ABSTRACT
This chapter tracks an unsuccessful project, narrating how the popular actor-producer Dev Anand, who was initially associated with Nav Ketan, endured an international failure. Anand teamed up with film producer-director Rolf Bayer in an attempt to re-launch his international career via Hollywood. Tentatively titled “The Evil Within” (1970) or “Inside Out/Passport to Danger/Flower of Evil”, the film was to be distributed by 20th Century Fox, across 42 countries. Based on a drug network that is busted by the Interpol agent Dev (Dev Anand), this project was shot on location in India, Vietnam, Hong Kong and Philippines. This chapter draws out a detailed account of the film, and in the process elucidates the interlacing of Dev Anand’s career trajectories on one hand, and the complex web of media networks and imaginaries in post Second World War/Cold War Asia, on the other. Although the project did not eventually model Bandung’s internationalist utopia, this analysis reveals a vast network across postcolonial worlds, which nonetheless, was imagined by the American studios.
