What's the true identity of Bollywood?

Comments [ 0 ] By Indra D. | 05 May 2008 | 10:59am

In its marathon journey of more than seventy-five years, Bollywood has surely traversed a long path making its presence felt internationally. Otherwise, who would have thought in the past that the wax figures of our celebs like Amitabh Bachchan, Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan and Aishwarya Rai would become a major tourist attraction in London’s honourable Madame Tussaud’s wax museum? With every elapsing era Bollywood, too, has changed its colours of emotions. Where romantic actors like Dev Anand and Rajesh Khanna introduced the romantic era in Bollywood, angry young man Amitabh Bachchan was the one who initialized the action era in the Hindi film industry. But, amidst all these metamorphosing phases, a question arises about the true identity of Bollywood. Where Iranian industry is known for making serious cinema, French cinema is renowned for its erotica and China has its own branded action flicks, what tag would be put on Bollywood? What is our unique identity in the arena of world cinema?

Young writer-director Sachin Yardi, who has scripted films like Kya Kool Hai Hum and Traffic Signal and is now on the verge of making his debut as a director with Balaji productions C Kkompany, feels that there isn’t any specific identity of Bollywood. “Bollywood movies can be termed as bhel puri. It’s like a mix and match of several things,” giggles Sachin.

On the other hand, veteran actress turned producer Aroona Aruna Irani Irani looks confused about the present situation of Bollywood films. “If I talk about the films made in our times then emotions, dance and songs were given importance along with a good story line,” Aroona draws a distinctive line between eons of Hindi movies and further she adds, “As far as today's films are concerned, I really don't understand what’s going on”.

There was also a time in the past where Bollywood was tagged to produce some good art cinema focusing on the social issues and these films somewhere or the other were termed as the true face of our cinema. But with changing facets of cinema, even that kind of cinema has literally disappeared from the industry.

“I think now, too, those kinds of films are being made but when one compares that cinema with big budget films, those movies don't leave behind the mark. Also the dynamics of the business have changed a lot. Like the whole game is on the three days of a film's release. Take for example a film like Khoya Khoya Chand; the minute it doesn’t have a good opening, the film is washed away in three days only and films like Dus or Cash, which are terrible films but because of the promos and platforms they get a good opening and by the time you realize that it is a bad movie the film has already made money, so the whole game is now on opening,” explains Sachin Yardi.

Aroona Irani, being a producer herself, brings out the financial consideration into focus. She expresses her concern saying, “Who will see this kind of films now, as those were rare during our times also? When it didn’t do business in those times, what impact can that cinema make in this jet age of entertainment?”

All said and done, but, isn’t Bollywood loosing out on making a specific identity for itself in the process of serving entertainment to the viewers?

Aroona Irani bounces back quickly, “See, we all are here to do business and would serve what people want to view. When a film is being made it is always seen that the buyers of the film must be there as the films are not made for personal home entertainment.”

According to the promising director, Sachin Yardi, Bollywood’s USP had always been music. “Our identity has always been of introducing minimum four songs in a film which is been followed until now. So from the western point of view it is still the same concept,” concludes Sachin.

Well, searching for an identity while comparing words of both of legendary actress Aroona Irani and young guy Sachin Yardi, at the end it seems that the money game has become the true identity of Bollywood. Neither to say that this maybe the reason why once termed as production houses are now been called as production factories of Hindi film industry. Producing movies, now, mean to cater the huge demands of the ever-growing multiplexes in our country.

Sabir Rahaman (SAMPURN)