One's Too Many and One Hundred is Not Enough

Just a quick note on the Oscars--pretty predictable, except for Sean Penn.  I rushed right out to see Milk, and he definitely deserves is (not that Mickey Rourke wasn't great, but Sean Penn was better).

Also, bleh, did you see Tilda Swinton?  Who dressed her?  I think she might be the worst dressed person I've seen at the Oscars--EVER!  Jessica Biel was pretty bad this year also, but no one could top the beige sack that Tilda was wearing.  Shudder.  Apparently she was so badly dressed that no one has dared put a picture up of her outfit that I could put here. 

Anyway, on to the main post.  As promised, here is my epic on BOLLYWOOD!  My favorite industry in the world will take up a lot of time.   You have been warned.  Now, there is much debate over this name, because there are those that argue that this is merely a reference to Hollywood, and demeans the Hindi cinema coming out of Mumbai/Bombay as a shadow or copy of American film (the capital of the film world is still Hollywood).  I'm not sure where I stand on this point--although there are many variations on this name, they only appear in India (Bollywood--Bombay, Tollywood--Tamil I believe, or perhaps the Telegu industry, Lollywood--Lahore perhaps?, and I think I've heard Dollywood also).  Despite this argument, I am going to use the term Bollywood in my references to the largest film industry in India, since it is easily recognizable and most people in the West associate this with the type of film th

at I will be discussing.

Now, I mention that Hollywood is still the film capital of the world, and that is true in terms of budget mostly.  The areas that Bollywood is stronger in is sheer number of films produced (over a thousand a year I've heard), and probably in the number of people that see these films.  Amitabh Bachchan is the biggest star in the world in terms of number of people 

who could recognize him, simply because Asia is the most heavily populated continent in the world, and India contains something like 1/4 of the world's population.

Now, one of the distinctions that is important to make is that not all

 Indian film is Bollywood, which seems like a mistake that is pretty common I believe.  When people talk about Bollywood, it is the Hindi-language film product of Mumbai/Bombay, which includes melodrama, masala plots (action, romance, comedy, etc. mixed into one), singing and dancing numbers.  For example, Slumdog Millionaire (my favorite film of the year, by the way) is not Bollywood because it was made by a Scottish director with a British lead (Dev Patel grew up in Great Britain), and is much more focused on reality than your average Bollywood film.  Likewise, Bride and Prejudice, while containing many elements of the Bollywood genre, is not in fact part of the genre because it is in English, and directed by a British director (even though she is part of the Indian diaspora I believe).

Focusing on the lack of reality in Bollywood films, this is not to say that there is no realism in them.  There are some very good films that deal with certain subjects very realistically.  The main fantastical elements come in during songs, where they are suddenly off in some foreign land/city/etc., and the regular laws of physics do not apply (someone will pop up behind someo

ne when they were just in another place, for example).  In my point of view, this lack of realism only adds to the joy of the film, and since these numbers clearly do not aspire to this, there is no reason for people to get their panties in a twist when they happen.  What's wrong with having a character think about a potential life that could happen.  Don't you ever fantasize about what could be?  And in these fantasies, are you winning the Academy Awards, frolicking with your lover in a field of flowers, or bending over a sink with dirty dishwater as the baby screams in the background?  

There are also many people who say that the films are bad because the acting is bad, the stories are all the same, and they always have predictable endings.  All I can say is that this is definitely not true.  Going back to early Indian cinema (even before Hindi had become the main language), there are several examples of movies that do not have happy endings at all (see various remakes of Devdas, praised for their excellent scripting, in several different languages, and definitely do not have happy endings).  Also, there are some great actors in the industry (Aamir Khan being my favorite actor in the world, one of the five best actors of the Hindi industry, and is quite talented).  There are two reasons why the actors are not quite as good as you might find in other industries (according to my film teacher).  1) There are no/few formal acting schools in India such as we have in America, for example, to help 

train.  Bollywood is a star system, meaning that with many films, you get the stars before you even have a script.  2) The actors do not stick to one film at a time (except Aamir Khan!), and thus they cannot throw themselves fully into a single character--often times the characters seem much like each other.

It is true that some stars are almost unwatchable, but with the amazing music, who cares about the acting.

Which brings me to another point, and that is the complaints that there are too many songs in Bollywood.  People, the music is what makes these movies great.  It is truly a unique form of filmmaking that is not duplicated anywhere else in the world.  Furthermore, the tradition of playback singing, going back to the 1940s I believe, is also criticized sometime.  My question is, why is it important that actors sing, act and dance?  Why not just stick to dancing and acting, an let people with phenomenal voices have careers also?  It certainly creates jobs, and exposes some great talent.  Here in America, and perhaps in other countries as well, we have a preconception that people have to do all their own work.  Why?  When the playback singers can become as famous or more famous than the actors they sing for, why does it matter?  It's not like Singing in the Rain, where she doesn't get credit for what she does.  EVERYONE KNOWS. 

As for similar plots, yes that's true in some cases (see again, the sheer number of films they make every year, and most of them have really low budgets).  There is a lot of copying that goes on of films, mostly from Hollywood (my particular favorite is Mann I think, the Hindi remake of An Affair to Remember).  I asked my film teacher last year how this could be, and he said that basically it's because if anyone tried to sue them for breach of copyright, they wouldn't get any money out of them anyway because they don't have much.  Most productions are pretty low budget unless you get an incredibly famous director or producer, like Yash Chopra.  One of my favorite moments in my experience with copyright issues was during my screening of Aamir Khan's early film Love Love Love, during a fight song, Darth Vader's theme music (or perhaps it was just the theme music of the Empire) came on.  I burst into laughter.  It was great.  Anyway, in relation to the copying of stories, I have not yet seen one that is an exact remake.  Because of the cultural differences between Bollywood and Hollywood, there are always multiple elements added to make the films a unique story.

A good example of this is Dil Hai Ki Manta Nahin, a remake of the classic It Happened One Night.  Who doesn't remember the scene where Claudette Colbert shows her leg off to hitch a ride?  The same thing happens in the Hindi remake, however, her showing off her leg leads to the driver assaulting her (showing off her leg like that, I'm assuming, would be viewed much differently, at least when this film was made), and the reporter has to come to her rescue (in a hilarious scene, he pretends to be a crazy killer who gets people driving by on the road).  It's differences like this that, to my mind, make the borrowing of basic elements not a bad idea, because they are taking stories and translating them for a different culture and audience. 

As to the idea that they all have the same story, this is simply not true at all.  Many of them are similar, but there are plenty that develop their own themes and stories, mostly involving love it's true.  I could point out many films that are pretty unique in their forms of story telling as well as their plots, but that might take awhile.

Also, in terms of copyright, in my studies there are lots of problems with the issues of copyrighting today vs. the original purpose of copyright laws, but I'll save that for another time as the post is already reaching book length.  

Anyway, since this post is already insanely long, I shall cut it short for now, although there is much more that I could say on this subject.  Bollywood is perhaps not one of the most innovative forms of filmmaking in the world, but what makes it so wonderful is that most of the films are full of joy and beauty (although plenty have their share of sadness also).  They leave you with a happy feeling at the end of them (except of course for the sad ones--see above note).  There is a lot of sheer optimism and hope in the films, whatever you may say about classism, sexism, racism, etc.  (all of which are also present in Hollywood films may I point out--they are both commercial film industries.  How many art films from Hollywood do you actually see in the movie theatres?)  There are those (kind of haughty in my opinion) people who will only watch films for artistic merit, or serious plots, etc.  I love the masala plot--there's something for everyone!  The sheer entertainment value of films such as Bollywood (and many of the mindless, happy films that Hollywood makes) is cathartic.  Sometimes, you just need a break from reality.  Reality is hard, and I don't think there is anyone who can argue otherwise (especially those people who like the serious, artistic films).  The length adds for the ability to develop characters and their relationships more, as well as including the best part, the singing and dancing!  Now, if singing and dancing isn't your thing, then why did you waste your time reading this post or watching the movie?