A debate is raging in India over why its Hindi-language films do
not win Oscars. About 800 to 900 films are made every year in
India, but the world's most productive film industry just cannot
figure out what it takes to win an Academy Award.
This story gets repeated every year. "Paheli" (A puzzle), directed
by Mumbai film-maker Amol Palekar, was entered for the Oscars this
year but got knocked out in the preliminary rounds.
The last time a Hindi film made a serious bid to win an Oscar was
in 2001, when Aamir Khan's "Lagaan" (The Tax) was nominated for
Best Foreign Film. It lost to a Bosnian film, No Man's Land.
Is there something else to what would seems a Hollywood bias
against Bollywood?
Firstly, Hindi movies usually last three hours, one-and-a-half
hours longer than many Hollywood films. Lagaan was even longer.
And, their scripts are somehow not consonant with the Western
mindset.
Till recently, the storylines of Hindi films were predictable and
hackneyed. Many Bollywood scripts are an Indian adaptation of
successful Western films, souped up with songs and dances. This
frothy fare provides excellent entertainment and takes people away
from their humdrum, everyday existence, but are not great works of
art.
A genre of movies in the 1970s and the 1980s represented by films
like "Amar Akbar Anthony", "Mr. Natwarlal" and "Sholay", which
mostly starred Amitabh Bachan were huge box office successes, but
they could not be entered for any awards, save for the ones the
Indian film industry gives to itself.
This is quite unlike the situation in Hollywood, where the movies
that do well at the box office also manage to bag a handful of
Oscars.
Similarly, films that win accolades for good stories and cinematic
techniques do not make an impact on the box office. Films by
eminent directors such as Satyajit Ray, Kumar Shahani, Shyam
Benegal and Adoor Gopalakrishnan have done well in European film
festivals but in India, they haven't gone beyond newspaper film
pages.
Accusations have been rife for many years against "art film-makers"
who tailor their scripts to the demands of European film festival
circuits.
The late Satyajit Ray's "Pather Panchali" belonged to a genre of
films whose stark realism has been castigated for feeding a Western
stereotype about India being wracked by poverty and death. Ray made
these films between the 1950s and the 1970s and since then, India
has changed.
A new breed of directors is taking a hard look at how they can
leave their mark in a globalised world and make money in the West.
The wealthy from the Indian diaspora, who are desperately trying to
connect with the homeland, have given them a new market, but that's
not enough. There is a humongous $300-billion ($476 billion) global
film market, of which the Bollywood variety takes home barely 1 per
cent.
There is a belief in India that greater recognition by Hollywood
and winning some Academy Awards could help its Hindi-language film
industry expand. In Bollywood, it is fashionable to talk of making
cross-over films with themes that make sense to a global audience.
Last year, Sanjay Bhansali's film "Black", which sensitively
portrayed the relationship between a teacher and his blind student,
was hailed as Bollywood's first crossover offering. It walked away
with many awards in India, but was not considered good enough to
win global recognition.
More recently, "Rang De Basanti" (Colours of Spring) starring
Aamir Khan, Soha Ali Khan and Alice Patten, the daughter of former
Hong Kong governor Chris Patten has again raised visions of an
Oscar with its slick production values, a good story, a smart
script and a great cast.
"Rang De Basanti" fits in with the views expressed by some
directors and writers in a recent seminar, who said that Bollywood,
like Hollywood, has to make films for its own audience. If they are
appreciated by the West, so be it.
"Rang de Basanti" could represent that interesting crossover. -
TODAY/zf