The fall of Indian Cinema
Mohan
The originator of the post should have started with the subject
"The fall of Bollywood Cinema", as it seems you guys are talking
about Hindi movies coming out of Bomaby. "Bollywood"-here is the problem,
what the hell is Bollywood anway? The very name conjures up an image
of cheap 'copy-cat' cinema of the worst kind. The very name suggests
lack of imagination and originality, besides it gives me the creeps every
time I hear this crappy name.
Don't get me wrong, I used to be a big movie fan in India back in the
60s,and 70s,i mainly saw Hindi,Malayalam,and Tamil movies and enjoyed
them,not all of them of course.Then later on when i landed in the good
ole USA, in the middle of the 70s, went to see many of Ray's Bengali
movies at the Village in New York and loved all of them,strangely
enough, I was the only Indian in the theatre. Movies in those days
were original,artistic and many had a social message to convey and it
made one to think.
I haven't seen an Indian movie for over 20 years, except one Malayalam
movie a couple of years ago while in Kerala, and I saw one Tamil
movie the other day in Texas. I have seen bits and pieces of Hindi
movies on tape and was rather disappointed, ie. a lot of fluff and
not much substance.What's with the Michael Jacksonian dance bits in Hindi
movies?,you know the pelvic thrusts and crotch grabbing,it wasn't even
enjoyable when he started it back in the 80s.It looks really silly and
stupid and after watching this crap for about a second, one can be
easily persuaded to vomit profusely.
As far as I can tell the regional language movies such as Malayalam,Tamil
and Bengali seem a cut above from what 'Bollywood' (puke!) is dishing
out. I say to 'Bollywood'-change the name p..leeeese and enough already
with the 'pelvic thrust'& 'crotch grabbing',for it's getting old and
not even 'cool',come on guys this is the 90s.
N. Tiwari wrote:
> Kanwar Dhaliwal (kdha...@cen.uiuc.edu) wrote:
>
> : One good movie for 1000 useless ones? For instance, Salaam Bombay is
> : probably one of the very few Indian movies to be heard of in the west
> : because it depicted some reality. I bet that most of the Indian movie
> : fans probably havent even heard of it. I guess it is the poor taste of
> : the Indian public which is responsible for this crap.
>
> The acceptance or non-acceptance of any movie in the West is by no
> means a good criteria to judge the quality of the movie. This "business"
> of getting "acceptance in the West" is even more ridiculous, since
> our view of "West" is pretty restricted. A couple of decades back,
> England was the "West" (because of our colonial hangover). Now it is
> the US, because of the "Go Liberal" ideology. Still further, history
> tells us that it is only the "dirt" in us, that gets accepted in
> the West. That was one good reason, why a movie like a Salam Bombay
> became such a hit in "West". And even further, the "West" is no
> connoisseur of movies either. A sensationlist movie, like Jurassic
> Park, or for that sake Independence Day, being such a big hit,
> is a good testimony to the tastes of the "West".
>
> The reason why desi movie makers have stopped making good movies, is
> pretty straight forward. We as a nation have become loo lazy. So, we
> cannot, Make good movies, write good books, and make new progress in
> the fields of science and technology. Even further, we do not even
> relish creating something good anymore. Atleast the "elite" of our
> nation. How else you can explain the mesmerization of our "elite"
> with the "Bold and the Beautiful", when American tube entered the
> Indian airwaver. How else can you explain the fact that the job of
> an air hostess is perhaps a very "cool" job by Indian standards.
> A nation so bereft of a will to work hard, cannot create anything
> good. And so, we do not make any good movies, and then blame it on
> the "lack of artistic sensiblities of the average Hindustani". The
> finger, however, points out towards US.
>
> --
> Nachiketa Tiwari
Mathews J. Thundyil
In article <32F569...@worldnet.att.net>,
Mohan <cybe...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>[...]
>movies on tape and was rather disappointed, ie. a lot of fluff and
>not much substance.What's with the Michael Jacksonian dance bits in Hindi
>movies?,you know the pelvic thrusts and crotch grabbing,it wasn't even
>enjoyable when he started it back in the 80s.It looks really silly and
>stupid and after watching this crap for about a second, one can be
>easily persuaded to vomit profusely.
No kidding. At least running around trees is part of our culture :-)
>As far as I can tell the regional language movies such as Malayalam,Tamil
>and Bengali seem a cut above from what 'Bollywood' (puke!) is dishing
I dont know about Bengali, but yeah, I have to agree with you. Mainstream
malayalam cinema was the first to divorce songs from song-and-dance, and
that had much to contribute to the 'realism' depicted. I remember watching
(damn, whats the name of that movie, with Mohan Lal and Geetha, she was
a naxalite 'murderer' on parole, and he was a reporter trying to get her
off on a legal technicality, had tonnes of great songs:-) ) and thinking
that there were few songs that one could snigger at.
Matt "Anybody seen MohanLal in 'Iruvar'" Thundyil
Rizi Richard Jeyarajah
A certain extent irrelevant to this thread, last week I saw a month a
ago Times. In an article about "must see ten recent foreign films",
'Nayagan' was there (And the only South Asian' Film). Though it won't
come to the level of Adoor's films, it is a credict for the tamil films.
I saw the Hindi remake of this (Vinod Khanna, Feroz Khan and Amela
Starer); One of the worse film I have ever seen.It happened only
because in lot of sceanes you can see compromises for the typical Hindi
film goer.
But, when you are talking about reality, 99% of the Indian films (as
well as Hollywood films) are abstrud. Better you consider about
non-commercial films (I do not say, 'Art films', since now it is a word
of foul language like communism). Recent Amol Bhaker's film, and another
about 'Sexual Identity', and of course, what Adoor shot for Nippon TV.
They make you feel a little bit better.
Rizi
Rizi Richard Jeyarajah
Mathews J. Thundyil wrote:
I remember watching
> (damn, whats the name of that movie, with Mohan Lal and Geetha, she was
> a naxalite 'murderer' on parole, and he was a reporter trying to get her
> off on a legal technicality, had tonnes of great songs:-) ) and thinking
liked the film a lot. Even the songs are great and going in the back.
MK's one time actor son, Muthu, did a dishonest politician role in the
film.
Rizi
Mathews J. Thundyil
In article <32F55A...@bigfoot.com>,
Rizi Richard Jeyarajah <jeya...@bigfoot.com> wrote:
>But, when you are talking about reality, 99% of the Indian films (as
>well as Hollywood films) are abstrud. Better you consider about
>non-commercial films (I do not say, 'Art films', since now it is a word
>of foul language like communism). Recent Amol Bhaker's film, and another
>about 'Sexual Identity', and of course, what Adoor shot for Nippon TV.
I like some of the slapstick comedies that come out of Indian cinema, though
What are the names of these movies.
There is a new movie called "Iruvar" that is (loosely) based on the
lives of MGR and MK. It should be a side splitter, (I hope) with Mohan
Lal as MGR. (Well, at least the Malayalee connection is still there :-) ).
I wonder what the people of tamil nad think, though. The following that
MGR and MK have there is not one that I would like to trifle with.
I personally do not think that a 'good' film is necessarily based only
on reality, any more than a good book needs to be 'realistic'. Orwell's
animal farm, is a case in point of a good book that is 'realistic' only
in a metaphorical sense. I think the folly of many indian movies is the
hackneyed theme that they play, and replay so often that it drives a
shiver down one's spine.
Matt "YOu should try watching Univision if you feel
you are not getting enough masala in your movie diet :-)" Thundyil
S Jagadish
> Matt "Anybody seen MohanLal in 'Iruvar'" Thundyil
yea :) ... but who cares ... I also saw Aishwarya :)
--
S.Jagadish : mailto:jaga...@post1.com, mailto:f91...@delta.ntu.ac.sg
Nanyang Technological University
Mayajaal : http://www2.ntu.ac.sg:8000/~sf918168/mayajaal.html
N. Tiwari
Mohan (cybe...@worldnet.att.net) wrote:
: The originator of the post should have started with the subject
: "The fall of Bollywood Cinema", as it seems you guys are talking
: about Hindi movies coming out of Bomaby. "Bollywood"-here is the problem,
: what the hell is Bollywood anway? The very name conjures up an image
: of cheap 'copy-cat' cinema of the worst kind. The very name suggests
: lack of imagination and originality, besides it gives me the creeps every
: time I hear this crappy name.
: Don't get me wrong, I used to be a big movie fan in India back in the
: 60s,and 70s,i mainly saw Hindi,Malayalam,and Tamil movies and enjoyed
: them,not all of them of course.Then later on when i landed in the good
: ole USA, in the middle of the 70s, went to see many of Ray's Bengali
: movies at the Village in New York and loved all of them,strangely
: enough, I was the only Indian in the theatre. Movies in those days
: were original,artistic and many had a social message to convey and it
: made one to think.
: I haven't seen an Indian movie for over 20 years, except one Malayalam
: movie a couple of years ago while in Kerala, and I saw one Tamil
: movie the other day in Texas. I have seen bits and pieces of Hindi
: movies on tape and was rather disappointed, ie. a lot of fluff and
: not much substance.What's with the Michael Jacksonian dance bits in Hindi
: movies?,you know the pelvic thrusts and crotch grabbing,it wasn't even
: enjoyable when he started it back in the 80s.It looks really silly and
: stupid and after watching this crap for about a second, one can be
: easily persuaded to vomit profusely.
: As far as I can tell the regional language movies such as Malayalam,Tamil
: and Bengali seem a cut above from what 'Bollywood' (puke!) is dishing
: out. I say to 'Bollywood'-change the name p..leeeese and enough already
: with the 'pelvic thrust'& 'crotch grabbing',for it's getting old and
: not even 'cool',come on guys this is the 90s.
This is once again not true. I mean the idea that only the
"Bolywood" is the culprit in this regard. We have a Tolly
Wood (I mean the Bengali cinema) and the Bollywood. All
these cinema industries (with no industrious people) are
basically producing a lot of junk. There used to be a time
when there were good movies in Bangla, Hindi, Tamil ....
That is no longer the case now. The mere nomenclature,
which has been used in ref. to the cinema in Bombay (Bollywood)
, Calcutta (Tollywood) is a mark of the intellectual bank-
ruptcy of our cinema makers.
Good movies still get made. But then, they deal with subjects
that are too "intellectual". So much so, that even the desi
crowd in US cannot digest them in large doses. Compare this
with very earthly issues themed in the movies of bygone eras.
These movies had a charm, an earthliness, and a sophistication
that the Mira Nayars of modern cinema cannot match, and the
Bhappi Lahiri do not try to think about.
--
Nachiketa Tiwari
Girish Ramachandran
The film in Malayalam is Panchagni
Girish
Doug Bragg
OK, I am an American, so you can say I don't belong here, but listen:
I have a copy of "Salaam Bombay". At the local "Blockbuster" Video
chain there was one other Indian Movie, for which I do not remember
the name - but I rented it, and it was excellent. However; for those
of us in America who want to see more, there is a shortage.
In a local Indian store, Shaheen's, there are many Indian movies
readily available, but when I asked for any in English, or with
subtitles, I was told there were none!
Why is there such a barrier to the East to see Indian movies? Or
am I not informed? There is so little here in the way of access
to knowlege of life in India, it seems. This is unfortunate, I
think.
Mohan
Cinema is art, therefore it is the rendition of the imagination of the
artist. When we see nude paintings of women in a museum, or what are
considered to be water lillies, it does not mean that they look that
way in reality. It is purely the artist's conception.
The reason I say this is because unlike art, where the form is judged
rather than the content, we tend to judge cinema by the content rather
than its form. I beg to disagree with that viewpoint due to the
reason's mentioned above.
So it is very possible that a movie based on what will never happen
in real life, including song and dance sequences and even bizarre
happenings could be very well made and appreciated and by the same
token a very serious theme being explored could be badly rendered thus
taking the joy out of the art. The theme can be anything, real or
unreal or meaningful or meaningless. It does not have to address any
aspect of society or social problems per se. It can be a plain farce
and can be beautifully made.
It is very true however in my opinion that Indian cinema for the most
part has declined in this artistic rendering. It has lost its attention
to detail that was much better in the days when high technology was not
available. Also the so called "good" directors in search of content
lose the accent on rendition. Cases in point are 2 tamil directors that
are well revered in the tamil movie industry, K Balachander and Visu.
Their movies explore serious social themes, express radical ideas and
yet please play each one of their movies on your VCR's, turn off the
sound and watch the silent version of the movies. You will find that
each of their actors/actresses come render a long dialog and leave only
to be followed by the next one. There are several detail flaws in them.
If you doubt or question me, please watch all Balachander Movies from
Thamarai Nenjam onwards. The worst case of this is varumaiyin niram
sigappu and nool veli. All his movies are dialogue packed and devoid of
acting or direction for the most part. On the other hand, there are 2
tamil directors and of course Basu Chaterjee who do an excellent job of
actually directing a movie. K Bhagyaraj who makes light popular movies,
which have no semblance to reality and minimal histrionics, is an
example of an excellent artist in the rendition aspect. There are 2
movies of his that bring out the best in him. One of them is a farce
called "Indru poi nalai Vaa" and instead of focussing on the message or
the lack of it, please watch the attention to detail that the director
pays and you will understand what I am saying. Basu Chaterjee of course
is an excellent director again for his artist rendering of cinema to
the audience.
Mohan
In <32F55A...@bigfoot.com> Rizi Richard Jeyarajah
<jeya...@bigfoot.com> writes:
>
>A certain extent irrelevant to this thread, last week I saw a month a
>ago Times. In an article about "must see ten recent foreign films",
>'Nayagan' was there (And the only South Asian' Film). Though it won't
>come to the level of Adoor's films, it is a credict for the tamil
films.
>
>I saw the Hindi remake of this (Vinod Khanna, Feroz Khan and Amela
>Starer); One of the worse film I have ever seen.It happened only
>because in lot of sceanes you can see compromises for the typical
Hindi
>film goer.
>
>
>But, when you are talking about reality, 99% of the Indian films (as
>well as Hollywood films) are abstrud. Better you consider about
>non-commercial films (I do not say, 'Art films', since now it is a
word
>of foul language like communism). Recent Amol Bhaker's film, and
another
>about 'Sexual Identity', and of course, what Adoor shot for Nippon TV.
Samir Dhume
Videoplex has a collection of sub-titled Satyajit ray films.
Sony picture Classics has another collection of sub-titled
Indian films. Ismail Merchant's company also has some; I've
watched a couple of films which were sub-titled.
There's no deliberate barrier. We dont have the structure in
place to market our films.
samir
Arnab Gupta
Doug Bragg wrote:
>
> OK, I am an American, so you can say I don't belong here, but listen:
>
> I have a copy of "Salaam Bombay". At the local "Blockbuster" Video
> chain there was one other Indian Movie, for which I do not remember
> the name - but I rented it, and it was excellent. However; for those
> of us in America who want to see more, there is a shortage.
>
The problem is Indian film industry never keeps the forign viewers
in mind when they produce a new movie. The stuff that manages to
cross the seven seas and land up here are mainly targetted for the
Indians in US. The prints are of extremely poor quality (the
PAL to NTSC conversion is usually done with least possible care)..and
believe me, I, inspite of being an Indian, sometimes find it difficult
to follow the sound track. About the picture quality...the least that
is said the better. Also, the market being aimed mainly at Indian
audiences here, it's no surprise that they don't have subtitles.
> In a local Indian store, Shaheen's, there are many Indian movies
> readily available, but when I asked for any in English, or with
> subtitles, I was told there were none!
>
Bulk of the stuff that's imported from India are the ones produced
at Bollywood (Bombay + Hollywood)...the commercial film capital of
India. Due to various reasons that stuff does not seem to do
well with the west European and American audience. Personally, I
think the difference is not as much in `intent' as in `form and
content'.Surprisingly Indian films used to do quite well in East
European countries.(A separate thread on the reasons for that might be
an interesting one to follow).
> Why is there such a barrier to the East to see Indian movies? Or
> am I not informed? There is so little here in the way of access
> to knowlege of life in India, it seems. This is unfortunate, I
> think.
Actually you have the answer to this in your post. The film `Salaam
Bombay' that you have just mentioned does not belong to the `Bollywood'
kind that I have mentioned earlier. Apart from the thousands of movies
that come out every year from Bollywood and similar places all over
the subcontinent, India has a very strong tradition of the so-called
`parallel' cinema. These films are the ones made with a `serious'
audience in mind, targetted mainly towrads the cities. Unfortunately
this tradition also seems to have hit an all time low now with
hackneyed themes and severe lack of innovation. Anyway, these are
the movies that are more or less carefully recorded on video tapes,
subtitled/dubbed in English and exported outside India. The main reason:
they bring back some amount of money that helps recover the cost of
their production. `Salaam Bombay' belongs to this tradition (the
production for this film, however, can be a foreign one, given that Mira
Nayar had her formal education on films in US and made other movies like
Mississipi Massala under US productions. Can somebody confirm ?).
However, a severe lack of enthusiasm among the Indian government
officials does not promote these films well enough and hence they find
it difficult to enter the video market here. Think about it, only
recently has a sincere effort started to restore the films of Satyajit
Ray, the most well known among the Indian directors and perhaps one of
the very best that the world cinema has produced...this too after he won
an honorary oscar and the Merchant-Ivory production team showed their
personal interest in his films!
My suggestion is: don't look for *subtitled* version of Indian Bollywood
films. They are difficult to find, if not impossible. Also, due to their
very difference in the `form and content' from the Hollywood
productions, you may not find them `interesting' enough and definitely
not `enjoyable'.A better bet would be the `Salaam Bombay' kind of stuff.
Look for these films in public libraries in your city or in the
collection of university libraries. I have myself found quite a number
of them in local video stores, Sony has come out with prints of Ray
movies. Indian/Pakistani/Bangladeshi groceries which keep Bengali films
may also have subtitled version of Ray films. About the other Indian
directors..well they were/are not so fortunate as Ray. I regret to say
that following the way things go in India, their creations are bound to
be lost to posterity.
Thanks..
Arnab.
Shoumyo Dasgupta
Arnab Gupta wrote:
> My suggestion is: don't look for *subtitled* version of Indian >Bollywood films. They are difficult to find, if not impossible.
Actually, many Bollywood films in the Indian Store here in State College
are subtitled: some in English, some in Arabic, and others in both. I
saw Suhaag and Andha Kanoon last week after a long time; they had both
English and Arabic subtitles.
The subtitles made my day. They were hilarious. I mean, the English
ones.
Shoumyo.
Manoj Thulasidas
There is a very good market for Indian movies in North African countries
like Algeria and Morocco (and possibly Egypt too). My friends from
these countries tell me that there are actually people (non-Indian, I
mean) there who learnt Hindi from movies. And all of them knew names
like Shashi Kapoor. That might explain why some of the movies are
subtitled in Arabic. North Africans speak French as well (kind of like
Indians speak English). Here in Marseille (a city in the south of
France), I've found movies like Bobby and Mother India with French
subtitles. This was very nice because my French is a whole lot better
than my Hindi. Extremely good copies too, made in Paris somewhere. In
fact the best Indian tapes I have ever seen.
There must be good quality videos somewhere in India, because all the
movies that come on Doordarshan or Z-tv or even local TV stations are
all of good signal quality. I guess the bad quality unsubtitled tapes
are what they call the camera copies - taped in a movie theater with a
camcorder. (It's funny how the dramatic passes of silence in those
movies get spoilt by the audio automatic gain control circuit kicking in
and amplifying the static!)
- regards,
- Manoj
--
550 Rue Paradis, Bat. C2 +33 4 91 82 72 53 (work)
13008 Marseille, FRANCE. +33 4 91 77 59 98 (home)
URL: http://alephwww.cern.ch/~thulasid/
Radha Krishnan
Mohan (moh...@ix.netcom.com) wrote:
: Cinema is art, therefore it is the rendition of the imagination of the
: artist. [...]
: The reason I say this is because unlike art, where the form is judged
: rather than the content, we tend to judge cinema by the content rather
: than its form. I beg to disagree with that viewpoint due to the
: reason's mentioned above.
: So it is very possible that a movie based on what will never happen
: in real life, including song and dance sequences and even bizarre
: happenings could be very well made and appreciated and by the same
: token a very serious theme being explored could be badly rendered thus
: taking the joy out of the art. The theme can be anything, real or
: unreal or meaningful or meaningless. It does not have to address any
: aspect of society or social problems per se. It can be a plain farce
: and can be beautifully made.
I have thought this for a long time now, never found anybody (in real
life :-) that agreed with me on this -- good to know there are other
such bizarros :-) out there...
I have always considered a movie successful if it makes me completely
moody (in other words, changes my mood :-) Couple of recent examples
(each in a very different sense) come to mind -- the first is Minsara
Kanavu. I still cant quite put my finger on exactly what it was
about that movie that was so perfect, but it was perfect -- I went
into a thrall last Saturday on seeing it, and am yet to come back down
to ground zero. Strangely enough, someone very close to me
"thought"(*) that it was good! I am thinking the movie was so poetic
because of a combination of extraordinarily beautiful music, people
and locations. But that is not quite it either -- since I have heard
better music, seen better looking people and scenery (may be not in
the same juxtaposition :-) That one scene with the "Vennilavae,
Vennilavae" song captures the spirit so completely! It has to be seen
to be believed capable of being given form!
* There are those rare movies that make you *forget* there is such a
thing as making sense at a cerebral level -- often, movies which
transport you into those far away places seem to be the ones that have
been put together well at this other, more accessible, level
too. Coincidence?
(The other movie is Kaathal Kottai: also rendered beautifully, if not
quite as powerfully evocatively as Minsara Kanavu.)
: It is very true however in my opinion that Indian cinema for the most
: part has declined in this artistic rendering. It has lost its attention
: to detail that was much better in the days when high technology was not
: available.
While regret and a sigh for the good old days seems the proper
province of art-critics and the artistic types :-) I am usually not a
contributor to this general theory of ever-decaying art (and morals
and values and every other current human activity) -- if this is the
case, considering the number of years that humans have been in
existence, our 'art' should be quite a thing of the past. On the
contrary, I think a general increase in material well-being is (and
should, if one thinks of the leisure that such comforts and
conveniences generate) contributing to a rising sense of appreciation
for the arts.
: Also the so called "good" directors in search of content
: lose the accent on rendition. Cases in point are 2 tamil directors that
: are well revered in the tamil movie industry, K Balachander and Visu.
The trick is to not concentrate only on those productions that receive
popular approval -- while some of them may have some merit, there are
other directors and producers who do seem to oh! so occasionally make
that beauty. Content-obsessed directors need to be judged on a
different scale than those movies that are made for artistic
pleasure...
: Their movies explore serious social themes, express radical ideas and
: yet please play each one of their movies on your VCR's, turn off the
: sound and watch the silent version of the movies. You will find that
: each of their actors/actresses come render a long dialog and leave only
: to be followed by the next one. There are several detail flaws in them.
: If you doubt or question me, please watch all Balachander Movies from
: Thamarai Nenjam onwards. The worst case of this is varumaiyin niram
: sigappu and nool veli. All his movies are dialogue packed and devoid of
: acting or direction for the most part. On the other hand, there are 2
The cinema as art form serves especially diverse purposes in places
and times where daily living isnt so comfortable, to put it
euphemistically. Part of that charter is to also raise social
consciousness by bringing out problematic issues -- these directors
may be actually classified under social philosophers rather more
aptly, for that is really the function that they serve. Art as content
in their cinema takes a secondary place to what they are *saying*
(literally, much to your dismay!). I do think it is fair to criticize
their individual movies on the basis of artistic merit; however, these
social-commentary movies cannot be used to draw conclusions on the
general state of art of that era, because then you would have to draw
from those instances that concentrate on putting up an artistic showing.
This is not to say that there cannot be movies that are both socially
aware and rendered in an artistically pleasing manner, such as are
Satyajit Ray's movies (especially Ghare Baire)...
[...]
: Mohan
Regards,
Radha.
Shannon M Meyers
Manoj Thulasidas (Ma...@in2p3.fr) wrote:
: There is a very good market for Indian movies in North African countries
: like Algeria and Morocco (and possibly Egypt too). My friends from
: these countries tell me that there are actually people (non-Indian, I
: mean) there who learnt Hindi from movies. And all of them knew names
: like Shashi Kapoor. That might explain why some of the movies are
: subtitled in Arabic.
screen and at the intervals? Are all the Indian movie duplicators from Pakistan
and Dubai or something?
Shannon