Indian Cinema
The cinema of India has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. It consists of films produced across India, which includes the cinematic cultures of
Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Gujarat, Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Orissa, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal. Indian films came to be followed throughout Southern Asia, the Greater Middle East, Southeast Asia, and the former Soviet Union. The cinema as a medium gained popularity in the country as many as
1,000 films in various languages of India were produced annually. Expatriates in countries such as the
United Kingdom and the
United States continue to give rise to international audiences for Indian films of various languages.
In the 20th century, Indian cinema, along with the Hollywood and Chinese film industries, became a global enterprise. At the end of 2010 it was reported that in terms of annual film output, India ranks first, followed by Hollywood and China. Enhanced technology paved the way for upgrading from established cinematic norms of delivering product, altering the manner in which content reached the target audience, as per regional tastes. Indian cinema found markets in over 90 countries where films from India are screened.
Films by Indian directors like
Satyajit Ray,
Mrinal Sen, Ritwik Ghatak, Shaji N.Karun, Girish Kasaravalli, Shyam Benegal, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, G. Aravindan and
Mani Ratnam have been screened in various international film festivals. Other Indian filmmakers such as Shekhar Kapur, Karan Johar, Mira Nair, Deepa Mehta and
Nagesh Kukunoor have also found success overseas. The Indian government extended film delegations to foreign countries such as the United States of America and Japan while the country's Film Producers Guild sent similar missions through Europe. Sivaji Ganesan, and S. V. Ranga Rao won their respective first international award for Best Actor held at
Afro-Asian Film Festival in
Cairo and Indonesian Film Festival in
Jakarta for the films
Veerapandiya Kattabomman and Narthanasala in 1959 and 1963.
India is the world's largest producer of films. In 2009, India produced a total of 2961 films on celluloid, that include a staggering figure of 1288 feature films. The provision of 100% foreign direct investment has made the Indian film market attractive for foreign enterprises such as 20th Century Fox, Sony Pictures, Walt Disney Pictures and Warner Bros. Indian enterprises such as Zee, UTV, Suresh Productions, Adlabs and Sun Network's Sun Pictures also participated in producing and distributing films. Tax incentives to multiplexes have aided the multiplex boom in India. By 2003 as many as 30 film production companies had been listed in the National Stock Exchange of India, making the commercial presence of the medium felt.
The South Indian film industry defines the four film cultures of South India as a single entity. They are the Kannada, the Malayalam, the Tamil and the Telugu industries. Although developed independently for a long period of time, gross exchange of film performers and technicians as well as globalisation helped to shape this new identity, currently holding 75% of all film revenues in India.
The Indian diaspora consists of millions of Indians overseas for which films are made available both through mediums such as
DVDs and by screening of films in their country of residence wherever commercially feasible. These earnings, accounting for some 12% of the revenue generated by a mainstream film, contribute substantially to the overall revenue of Indian cinema, the net worth of which was found to be US$1.3 billion in 2000. Music in Indian cinema is another substantial revenue generator, with the music rights alone accounting for
4–5% of the net revenues generated by a film in India.
Golden Age of Indian cinema
Following India's independence, the period from the late 1940s to the 1960s are regarded by film historians as the 'Golden Age' of Indian cinema. Some of the most critically acclaimed Indian films of all time were produced during this period. This period saw the emergence of a new Parallel Cinema movement, mainly led by Bengali cinema. Early examples of films in this movement include Chetan Anand's Neecha Nagar (1946), Ritwik Ghatak's Nagarik (1952), and
Bimal Roy's Two Acres of Land (1953), laying the foundations for Indian neorealism and the "Indian New Wave".
Pather Panchali (1955), the first part of The Apu Trilogy
(1955–1959) by Satyajit Ray, marked his entry in Indian cinema. The Apu Trilogy won major prizes at all the major international film festivals and led to the 'Parallel Cinema' movement being firmly established in Indian cinema. Its influence on world cinema can also be felt in the "youthful coming-of-age dramas that have flooded art houses since the mid-fifties" which "owe a tremendous debt to the Apu trilogy". The cinematographer Subrata Mitra, who made his debut with Satyajit Ray's The Apu Trilogy, also had an important influence on cinematography across the world. One of his most important techniques was bounce lighting, to recreate the effect of daylight on sets. He pioneered the technique while filming
Aparajito (1956), the second part of The Apu Trilogy. Some of the experimental techniques which Satyajit Ray pioneered include photo-negative flashbacks and X-ray digressions while filming
Pratidwandi (1972). Ray's 1967 script for a film to be called The Alien, which was eventually cancelled, is also widely believed to have been the inspiration for Steven Spielberg's E.T.
(1982). Satyajit Ray and Ritwik Ghatak went on to direct many more critically acclaimed 'art films', and they were followed by other acclaimed Indian independent filmmakers such as Mrinal Sen, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Mani Kaul and Buddhadeb Dasgupta. During the 1960s, Indira Gandhi's intervention during her reign as the Information and Broadcasting Minister of India further led to production of off-beat cinematic expression being supported by the official Film Finance Corporation.
Commercial Hindi cinema also began thriving, with examples of acclaimed films at the time 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.[41] Some epic films 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,[54] 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).[56] Madhumati (1958), directed by Bimal Roy and written by Ritwik Ghatak, popularized the theme of reincarnation in Western popular culture. Other mainstream Hindi filmmakers at the time included Kamal Amrohi and Vijay Bhatt.
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