June 23, 2013, 6:49 am IST in Dharker's Dilemma | Entertainment

100 years of cinema: Been there, not done that

This year is being celebrated as the hundredth year of Indian cinema. We could actually have had the centenary 15 years earlier, because the Lumiere brothers, after the Paris demonstration of their Cinematographe apparatus in 1895, brought it to Bombay in 1898. But that was newsreel-type footage, fascinating to an audience which had never seen moving images, but of no general interest beyond its novelty value. Dabasaheb Phalke’s Raja Harishchandra, India’s very first feature, was made in 1913, which we take as the date for the birth of our cinema. 

Either way, cinema — at least the technology — came to us early. We can’t pretend, as we do in other fields, that we were latecomers to the field, so please excuse our shortcomings: simply put, Indian cinema is as old as any cinema in the world, so if we are to be judged, it has to be by the same exacting standards we might use for French or American or British Cinema. 

If we were to make that comparison, where would we stand? An objective way to arrive at an evaluation would be to look at international awards won by our films. The record is dismal: Foreign Language Oscars (none), important awards at leading film festivals like Cannes and Venice (very, very few). It could be argued that the sensibilities and cultural background of our audiences are vastly different from those in the West, so our cinema runs in a separate, distinct stream. Song and dance, for example, is intrinsic to our movies (even Raja Harishchandra had songs), and while an international observer might see this as hindering narrative, we don’t. But this reasoning ignores the fact that films from Iran, China, Japan and other countries, with markedly individualistic cultures, have been lauded internationally. 

If we ignore the exception to the rule — and there are some notable exceptions — what has been lacking at the core of our cinema is the absence of social or moral significance. These do occur, but do so in a cliched and heavyhanded way, and come wrapped up in layers of candy floss and empty fluff. 

The bane of our cinema, then, has been its overwhelming emphasis on entertainment and romance. Yet literature in India is not all entertainment ; neither is theatre or music. The early excuse given by our film-makers was that India is a huge, heterogeneous country with 16 recognized languages, so to appeal to all of them the pan-Indian film had to cater to the lowest common denominator. Why should that excuse be valid? An English-language film is shown in all of America, where many of the states differ from each other, if not in language, at least in outlook; it’s shown in Great Britain; it’s shown undubbed and unsubtitled, in parts of Europe; it’s shown in India, Africa, Australia, New Zealand and so many other countries where English is spoken. We are now talking countries, not states of one country, yet do most English-language films only reach for the lowest common denominator? Many do, but significantly, very many don’t. 

Another excuse you often hear is about the kind of audience that sees our films: uneducated or under-educated, if not illiterate; living in abysmal conditions, therefore looking to movies for escapism. Much of this, of course, is true. But you can say that of an English film audience too. What should not be forgotten is that the ‘Great Unwashed’ aren’t the only audience for an Indian film; there is the educated, literate ‘elite’ too. And in India, that’s a very large number. This large constituency has been left untapped, and has been denied the massive possibilities of the cinema medium: thoughtful films, troubled films, films dealing with mature subjects (including love stories going beyond the collegiate),with scripts at the cutting edge exploring subjects covering the variety and depth of human knowledge. In our cinema’s hundred years, draw up a list of these kind of films: I can guarantee that the list won’t be long. 

So as we celebrate a hundred years of cinema, we should be aware that we are really celebrating nothing. We are celebrating a hundred years of being around, not celebrating any achievement we can be proud of.

DISCLAIMER : Views expressed above are the author's own.
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