Sholay (1975, Indian)

One of the most popular Bollywood films of all time, Sholay is a prime example of the “curry Western,” a subset of the “angry young man” genre that dominated Bollywood in the late 70’s and early 80’s. The plot is similar to what you’d get if you took The Seven Samurai/The Magnificent Seven, got rid of five of the heroes, and added some songs. Sort of. Despite the highly dated fashion (those are some lovely leisure suits, Amitabh) and occasionally silly plot, it’s a pretty fantastic movie. The songs are fabulous (though the U.S. DVD release doesn’t bother to translate the lyrics in the subtitles), the action sequences are inventive (including a well-done bandit attack on a moving train), and, above all, there's a wonderfully nasty villain. I’ve read that the actor Amjad Khan, who played the villain, Gabbar Singh, had trouble walking through city streets after Sholay hit theaters, because pretty much everyone in India had seen it, and they would all hiss at him or call him names. Indians take their movies seriously.