Bandie

Bandie is a 1978 Indian bilingual swashbuckler film simultaneously shot in Bengali and Hindi languages, co-written and directed by Alo Sircar. Produced by F. C. Mehra under the banner of Eagle Films, the film stars Uttam Kumar in dual roles, alongside an ensemble cast of Utpal Dutt, Amjad Khan, Sulakshana Pandit, Amrish Puri, Bindu, Iftekhar, Madan Puri and Prema Narayan, with Helen and Padma Khanna in special appearances.

The film is partially adapted from Anthony Hope's 1894 novel The Prisoner of Zenda, and had some plot similarities with the 1961 Bengali film Jhinder Bondi, also starring Kumar. The film marks the second collaboration between Sircar and Kumar after Chhoti Si Mulaqat (1967), and the Bengali debuts of Khan, Puri and Bindu. The screenplays of the two versions were written by Sircar, Ashok Ghoshal and Jayanendra Jain. Dialogues were written by Salil Sen and Ghoshal for the Bengali version and Kamleshwar for the Hindi version. Music of the film was composed by Shyamal Mitra, with lyrics penned by Gauriprasanna Mazumder and Salil Chowdhury for the Bengali version and Indeevar for the Hindi version. Pradeep Pai handled its cinematography, while Pran Mehra edited the film.

Bandie theatrically released with its Hindi version on 10 March 1978, while with its Bengali version on 14 April 1978, coinciding with Pohela Boishakh. It received mixed reviews from critics, with praise for its cast performances, songs, action sequences and technical aspects, but criticism for the film's plot and screenplay. It ran for over 35 weeks in West Bengal and became hit at the box office, but bombed in Hindi. The film emerged as the third highest grossing Bengali film of 1978. Bandie was remade into Telugu as Kaksha in 1980.