Bollywood Filmmakers

Every Indian lives alongside one billion others whom he or she will never meet. Each comes from a different region and religious group, yet shares the common language of cinema. The practice of watching Hindi fiction film creates a unified consciousness among Indians in an “imagined community”, such that they perceive themselves as belonging to a particular identity (Anderson 1983: 35, 70). The mainstream ‘All-India’ Bollywood film transcends regional divides and seeks to define and celebrate a modern national identity, a theme created in the wake of independence (Rajadhyaksha 1997: 681). Beloved by all, the Mumbai film industry intends to reflect the shared tropes and desires of this imagined community and has come to serve as a source of cultural imperialism.

Yet in the new millennium, criticism has grown surrounding the universal appeal of mainstream Hindi Fiction Film. As Mumbai filmmakers discover profitable opportunities to produce films for what are considered ‘modern’ audiences in the diaspora and overseas markets, Indian audiences fear directors are sacrificing substance for style. Films labeled as universal hits have been successful overseas but receive mixed reviews in India (Ganti 2011: 445). As Indian editorials call for directors and producers to return their attention to the ‘All-India’ hit, Bollywood filmmakers maintain that their priorities reside in producing profitable films that exhibit a distinct movement toward modernity. With rising distribution and production costs, the single-screen Indian film generates little equity. For generations, it has been associated with the ‘backward’ lower classes that have a limited entertainment budget. Filmmakers consider these audiences to be a detriment to the industry: un...

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...re are granted their own spaces to allow for communal development in exclusion from working or rural classes who present a challenge to modernity. The downtown areas of Indian metros cater primarily to urban elites and tourists. The colorful displays and clean conditions attract gentrified audiences while the high prices kept the ‘riff-raff” out. Breckenridge and Appadurai suggest these spaces serve as an "interocular field” (...) structured so that each site or setting for the socializing or regulating of the public gaze is to some degree affected by the experience of the other sites" (Appadurai and Breckenridge 1995: 12). The elite individual draws strict comparisons in his or her mind between the spaces designated for consumerism and the rest of the city and creates distinctions between the purchasing power and modern capacity of consumers in each landscape.