We are a nation that makes over 800 films a year, no country can ever match that, even Hollywood that has the biggest market share all over the world, do not even come close to even 150 films a year. Hollywood has tried and failed constantly to gain control of our movie market and has failed. Let’s admit the qualities of their films are far superior to the crap that is dished out every Friday in Bollywood.Bollywood is a term that I personally hate; I think we did not even have the originality to name our own film industry, in spite of gaining an industry status.
The trend continues even to regional cinema; if you want to name your own film industry just replace the first letter. Mollywood, Tollywood etc. Just a thought that crossed my mind, what do you name the Bhojpuri industry? Bihariwood?
Regardless, moving on, why isn’t our cinema responsible anyway? When I say cinema being responsible, let’s take the case of the recent hit Rang De Basanti, this is one film hugely responsible for the way protests were done in our country. The characters in the movie protested against the system who blamed the death of the pilot to irresponsible handling of the airplane, when the real reason was the airplance had faulty parts. The movie showed characters holding candles and holding peaceful protests at India Gate. So did anyone have a sense of Déjà vu, when the system failed to acquit the people behind the murder of Jessica Lall? The news networks were flooded with images of people protesting with candles and banners in front of India gate. The police re-opened the case. Who gets credit? Was it Rakesh Mehra or the movie which communicated to its audience? Did a generation awake? Sometimes I felt the cameramen from the news network were inspired to do the shots straight from the movie, a picture of Jessica Lall with the sunset taking place right behind her picture frame. Remember the shot of Madhavan’s picture frame with the rays of the sun radiating right behind.So now protests took a different turn with the Quota issue, burning candles and peaceful protests. Again a generation awakes. Well there are people who would beg to differ with my example, saying the protests were always done in a peaceful manner and Rang De Basanti did not invoke any generation. Personally this is an observation
and not a debate. The point behind the example is cinema is a powerful medium to communicate. The communication is perceived in different ways and not necessary it might be the right message.Our film makers should understand that cinema is a form of communication.Movies inspire, make you think, laugh and move with the character’s journey. All this while, the director is manipulating the audience thinking. It might seem hard to believe, but he or she is constantly feeding your sub conscious with what he thinks or what he thinks might commercially work, . It might be a scary thought to some that their thinking is manipulated once they walk out of the theatre. Remember the age old saying, reel life inspired by real life or is it really real life affected by reel life. If you can manipulate someone’s thinking, in a way you are manipulating how someone goes through their daily activities. Imagine if 300 people walked out a particular show, thinking about Rang De Basanti on their way back home. I remember I walked out of the theatre debating with my wife and friends about what the characters did and what was right and wrong? The movie plainly manipulated my mind for the next one hour. At least 100 of them must have debated like me on the way back home and their thinking was affected. So manipulating someone’s mind I believe is great power. Like the Spiderman movie said “ Son, with great power comes greater responsibility.”
So why hasn’t the Indian film industry understood this? Why is the focus purely on aimless entertainment? When people say “I want to watch a movie leaving my brain behind at home and watch a movie” do they actually leave their brains behind? Our cinema largely focuses on themes that deal with escapism. Indian audiences like to see smiling families, girls and guys dancing near cliffs, the hero fighting all odds to get his girl and elope. We have seen obsession, passion, love, hate, anger and laughter. Escapism in a way is feeding you with these emotions to escape frustration. So people actually don’t leave their brains behind in fact they think it is better to feed my brain with all these emotions for three hours. So while they feed themselves with these emotions, they choose to ignore logic. This kind of escapism was alright in times of economic struggle, much before our reforms happened, during the eighties and nineties. Film makers fed their audiences with this and the next generation of film makers got their brains tuned to this logic i.e. escape without logic. So the few people who dared to think different either survived and reached the top, while the sons of film makers got the best grooming to make this kind of escapist fantasy cinema. People who thought different still had to make do with fantasy and escapism, but they tried to bring in logic into their scripts and story lines.
Others simply fail at this and fall into a dilemma.
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2 comments:
Very true. In fact Id like to add on to that... Indian Cinema as seen by many is 'larger than life'. It is supposed to make people feel good. As Javed Akhtar said, recently at an award function, movies make people laugh, it gives reason for people to forget their own worries and smile at the success of the character, it allows a man to shed tears in the darkness of the theatre. But in the bargain, it is discounting the intelligence of the public and reducing their imagination to zilch. And this eventually causes the public to think inside of a box. Then the film makers say that the public wont digest an innovative idea... As a member of the general public i demand something more than a 'nobrainer', something that triggers my thought process. So wat r u going to do abt???
We Pomise CHANGE... Wait and watch
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