"Nothing is worse than a prospective (suitor?) audience-base, led up the garden path and left dangling …." Why are Hindi films the way they are? Against the background of India's rich tradition, Indian drama was reborn during British colonial interregnum in 18th and 19th centuries. The impetus came from two sources: the rich heritage of Indian drama and the exposure to Western dramatic classics through English. With the East India Company came European theatre to the educated Indian audience and Bengal being the epicentre, saw many Bengali actors performed English plays. Bombay on the other hand, had popular commercial theatres owned by rich Parsee entrepreneurs who later extended to Bengal too. Translations started appearing simultaneously of Sanskrit classics and Western classics, particularly Shakespeare. Till now drama had not developed as a major literary genre in Indian languages. Drama now began to flourish as a cherished literary genre alongside the modern genre of fiction, also a response to Western influence. There was corresponding unprecedented development in theatre: the rise of urban entertainment theatre. This arose in order to provide entertainment to the increasing population of big cities consequent upon industrialization. The new urban theatre is popularly known as Parsi theatre. This genre was an interesting mixture of Western Naturalistic drama, opera and several local elements. Spectacle based on huge settings and colourful backdrops was an essential part of it. The stage was normally divided into front and back for the staging of main and subsidiary action. Music was its life-breath. The actors of this theatre were also great singers. The acting became naturalistic and melodramatic in contrast to the stylized techniques of traditional Indian theatre. Parsi theatre productions chose their story-lines from diverse sources: popular mythological, folklore and contemporary life. Before the establishment of indigenous ventures, Hindu mythological pictures were printed in Germany then imported to India via British firms. Their vast nineteenth century image manufacture transformed the nature of Hindu belief and worship but also through the illusionist work of artists like Ravi Varma (1846 - 1906) and several of his counterparts. In a sense 'classical' Hindu mythology was revived, romanticised and circulated all over the country. This set in motion a process of reconfiguration of the culturally heterogeneous Indian space into a more homogeneous Hindu space based on a commonly shared new iconic visualise. So the first popular Indian films were of historic or mythological kind about Gods and Goddesses, Kings and Queens. The very first Indian full feature length (Marathi) film was Raja Harishchandra was produced by Dadasaheb Phalke in 1913. Dadasaheb Phalke wanted to inspire Indian about their mythology as the west had done with films on Christ. Interestingly, the female roles in the film were played by male actors. In the 20s J.F.Madan’s Madan theatres brought fetishizing of women as sex objects in Indian films. The studio kept Anglo-Indian and Jewish scantily cladded dance girls to provide “visions of transparent promise”. Kissing passionately in silver screen was common in those days. Sulochana who appeared in films like Anarkali and Heer Ranjha, became India’s first sex symbol. The birth of Hindi films (and singing & dancing) came with the ‘talkies’ and the ‘’New Theatre” (and the orchestra disappeared) and regional films started. Talkies changed the world. Films were made by adapting popular western literature or popular Bengali novels and stories by Parsee writers who were well versed in Urdu. There were also adaptations of Western classics like Shakespeare and Lessing. Unlike traditional folk and tribal theatre Parsi theatre was acted out in interior spaces, now called proscenium theatre. Geared to amuse urban middle and working classes this theatre produces a pot pouri of melodrama, humour, romance and social criticism. Zubeida started in the first talkie, Alam Ara, where she successfully portrayed innocence with eroticism. This was the era of famous Parsee playwrights and poets. These were Parsi theatre influences, which "blended realism and fantasy, music and dance, narrative and spectacle, earthy dialogue and ingenuity of stage presentation, integrating them into a dramatic discourse of melodrama. The Parsi plays contained crude humour, melodious songs and music, sensationalism and dazzling stagecraft." This worked well as India has a strong folk tradition of narrating mythology, history, fairy stories and so on through song and dance; which became popular from around the 10th century with the decline of Sanskrit theatre. These regional traditions include the Yatra of Bengal, the Ramlilaof Uttar Pradesh, and the Terukkuttu of Tamil Nadu. Prabhat's Sairandhri, which was processed and printed in Germany in 1933, became India's first colour film. However, the first indigenously made colour film was Ardashir Irani’s Kisan Kanya made in 1937 and directed by Gidwani. Is there popular “alternate cinema” that portrays women as they are? Mani Ratnam’s Bombay is a film about the taboo of Hindu-Muslim marriage, the female protagonist chooses her own groom out of her religion against all odds. Aparna Sen’s Mr. & Mrs. Iyer is a poignant film on effects of perception of religious identity and culture. Mahie Gill's portrayal of Paro in Anurag Kashyap's Dev.D is the coming of age film about an Indian woman as they are today. A woman who shows real passionate reactions, who can be fierce and very well knows her worth. A women having desires and expressing them in a non-item song numberish manner. A simple movie like Khosla ka Ghosla inadvertently shows a strong woman character that stays, works and lives independently, in a different city from her divorced parents, and who is brave enough to choose her own husband. In Paa the male protagonist’s is a kid whose mother expresses her sexuality (during her youth) without guilt. In Wake Up Sid and Band Baja Baarat, these portal of independent women are feel authentic, multi-faceted and their character explore and grows as the film unravels itself, without just coming out of a vacuum. In No One Killed Jessica, the female protagonist is like a ‘typical’ man, brash, cocky and promiscuous. Today India has got the largest population in the world and the huge majority, 70%, are a young, between the ages of 15 and under 35. There is money to be made here for sure. But another fact is that out of the 70%, half of them are female. So if you want a successful business, you have to cater the female audience equally or perish. This is the new reality and like history of product design has shown, this fact alone creates a new, better benchmark. Firstly, you need to change from top and bottom and middle. There is a huge demand of fresh bankable actors. These days the old superstars have enough money to pick and choose their films, (no more running to multiple production houses in the same day to churn out 2-4-5 films together) and no longer interested in the new competition. It’s about quality now, and no longer quantity. Till 20 years back, it was still popular to see 3-4 hours long films, but today with time being the most valued commodity, films have to be shorter and more focused on the plot and this leads theaters to screen 6 times a film rather than the normal 3 times a day. The idea of women portrayed in the World’s largest entertainment industry or ‘Bollywood’ has been slowly improving but with limited success. It has been a hundred years where popular films have expressed and changed over time in a country comprehending multiple identities. It’s been a challenge but within these years, a few films have been able to show us the changing face of Indian women enmeshed in their private world of inner turmoil and the external world of multiple challenges without ever being judgmental Hopefully, the baby steps led to bigger footprints. Art is slowly overwhelming commerce. Values and Indian society itself is in a flux. The large scale production of films with intricate network of distribution, advance technology and exhibition is exactly like any other capitalist industry. They are made for mass consumption. The exploitation of the female form did not start with films in India. The “workers” (artists & technicians) have become slaves to a medium that requires a lot of money. On paper, these distribution rights are sold for a much lower amount. After the film's release, the investor claims the box office returns as 'clean' profit i.e. white money. Hopefully, with low-budget digital independent films distributed over the internet (like mp3 instead buying CDs), the future holds promise. The commercial film industry has already introduced expensive 3D technology in films, combining it with high-end animation and visual effects; and even few 4D films.
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AuthorI am interested in unfolding scene design, character design and image design; representing contemporary narrative strategy, narrative shot and narrative style. The flowing images, which combine aesthetics and ideology. NoticeThis site contains copyrighted material for purposes that constitutes 'fair use'; and has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. No fee is charged, and no money is made off this site. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
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