Uttarakhand Information Centre

Bollywood (Hindi: बॉलीवूड) is the informal term popularly used for the Hindi-language film industry based in Mumbai, India. The term is often incorrectly used to refer to the whole of Indian cinema; it is only a part of the Indian film industry.Bollywood is the largest film producer in India and one of the largest in the world.The name is a portmanteau of Bombay (the former name for Mumbai) and Hollywood, the center of the American film industry.

Bollywood is generally referred to as Hindi cinema, though frequent use of poetic Urdu words is fairly common. There has been a growing presence of Indian English in dialogue and songs as well. It is not uncommon to see films that
feature dialogue with English words and phrases, or even whole sentences.

Contents 1 Etymology 2 History 2.1 Golden Age 2.2 Modern cinema 3 Influences 4 Influence 5 Genre conventions 6 Cast and crew 7 Sound 8 Bollywood song and dance 9 Dialogues and lyrics 10 Finances 11 Advertising 12 Awards 13 Film education 14 Popularity and appeal 14.1 Asia 14.2 Africa 14.3 Russia and Eastern Europe 14.4 Western Europe and the Americas 14.5 Oceania 15 Plagiarism 16 See also 17 References 18 Further reading 19 External links

Etymology

Unlike Hollywood, Bollywood does not exist as a physical place. Though some deplore the name, arguing that it makes he industry look like a poor cousin to Hollywood, it has its own entry in the Oxford English Dictionary.

The term “Bollywood” has origins in the 1970s, when India overtook America as the world’s largest film producer. Credit for the term has been claimed by several different people, including the lyricist, filmmaker and scholar Amit
Khanna,and the journalist Bevinda Collaco.

History

Raja Harishchandra (1913), by Dadasaheb Phalke, was the first silent feature film made in India. By the 1930s, the industry was producing over 200 films per annum. The first Indian sound film, Ardeshir Irani’s Alam Ara (1931), was a major commercial success. There was clearly a huge market for talkies and musicals; Bollywood and all the regional film industries quickly switched to sound filming.

The 1930s and 1940s were tumultuous times: India was buffeted by the Great Depression, World War II, the Indian
independence movement, and the violence of the Partition. Most Bollywood films were unabashedly escapist, but there were also a number of filmmakers who tackled tough social issues, or used the struggle for Indian independence as a backdrop for their plots.

In 1937, Ardeshir Irani, of Alam Ara fame, made the first colour film in Hindi, Kisan Kanya. The next year, he made another colour film, Mother India. However, colour did not become a popular feature until the late 1950s. At this time, lavish romantic musicals and melodramas were the staple fare at the cinema.

Golden Age

Following India’s Independence, the period from the late 1940s to the 1960s are regarded by film historians as the “Golden Age” of Hindi cinema. Some of the most critically-acclaimed Hindi films of all time were produced during this period. Examples include the Guru Dutt films Pyaasa (1957) and Kaagaz Ke Phool (1959) and the Raj Kapoor films Awaara (1951) and Shree 420 (1955). These films expressed social themes mainly dealing with working-class urban life in India; Awaara presented the city as both a nightmare and a dream, while Pyaasa critiqued the unreality of city
life. Some of the most famous epic films of Hindi cinema were also produced at the time, including Mehboob Khan’s Mother India (1957), which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, and K. Asif’s Mughal-e-Azam (1960).V. Shantaram’s Do Aankhen Barah Haath (1957) is believed to have inspired the Hollywood film The Dirty Dozen (1967).Madhumati (1958), directed by Bimal Roy and written by Ritwik Ghatak, popularized
the theme of reincarnation in Western popular culture. Other acclaimed mainstream Hindi filmmakers at the time included Kamal Amrohi and Vijay Bhatt. Successful actors at the time included Dev Anand, Dilip Kumar, Raj Kapoor and Guru Dutt, while successful actresses included Nargis, Meena Kumari, Nutan, Madhubala, Waheeda Rehman and Mala Sinha.

While commercial Hindi cinema was thriving, the 1950s also saw the emergence of a new Parallel Cinema movement. Though the movement was mainly led by Bengali cinema, it also began gaining prominence in Hindi cinema. Early examples of Hindi films in this movement include Chetan Anand’s Neecha Nagar (1946) and Bimal Roy’s Two Acres of Land (1953). Their critical acclaim, as well as the latter’s commercial success, paved the way for Indian neorealism and the Indian New Wave. Some of the internationally-acclaimed Hindi filmmakers involved in the movement
included Mani Kaul, Kumar Shahani, Ketan Mehta, Govind Nihalani, Shyam Benegal and Vijaya Mehta.

Ever since the social realist film Neecha Nagar won the Grand Prize at the first Cannes Film Festival, Hindi films were frequently in competition for the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival throughout the 1950s and early 1960s, with some of them winning major prizes at the festival. Guru Dutt, while overlooked in his own lifetime, had belatedly generated international recognition much later in the 1980s. Dutt is now regarded as one of the greatest Asian filmmakers of all time, alongside the more famous Indian Bengali filmmaker Satyajit Ray. The 2002 Sight & Sound critics’ and directors’ poll of greatest filmmakers ranked Dutt at #73 on the list.Some of his films are now included among the greatest films of all time, with Pyaasa (1957) being featured in Time magazine’s “All-TIME” 100 best movies list and with both Pyaasa and Kaagaz Ke Phool (1959) tied at #160 in the 2002 Sight & Sound critics’ and directors’
poll of all-time greatest films. Several other Hindi films from this era were also ranked in the Sight & Sound poll, including Raj Kapoor‘s Awaara (1951), Vijay Bhatt’s Baiju Bawra (1952), Mehboob Khan’s Mother India (1957) and K. Asif’s Mughal-e-Azam (1960) all tied at #346 on the list.

Modern cinema

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, romance movies and action films starred actors like Rajesh Khanna and Dharmendra, and actresses like Sharmila Tagore, Mumtaz, Leena Chandavarkar and Helen. In the mid-1970s,
romantic confections made way for gritty, violent films about gangsters (see Indian mafia) and bandits. Amitabh Bachchan, the star known for his “angry young man” roles, rode the crest of this trend with actors like Mithun Chakraborty and Anil Kapoor, which lasted into the early 1990s. Actresses from this era included Hema Malini, Jaya Bachchan and Rekha.

Some Hindi filmmakers such as Shyam Benegal continued to produce realistic Parallel Cinema throughout the 1970s, alongside Mani Kaul, Kumar Shahani, Ketan Mehta, Govind Nihalani and Vijaya Mehta. However, the ‘art film’ bent of the Film Finance Corporation came under criticism during a Committee on Public Undertakings investigation in 1976, which accused the body of not doing enough to encourage commercial cinema. The 1970s thus saw the rise of commercial cinema in the form of enduring films such as Sholay (1975), which solidified Amitabh Bachchan’s position as a lead actor. The devotional classic Jai Santoshi Ma was also released in 1975. Another important film from 1975 was Deewar, directed by Yash Chopra and written by Salim-Javed. A crime film pitting “a policeman against his brother, a gang leader based on real-life smuggler Haji Mastan”, portrayed by Amitabh Bachchan, it was described as being “absolutely key to Indian cinema” by Danny Boyle.The most internationally-acclaimed Hindi film of the 1980s was Mira Nair’s Salaam Bombay! (1988), which won the Camera d’Or at the 1988 Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

During the late 1980s and early 1990s, the pendulum swung back toward family-centric romantic musicals with the success of such films as Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak (1988), Maine Pyar Kiya (1989), Hum Aapke Hain Kaun (1994) and Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995), making stars out of a new generation of actors (such as Aamir Khan, Salman Khan and Shahrukh Khan) and actresses (such as Sridevi, Madhuri Dixit, Juhi Chawla and Kajol). In that point of time, action and comedy films were also successful, with actors like Govinda and Akshay Kumar and actresses such as Raveena Tandon and Karisma Kapoor appearing in films of this genre. Furthermore, this decade marked the entry of new performers in art and independent films, some of which succeeded commercially, the most influential example being Satya (1998), directed by Ram Gopal Varma and written by Anurag Kashyap. The critical and commerical success of Satya led to the emergence of a distinct genre known as Mumbainoir, urban films reflecting social problems in the city of Mumbai.This led to a resurgence of Parallel Cinema by the end of the decade. These films often featured actors like Nana Patekar, Manoj Bajpai, Manisha Koirala, Tabu and Urmila Matondkar, whose performances were usually acclaimed by critics.

The 2000s saw a growth in Bollywood’s popularity in the world. This led the
nation’s filmmaking to new heights in terms of quality, cinematography and
innovative story lines as well as technical advances in areas such as special
effects, animation, etc.Some of the largest production houses, among them Yash Raj Films and Dharma Productions were the producers of new modern films.The opening up of the overseas market, more Bollywood releases abroad and the explosion of multiplexes in big cities, led to wider box office successes in India and abroad, including Lagaan (2001), Devdas (2002), Koi… Mil Gaya (2003), Kal Ho Naa Ho (2003), Veer-Zaara (2004), Rang De Basanti (2006), Lage Raho Munnabhai (2006), Krrish (2006), Dhoom 2 (2006), Om Shanti Om (2007), Taare Zameen Par (2007), and Ghajini (2008), delivering a new generation of popular actors (Hrithik Roshan, Abhishek Bachchan) and actresses (Aishwarya Rai, Preity Zinta and Rani Mukerji), and keeping the popularity of actors of the previous decade. Among the mainstream films, Lagaan won the Audience Award at the Locarno International Film Festival and was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 74th Academy Awards, while Devdas and Rang De Basanti were both nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

The Hindi film industry has preferred films that appeal to all segments of the audience (see the discussion in Ganti, 2004, cited in references), and has resisted making films that target narrow audiences. It was believed that aiming
for a broad spectrum would maximise box office receipts. However, filmmakers may be moving towards accepting some box-office segmentation, between films that appeal to rural Indians, and films that appeal to urban and overseas
audiences.

Influences

There have generally been six major influences that have shaped the conventions of Indian popular cinema:

• The ancient Indian epics of Mahabharata and Ramayana which have exerted a profound influence on the thought and imagination of Indian popular cinema, particularly in its narratives. Examples of this influence include the techniques of a side story, back-story and story within a story. Indian popular films often have plots which branch off into sub-plots; such narrative dispersals can clearly be seen in the 1993 films Khalnayak and Gardish.
• Ancient Sanskrit drama, with its highly stylized nature and emphasis on spectacle, where music, dance and
  gesture combined “to create a vibrant artistic unit with dance and mime being central to the dramatic experience.” Sanskrit dramas were known as natya, derived from the root word nrit (dance), characterizing them as specacular dance-dramas which has continued Indian cinema.
• The traditional folk theatre of India, which became popular from around the 10th century with the decline of Sanskrit theatre. These regional traditions include the Yatra of Bengal, the Ramlila of Uttar Pradesh, and the Terukkuttu of Tamil  Nadu.
• The Parsi theatre, 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.”
• Hollywood, where musicals were popular from the 1920s to the 1950s, though Indian filmmakers departed from their Hollywood counterparts in several ways. “For example, the Hollywood musicals had as their plot the world of entertainment itself. Indian filmmakers, while enhancing the elements of fantasy so pervasive in Indian popular films, used song and music as a natural mode of articulation in a given situation in their films. There is a strong Indian tradition of narrating mythology, history, fairy stories and so on through song and dance.” In addition, “whereas Hollywood filmmakers strove to conceal the constructed nature of their work so that the realistic narrative was wholly dominant, Indian filmmakers made no attempt to conceal the fact that what was shown on the screen was a creation, an illusion, a fiction. However, they demonstrated how this creation  intersected with people’s day to day lives in complex and interesting ways.”
• Western musical television, particularly MTV, which has had an increasing influence since the 1990s, as can be seen in the pace, camera angles, dance sequences and music of 2000s Indian films. An early example of this approach was in Mani Ratnam’s Bombay (1995).

Influence

In the 2000s, Bollywood began influencing musical films in the Western world, and played a particularly instrumental role in the revival of the American musical film genre. Baz Luhrmann stated that his successful musical film Moulin Rouge! (2001) vwas directly inspired by Bollywood musicals.The film thus pays homage to India, incorporating an Indian-themed play based on the ancient Sanskrit drama The Little Clay Cart and a Bollywood-style dance sequence with a song from the film China Gate. The critical and financial success of Moulin Rouge! renewed interest in the then-moribund Western musical genre, and subsequently films such as Chicago, The Producers, Rent, Dreamgirls, Hairspray, Sweeney Todd, Across the Universe, The Phantom of the Opera, Enchanted and Mamma Mia! were produced, fueling a renaissance of the genre.

A. R. Rahman, an Indian film composer, wrote the music for Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Bombay Dreams, and a musical version of Hum Aapke Hain Koun has played in London’s West End. The Bollywood musical Lagaan (2001) was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, and two other Bollywood films Devdas (2002) and Rang De Basanti (2006) were nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Danny Boyle’s  Slumdog Millionaire (2008), which has won four Golden Globes and eight Academy Awards, was also directly inspired by Bollywood films, and is considered to be a “homage to Hindi commercial cinema”. Several other Hollywood films are also believed to have been inspired by Bollywood films. For example, V. Shantaram’s Do Aankhen Barah Haath (1957) is believed to have inspired the Hollywood film The Dirty Dozen (1967).The theme of reincarnation was also popularized in Western popular culture through Bollywood films, with Madhumati (1958) inspiring the Hollywood film The Reincarnation of Peter Proud (1975),which in turn inspired the Bollywood film Karz (1980), which in turn influenced another Hollywood film Chances Are (1989). The 1975 film Chhoti Si Baat is believed to have inspired Hitch (2005), which in turn inspired the Bollywood film Partner (2007).

The influence of Bollywood filmi music can also be seen in popular music elsewhere in the world. For example, Devo‘s 1988 hit song “Disco Dancer” was inspired by the song “I am a Disco Dancer” from the Bollywood film Disco Dancer (1982). The 2002 song “Addictive“, sung by Truth Hurts and produced by DJ Quik and Dr. Dre, was lifted from Lata Mangeshkar‘s “Thoda Resham Lagta Hai” from Jyoti (1981). The Black Eyed Peas‘ Grammy Award winning 2005 song “Don’t Phunk with My Heart” was inspired by two 1970s Bollywood songs: “Ye Mera Dil Yaar Ka Diwana” from Don (1978) and “Ae Nujawan Hai Sub” from Apradh (1972). Both songs were originally composed by Kalyanji Anandji, sung
by Asha Bhosle, and featured the dancer Helen.Also in 2005, the Kronos Quartet re-recorded several R. D. Burman compositions, with Asha Bhosle as the singer, into an album You’ve stolen my heart – Songs From R D Burman’s Bollywood, which was nominated for “Best Contemporary World Music Album” at the 2006 Grammy Awards. Filmi music composed by A. R. Rahman (who would later win two Academy Awards for the Slumdog Millionaire soundtrack) has frequently been sampled by musicians elsewhere in the world, including the Singaporean artist Kelly Poon, the Uzbek artist Iroda Dilroz, the French rap group La Caution, the American artist Ciara, and the German band Löwenherz,among others. Many artists among the overseas Indian diaspora have also been inspired by Bollywood music.

Genre conventions

Bollywood films are mostly musicals, and are expected to contain catchy music in the form of song-and-dance numbers woven into the script. A film’s success often depends on the quality of such musical numbers. Indeed, a film’s music is often released before the movie itself and helps increase the audience.

Indian audiences expect full value for their money, with a good entertainer generally referred to as paisa vasool, (literally, “money’s worth”). Songs and dances, love triangles, comedy and dare-devil thrills are all mixed up in a three-hour-long extravaganza with an intermission. Such movies are called masala films, after the Hindi word for a spice mixture. Like masalas, these movies are a mixture of many things such as action, comedy, romance etc. Most films have heroes who are able to fight off villains all by themselves.

Bollywood plots have tended to be melodramatic. They frequently employ formulaic ingredients such as star-crossed lovers and angry parents, love triangles, family ties, sacrifice, corrupt politicians, kidnappers, conniving villains, courtesans with hearts of gold, long-lost relatives and siblings separated by fate, dramatic reversals of fortune, and convenient coincidences.

There have always been Indian films with more artistic aims and more sophisticated stories, both inside and outside the Bollywood tradition (Parallel Cinema). They often lost out at the box office to movies with more mass appeal. Bollywood conventions are changing, however. A large Indian diaspora in English speaking countries, and increased Western influence at home, have nudged Bollywood films closer to Hollywood models.

Film critic Lata Khubchandani writes,”..our earliest films…had liberal doses of sex and kissing scenes in them. Strangely, it was after Independence the censor board came into being and so did all the strictures.”Plots now tend to feature Westernised urbanites dating and dancing in clubs rather than centering on pre-arranged marriages. Though these changes can widely be seen in contemporary Bollywood, traditional conservative ways of Indian culture continue to exist in India outside the industry and an element of resistance by some to western-based influences.Despite this, Bollywood continues to play a major role in fashion in India.Indeed some studies into fashion in India have revealed that some people are unaware that the changing nature of fashion in Bollywood films which are presented to them are often influenced by globalisation and many consider the clothes worn by Bollywood actors as authentically Indian.

Cast and crew

Bollywood employs people from all parts of India. It attracts thousands of aspiring actors and actresses, all hoping for a break in the industry. Models and beauty contestants, television actors, theatre actors and even common people come to Mumbai with the hope and dream of becoming a star. Just as in Hollywood, very few succeed. Since many Bollywood films are shot abroad, many foreign extras are employed too.

Stardom in the entertainment industry is very fickle, and Bollywood is no exception. The popularity of the stars can rise and fall rapidly. Directors compete to hire the most popular stars of the day, who are believed to guarantee the success of a movie (though this belief is not always supported by box-office results). Hence many stars make the most of their fame, once they become popular, by making several movies simultaneously.

Only a very few non-Indian actors are able to make a mark in Bollywood, though many have tried from time to time. There have been some exceptions, one recent example is the hit film Rang De Basanti, where the lead actress is Alice Patten, an Englishwoman. Kisna, Lagaan, and The Rising: Ballad of Mangal Pandey also featured foreign actors.

Bollywood can be very clannish, and the relatives of film-industry insiders have an edge in getting coveted roles in films and/or being part of a film’s crew. However, industry connections are no guarantee of a long career: competition is fierce and if film industry scions do not succeed at the box office, their careers will falter. Some of the biggest stars, such as Dharmendra, Amitabh Bachchan, andShahrukh Khan have succeeded despite total lack of show business connections. Sound Sound in Bollywood films is rarely recorded on location (otherwise known as sync sound). Therefore, the sound is usually created (or recreated) entirely in the studio, with the actors reciting their lines as their images appear on-screen in the studio in the process known as “looping in the sound” or ADR—with the foley and sound effects added later. This creates several problems, since the sound in these films usually occurs a frame or two earlier or later than the mouth movements or gestures. The actors have to act twice: once on-location, once in bthe studio—and the emotional level on set is often very difficult to recreate. Commercial Indian films, not just the Hindi-language variety, are known for their lack of ambient sound, so there is a silence underlying everything instead of the background sound and noises usually employed in films to create aurally perceivable depth and environment.

The ubiquity of ADR in Bollywood cinema became prevalent in the early 1960s with the arrival of the Arriflex 3 camera, which required a blimp (cover) in order to shield the sound of the camera, for which it was notorious, from on-location filming. Commercial Indian filmmakers, known for their speed, never bothered to blimp the camera, and its excessive noise required that everything had to be recreated in the studio. Eventually, this became the standard for Indian films.

The trend was bucked in 2001, after a 30-year hiatus of synchronized sound, with the film Lagaan, in which producer-star Aamir Khan insisted that the sound be done on location. This opened up a heated debate on the use and economic feasibility of on-location sound, and several Bollywood films have employed on-location sound since then. Bollywood song and dance Bollywood film music is called filmi music (from Hindi, meaning “of films”). Songs from Bollywood movies are generally pre-recorded by professional playback singers, with the actors then lip synching the words to the
song on-screen, often while dancing. While most actors, especially today, are excellent dancers, few are also singers. One notable exception was Kishore Kumar, who starred in several major films in the 1950s while also having a stellar career as a playback singer. K. L. Saigal, Suraiyya, and Noor Jehan were also known as both singers and actors. Some actors in the last thirty years have sung one or more songs themselves.

Playback singers are prominently featured in the opening credits and have their own fans who will go to an otherwise lackluster movie just to hear their favourites. Going by the quality as well as the quantity of the songs they rendered, most notable singers of Bollywood are Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhosle, Geeta Dutt, Shamshad Begum and Alka Yagnik among female playback singers; and K. L. Saigal, Talat Mahmood, Mukesh, Mohammed Rafi, Manna Dey, Hemant Kumar, Kishore Kumar, Kumar Sanu,S.P.Balasubramanyam,Udit Narayan and Sonu Nigam among male playback singers. Mohammed Rafi is often considered arguably the finest of the singers that have lent their voice to Bollywood songs, followed by Lata Mangeshkar, who, through the course of a career spanning over six decades, has recorded thousands of songs for Indian movies. The composers of film music, known as music directors, are also well-known. Their songs can make or break a film and usually do. Remixing of film songs with modern beats and rhythms is a common occurrence today, and producers may even release remixed versions of some of their films’ songs along with the films’ regular soundtrack albums.

The dancing in Bollywood films, especially older ones, is primarily modelled on Indian dance: classical dance styles, dances of historic northern Indian courtesans (tawaif), or folk dances. In modern films, Indian dance elements often blend with Western dance styles (as seen on MTV or in Broadway musicals), though it is not unusual to see Western pop and pure classical dance numbers side by side in the same film. The hero or heroine will often perform with a troupe of supporting dancers. Many song-and-dance routines in Indian films feature unrealistically instantaneous shifts of location and/or changes of costume between verses of a song. If the hero and heroine dance and sing a pas de deux, it is often staged in beautiful natural surroundings or architecturally grand settings. This staging is referred to as a “picturisation”.

Songs typically comment on the action taking place in the movie, in several ways. Sometimes, a song is worked into the plot, so that a character has a reason to sing; other times, a song is an externalisation of a character’s
thoughts, or presages an event that has not occurred yet in the plot of the
movie. In this case, the event is almost always two characters falling in
love.

Bollywood films have always used what are now called “item numbers”. A physically
attractive female character (the “item girl”), often completely unrelated to the
main cast and plot of the film, performs a catchy song and dance number in the
film. In older films, the “item number” may be performed by a courtesan
(tawaif) dancing for a rich client or as part of a cabaret show. The
dancer Helen was famous for her
cabaret numbers. In modern films, item numbers may be inserted as discotheque sequences,
dancing at celebrations, or as stage shows.

For the last few decades Bollywood producers have been releasing the film’s
soundtrack, as tapes or CDs, before the main movie release, hoping that the
music will pull audiences into the cinema later. Often the soundtrack is more
popular than the movie. In the last few years some producers have also been
releasing music videos, usually featuring a song from the film. However, some
promotional videos feature a song which is not included in the movie.

Dialogues and lyrics

The film script or lines of dialogue (called “dialogues” in Indian English)
and the song lyrics are often written by different people.

Dialogues are usually written in an unadorned Hindi or Hindustani that
would be understood by the largest possible audience. Some movies, however, have
used regional dialects to evoke a village setting, or old-fashioned courtly Urdu in Mughal era historical films. Contemporary mainstream movies also make great use of English.
In fact, many movie scripts are first written in English, and then translated
into Hindi. Characters may shift from one language to the other to express a
certain atmosphere (for example, English in a business setting and Hindi in an
informal one).

Cinematic language, whether in dialogues or lyrics, is often melodramatic and
invokes God, family, mother, duty, and self-sacrifice liberally.

Music directors often prefer working with certain lyricists, to the point
that the lyricist and composer are seen as a team. This phenomenon is not unlike
the pairings of American composers and songwriters that created old-time
Broadway musicals (e.g., Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein
II, or Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe). Song
lyrics are usually about love. Bollywood song lyrics, especially in the old
movies, frequently use Arabo-Persic Urdu vocabulary. Another source for love
lyrics is the long Hindu tradition of poetry about
the mythological amours of Krishna, Radha, and the gopis. Many lyrics compare the
singer to a devotee and the object of his or her passion to Krishna or
Radha.

Finances

Bollywood films are multi-million dollar productions, with the most expensive
productions costing up to 100 crores Rupees (roughly USD 20
million). Sets, costumes, special effects, and cinematography were less
than world-class up until the mid-to-late 1990s, although with some notable
exceptions. As Western films and television gain wider distribution in India
itself, there is increasing pressure for Bollywood films to attain the same
production levels. In particular, in areas such as action and special effects.
Recent Bollywood films have employed international technicians to improve in
these areas, such as Krrish (2006) which has
action choreographed by Hong Kong based Tony Ching. The
increasing accessibility to professional action and special effects, coupled
with rising film budgets, has seen an explosion in the action and sci-fi
genres.

Sequences shot overseas have proved a real box office draw, so Mumbai
film crews are increasingly filming in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United
Kingdom, the United States, continental Europe
and elsewhere. Nowadays, Indian producers are winning more and more funding for
big-budget films shot within India as well, such as Lagaan, Devdas and other
recent films.

Funding for Bollywood films often comes from private distributors and a few
large studios. Indian banks and
financial institutions were forbidden from lending money to movie studios.
However, this ban has now been lifted.As finances are not regulated, some funding also comes from illegitimate
sources, such as the Mumbai underworld. The
Mumbai underworld has been known to be involved in the production of several
films, and are notorious for their patronisation of several prominent film
personalities; On occasion, they have been known to use money and muscle power
to get their way in cinematic deals. In January, 2000, Mumbai mafia hitmen shotRakesh Roshan, a film
director and father of star Hrithik Roshan. In 2001,
the Central
Bureau of Investigation seized all prints of the movie Chori Chori Chupke
Chupke after the movie was found to be funded by members of the Mumbai underworld.

Another problem facing Bollywood is widespread copyright
infringement of its films. Often, bootleg DVD copies of movies are
available before the prints are officially released in cinemas. Manufacturing of
bootleg DVD, VCD, and VHS copies of the latest movie titles is a well
established ‘small scale industry’ in parts of South Asia and South East Asia. The
Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) estimates that
the Bollywood industry loses $100 million annually in loss of revenue from
pirated home videos and DVDs. Besides catering to the homegrown market, demand
for these copies is large amongst some sections of the Indian diaspora, too.
(In fact, bootleg copies are the only way people in Pakistan can watch Bollywood
movies, since the Government of Pakistan has banned their sale, distribution and
telecast). Films are frequently broadcast without compensation by countless
small cable TV companies in India and other parts of South Asia. Small
convenience stores run by members of the Indian diaspora in the U.S. and the UK
regularly stock tapes and DVDs of dubious provenance, while consumer copying
adds to the problem. The availability of illegal copies of movies on the
Internet also contributes to the piracy problem.

Satellite TV, television and imported foreign films are making huge inroads
into the domestic Indian entertainment market. In the past, most Bollywood films
could make money; now fewer tend to do so. However, most Bollywood producers
make money, recouping their investments from many sources of revenue, including
selling ancillary rights. There are also increasing returns from theatres in
Western countries like the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States, where
Bollywood is slowly getting noticed. As more Indians migrate to these countries,
they form a growing market for upscale Indian films.

For an interesting comparison of Hollywood and Bollywood financial figures. It shows tickets sold in 2002 and total revenue
estimates. Bollywood sold 3.6 billion tickets and had total revenues (theatre
tickets, DVDs, television etc.) of US$1.3 billion,
whereas Hollywood films sold 2.6 billion tickets and generated total revenues
(again from all formats) of US$51 billion.

Advertising

Many Indian artists used to make a living by hand-painting movie billboards
and posters (The well-known artist M.F. Hussain used to paint
film posters early in his career) This was because human labour was found to be
cheaper than printing and distributing publicity material. Now, a majority of the huge and ubiquitous billboards in India’s major cities
are created with computer-printed vinyl. The old hand-painted posters, once
regarded as ephemera, are becoming increasingly collectible as folk art.

Releasing the film music, or music videos, before the actual release of the
film can also be considered a form of advertising. A popular tune is believed to
help pull audiences into the theaters.

Bollywood publicists have begun to use the Internet as a venue for
advertising. Most of the better-funded film releases now have their own
websites, where browsers can view trailers, stills, and information about the
story, cast, and crew.

Bollywood is also used to advertise other products. Product placement, as
used in Hollywood, is widely practiced in Bollywood.

Bollywood movie stars appear in print and television advertisements for other
products, such as watches or soap ( Celebrity
endorsement). Advertisers say that a star endorsement boosts sales.

Awards

The Filmfare Awards ceremony
is one of the most prominent film events given for Hindi
films in India. The Indian screen magazine Filmfare started the first
Filmfare Awards in 1954, and awards were given to the best films of 1953. The
ceremony was referred to as the Clare Awards after the magazine’s editor.
Modelled after the poll-based merit format of the Academy
of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, individuals may submit their votes in
separate categories. A dual voting system was developed in 1956. Like the Oscars, the Filmfare awards are frequently accused of bias towards
commercial success rather than artistic merit.

As the Filmfare, the National Film
Awards were introduced in 1954. Since 1973, the Indian government has
sponsored the National Film Awards, awarded by the government run Directorate of
Film Festivals (DFF). The DFF screens not only Bollywood films, but films
from all the other regional movie industries and independent/art films. These
awards are handed out at an annual ceremony presided over by the President of
India. Under this system, in contrast to the National Film Awards, which are
decided by a panel appointed by Indian Government, the Filmfare Awards are voted
for by both the public and a committee of experts.

Additional ceremonies held within India are:

• Stardust Awards
• Star Screen Awards

Ceremonies held overseas are:

• Bollywood Movie
  Awards – Long Island, New York,
  United States
• Global Indian
  Film Awards – (different country each year)
• IIFA Awards – (different
  country each year)
• Zee Cine Awards-
  (different country each year)

Most of these award ceremonies are lavishly staged spectacles, featuring
singing, dancing, and numerous celebrities.

Film education

• Film
  and Television Institute of India
• Satyajit
  Ray Film and Television Institute
• Asian
  Academy of Film & Television

Popularity and appeal

Besides being popular among the India diaspora, such far off locations as
Nigeria to Egypt to Senegal and to Russia generations of non-Indian fans have
grown up with Bollywood during the years, bearing witness to the cross-cultural
appeal of Indian movies.

Over the last years of the twentieth century and beyond, Bollywood progressed
in its popularity as it entered the consciousness of Western audiences and
producers.

Asia

Bollywood films are widely watched in South Asian countries, such
as Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
Most Pakistanis watch Bollywood films, as they understand Hindi (due to its linguistic similarity to Urdu). Despite a government ban on
Indian films since 1965,a few Bollywood films were legally released in the country in 2006, including Taj Mahal and Mughal-e-Azam, decades
after its release, though more movies followed. For the most part, Bollywood movies are watched on cable television in Pakistan;
there is also a huge market for Bollywood movies in local video stores.
Historically, video piracy was another
accessible venue to watch Indian movies.

Bollywood movies are also popular in Afghanistan due to the
country’s proximity with the Indian subcontinent and certain other cultural
perspectives present in the movies. A number of Bollywood movies were filmed inside Afghanistan while some dealt
with the country, including Dharmatma, Kabul
Express, Khuda Gawah and Escape From
Taliban.Hindi films have also been popular in numerous Arab
countries, including Palestine, Jordan, Egypt and the Gulf countries. Imported Indian films are usually subtitled in Arabic upon the film’s release.
Since the early 2000s, Bollywood has progressed in Israel. Special channels
dedicated to Indian films have been displayed on cable television. Bollywood films are also popular across Southeast Asia (particularly the Malay Archipelago) and Central Asia (particularly
in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan).

Some Hindi movies also became big successes in the People’s
Republic of China during the 1940s and 1950s. The most popular Hindi films
in China were Dr. Kotnis Ki Amar
Kahani (1946), Awaara (1951) and Two Acres of Land (1953). Raj
Kapoor was a famous movie star in China, and the
song “Awara Hoon” (“I am a Tramp”) was popular in the country. Since then, Hindi
films significantly declined in popularity in China, until the Academy
Award nominated Lagaan (2001) became the
first Indian film to have a nation-wide release there in decades. The Chinese filmmaker He Ping was
impressed by Lagaan, especially its soundtrack, and thus hired the film’s
music composer A. R. Rahman to score the
soundtrack for his film Warriors of
Heaven and Earth (2003). Several older Hindi films also have a cult following in Japan, particularly the films
directed by the late Guru Dutt

Africa

Historically, Hindi films have been distributed to some parts of Africa,
largely by Lebanese businessmen. Mother India (1957),
for example, continued to be played in Nigeria decades after its release. Indian
movies have also gained ground so as to alter the style of Hausa
fashions, songs have also been copied by Hausa singers and stories have
influenced the writings of Nigerian novelists. Stickers of Indian films and
stars decorate taxis and buses in Northern Nigeria, while posters of Indian
films adorn the walls of tailor shops and mechanics’ garages in the country.
Unlike in Europe and North America where Indian films largely cater to the
expatriate Indian market yearning to keep in touch with their homeland, in West
Africa, as in many other parts of the world, such movies rose in popularity
despite the lack of a significant Indian audience, where movies are about an
alien culture, based on a religion wholly different, and, for the most part, a
language that is unintelligble to the viewers. One such explanation for this
lied in the similarities between the two cultures. Clothing is largely similar,
where men often wear long kurtas similar to the Hausa Babba riga and kaftan. Other
similarities include wearing turbans; the presence of animals in markets;
porters carrying large bundles, chewing sugar cane; youths riding Bajaj motor scooters; wedding
celebrations, and so forth. With the strict Muslim culture, Indian movies were
said to show “respect” toward women, where Hollywood movies were seen to have
“no shame”. In Indian movies women were modestly dressed, men and women rarely
kiss, and there is no nudity, thus Indian movies are
said to “have culture” that Hollywood films lack. The latter choice was a
failure because “they don’t base themselves on the problems of the people,”
where the former is based socialist values and on the
reality of developing countries emerging from years of colonialism. Indian
movies also allowed for a new youth culture to follow without such ideological
baggage as “becoming western.” Bollywood is also popular among Somalis and the Somali diaspora, where the
emerging Islamic Courts
Union found a bete noire. Chad and Ethiopia have also shown an interest in the movies.

Several Bollywood personalities have avenued to the continent for both
shooting movies and off-camera projects. The film Padmashree
Laloo Prasad Yadav (2005) was one of many movies shot in South Africa. Dil Jo Bhi Kahey (2005) was shot almost entirely in Mauritius, which has a large
ethnically Indian population.

Ominously, however, the popularity of old Bollywood versus a new, changing
Bollywood seems to be diminishing the popularity on the continent. The changing
style of Bollywood has begun to question such an acceptance. The new era
features more sexually explicit and violent films. Nigerian viewers, for
example, commented that older films of the 1950s and 1960s had culture to the
newer, more westernized picturizations. The old days of India avidly “advocating decolonization … and India’s
policy was wholly influenced by his missionary zeal to end racial domination and
discrimination in the African territories” were replaced by newer realities. The emergence of Nollywood, Africa’s local
movie industry has also contributed to the declining popularity of Bollywood
films. A greater globalised world worked in
tandem with the sexualisation of Indian films so as to become more like American
films, thus negating the preferred values of an old Bollywood and diminishing
Indian soft
power.

Russia and Eastern Europe

Bollywood films are particularly popular in the former Soviet
Union. Bollywood films have been dubbed into
Russian, and shown in prominent theatres such as Mosfilm and Lenfilm.

Ashok Sharma, Indian Ambassador to Suriname, who has served three
times in the Commonwealth
of Independent States region during his diplomatic career said:

“

The popularity of Bollywood in the CIS dates back to the Soviet days when the films from Hollywood and other Western countries were banned in the Soviet Union. As there was no means of other cheap entertainment, the films from Bollywood provided the Soviets a cheap source of entertainment as they were supposed to be non-controversial and non-political. In addition, the Soviet Union was recovering from the onslaught of the Second World War. The films from India, which were also recovering from the disaster of partition and the struggle for freedom from colonial rule, were found to be a good source of providing hope with entertainment to the struggling masses. The aspirations and needs of the people of both countries matched to a great extent. These films were dubbed in Russian and shown in theatres throughout the Soviet Union. The films from Bollywood also strengthened family values, which was a big factor for their popularity with the government authorities in the Soviet Union.

”

The film Mera Naam Joker (1970), sought to cater to such an appeal and the popularity of Raj Kapoor in Russia, when it recruited Russian actress Kseniya
Ryabinkina for the movie. In the contemporary era, Lucky: No Time for
Love was shot entirely in Russia. After the collapse of the Soviet film
distribution system, Hollywood occupied the void created in the Russian film
market. This made things difficult for Bollywood as it was losing market share
to Hollywood. However, Russian newspapers report that there is a renewed
interest in Bollywood among young Russians.

Western Europe and the Americas

Bollywood has experienced a marked growth in revenue in North American
markets, and is particularly popular amongst the South Asian communities of such
large cities as Chicago, Toronto and New York City.Yash Raj Films, one of
India’s largest production houses and distributors, reported in September 2005
that Bollywood films in the United States earn around $100 million a year
through theater screenings, video sales and the sale of movie soundtracks. In other words, films from India do more business in the United States than
films from any other non-English speaking country. Numerous films in the mid-1990s and onwards have been largely, or entirely, shot
in New York, Los Angeles, Vancouver and Toronto. Bollywood’s immersion in the
traditional Hollywood domain was further tied with such films as The Guru (2002)
and Marigold: An
Adventure in India (2007) trying to popularise the Bollywood-theme for
Hollywood.

The awareness of Hindi cinema is however more spread in the United
Kingdom,where they frequently enter the UK top ten. Many films, such as Kabhi Khushi Kabhie
Gham (2001) have been set in London. Bollywood is also appreciated in Germany, France, and the Scandinavian countries.
Various Bollywood movies are dubbed in German and shown on the German television
channel RTL II
on a regular basis. A considerable number of Hindi movies has been shot in Western Europe as well,
particularly in Switzerland, starting with Dilwale Dulhania
le Jayenge.

Bollywood’s popularity, however, is not greatly matched in the non-English
speaking countries of South America, though Bollywood culture and dance is
recognised. In 2006, Dhoom 2 became the first
Bollywood film to be shot in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The feeling was reciprocated as Latin America’s largest
theater chain, Mexico’s Cinepolis, was considering expanding its domains
outside the Spanish-speaking areas of the continent as it appeared to be bound
for Bollywood.

Oceania

Bollywood is not as successful in the Oceanic countries and Pacific Islands
such as New
Guinea. However, it ranks second to Hollywood in countries such as Fiji, with its large
Indian minority, Australia and New Zealand.

Australia is one of the countries where there is a large South Asian
Diaspora. Bollywood is popular amongst non-Asians in the country as well. Since 1997 the country has provided a backdrop for an increasing number of
Bollywood films. Indian filmmakers have been attracted to Australia’s diverse locations and
landscapes, and initially used it as the setting for song-and-dance sequences,
which demonstrated the contrast between the values. However, nowadays, Australian locations are becoming more important to the plot
of Bollywood films.Hindi films shot in Australia usually incorporate aspects of Australian
lifestyle. The Yash Raj Film Salaam
Namaste (2005) became the first Indian film to be shot entirely in
Australia and was the most successful Bollywood film of 2005 in the country. This was followed by Heyy Babyy (2007) Chak
De! India (2007) and Singh Is Kinng (2008)
which turned out to be box office successes. Following the release of Salaam Namaste, on a visit to India the then
Prime Minister John Howard also sought,
having seen the film, to have more Indian movies shooting in the country to
boost tourism, where the Bollywood and cricket nexus, was further tightened withSteve
Waugh’s appointment as tourism ambassador to India.Australian actress Tania Zaetta, who
co-starred in Salaam Namaste, among other Bollywood films, expressed her
keenness to expand her career in Bollywood.

Plagiarism

Constrained by rushed production schedules and small budgets, certain
Bollywood writers and musicians have been known to resort to plagiarism. They
copy ideas, plot lines, tunes or riffs from sources close at hand from other
Indian films or far away (including Hollywood
and other Asian films). This has lead
to criticism towards the film industry.

In past times, this could be done with impunity. Copyright enforcement was
lax in India and few actors or directors ever saw an official contract. The Hindi film industry was not widely known to non-Indian audiences (excluding
the Soviet states), who would
not even be aware that their material was being copied. Audiences may also not
have been aware of the plagiarism since many audiences in India were unfamiliar
with foreign films and music. While copyright enforcement in India is still
somewhat lenient, Bollywood and other film industries are much more aware of
each other now and Indian audiences are more familiar with foreign movies and
music. Organizations like the India EU Film Initiative seek to foster a
community between film makers and industry professional between India and the
EU.

One of the main problems in curbing plagiarism in Bollywood is due to the
fact that producers in a competitive market, where gross income is important,
often play a safer option by remaking popular Hollywood films in an Indian
context. Screenwriters generally produce original scripts, but due to financial
uncertainty and insecurity over the success of a film many were rejected. Screenwriters themselves have been criticised for lack of creativity which
happened due to tight schedules and restricted funds in the industry to employ
better screenwriters. Certain filmmakers see plagiarism in Bollywood as an intergral part of
globalisation where American and western cultures are firmly embedding
themselves into Indian culture, which is manifested, amongst other mediums, in
Bollywood films. Vikram
Bhatt, director of films such as Raaz, a remake of What Lies Beneath,
and Kasoor, a remake of Jagged
Edge, has spoken about the strong influence of American culture and
desire to produce box office hits based along the same lines in Bollywood,
“Financially, I would be more secure knowing that a particular piece of work has
already done well at the box office. Copying is endemic everywhere in India. Our
TV shows are adaptations of American programmes. We want their films, their
cars, their planes, their diet cokes and also their attitude. The American way
of life is creeping into our culture.” Mahesh
Bhatt has said ,”If you hide the source, you’re a genius. There’s no such
thing as originality in the creative sphere”.

There have been very few cases of film copyright violations taken to court
because of serious delays in the legal process, and due to the long time they
take to decide a case.There have been some notable cases of conflict though. The makers of Partner (2007)
and Zinda (2005) have been targeted by the owners and distributors of the original films, Hitch and Oldboy.Some on the other hand do comply with copyright law, with Orion
Pictures recently securing the rights to remake the Hollywood film Wedding
Crashers.

See also

• List of
  Bollywood film clans

References

too follow …

Further reading

• Alter, Stephen. Fantasies of a Bollywood Love-Thief: Inside the World
  of Indian Moviemaking. (ISBN
  0-15-603084-5)
• Begum-Hossain, Momtaz. Bollywood Crafts: 20 Projects Inspired by
  Popular Indian Cinema, 2006. The Guild of Mastercraftsman Publications.
  (ISBN
  1-86108-418-8)
• Bernard ‘Bollywood’ Gibson. Passing the Envelope, 1994.
• Ganti, Tejaswini. Bollywood, Routledge, New York and London, 2004.
• Jolly, Gurbir, Zenia Wadhwani, and Deborah Barretto, eds. Once Upon a
  Time in Bollywood: The Global Swing in Hindi Cinema, TSAR Publications.
  2007. (ISBN
  978-1-89-4770-40-8)
• Joshi, Lalit Mohan. Bollywood: Popular Indian Cinema. (ISBN
  0-9537032-2-3)
• Kabir, Nasreen Munni. Bollywood, Channel 4 Books, 2001.
• Mehta, Suketu. Maximum City, Knopf, 2004.
• Mishra, Vijay. Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire. (ISBN
  0-415-93015-4)
• Pendakur, Manjunath. Indian Popular Cinema: Industry, Ideology, and
  Consciousness. (ISBN
  1-57273-500-5)
• Prasad, Madhava. Ideology of the Hindi Film: A Historical
  Construction, Oxford University Press, 2000. (ISBN
  0-19-565295-9)
• Raheja, Dinesh and Kothari, Jitendra. Indian Cinema: The Bollywood
  Saga. (ISBN
  81-7436-285-1)
• Raj, Aditya (2007) “Bollywood Cinema and Indian Diaspora” in Media
  Literacy: A Reader edited by Donaldo Macedo and Shirley Steinberg New
  York: Peter Lang
• Rajadhyaksa, Ashish (1996), “India: Filming the Nation”, The Oxford
  History of World Cinema, Oxford University Press, ISBN
  0198112572.
• Rajadhyaksha, Ashish and Willemen, Paul. Encyclopedia of Indian
  Cinema, Oxford University Press, revised and expanded, 1999.

External links

• IMDB – A
  database of Hindi movies
• Bollypedia German Lexicon of
  Bollywood
• An article on Bollywood in National Geographic archives
• “Cinema India”. Asia. Victoria and
  Albert Museum. http://www.vam.ac.uk/vastatic/microsites/1153_cinema_india/.
• wikipedia.org/

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