadel. The film was directed by Dev's brother, Vijay and was also successful.

In the 1970s, Raj Kapoor started playing roles of father in films like Kal Aaj Aur Kal in 1971 and Dharam Karam in 1974 and had put lot of weight and films with Dilip Kumar as lead hero were failures at the box office . Some of the hurriedly-made films with Dev Anand as the leading man—three each opposite Hema Malini and Zeenat Aman and Yeh Gulistaan Hamara with Sharmila Tagore became flops and posed a threat to his career as leading man. But he delivered commercial hits again with young heroines Yogita Bali and Raakhee in Banarasi Babu (1973), Hema Malini in Chhupa Rustam (1973) and Amir Garib (1974), Zeenat Aman in Heera Panna(1973), Warrant(1975) and Darling Darling(1977) and Parveen Babi in Bullet(1976). The presence of his discoveries in the 1970s—Zeenat, and later Tina Munim, in films and his good onscreen chemistry with beautiful young stars like Raakhee, Parveen Babi, Hema Malini, Zeenat Aman in various films boosted Dev's image as the evergreen star even though he was well into his fifties.