Bollywood: Popular Indian Cinema

Book Description

Written by Gulzar, Shyam Benegal, Lalit Mohan Joshi, among many other experts on the Industry, Bollywood, Popular Indian Cinema is the ultimate guide to the most popular of Indian cinema. A gripping analysis of the last 100 years is provided by the book's editor, Lalit Mohan Joshi. It covers the long Indian film history including rarely seen images from film archives together with those by leading photographers. This is the one book that every Hindi movie lover should own.

It celebrates what is now a far-reaching and world-renowned cultural phenomenon with 400 pages of the most spectacular photographs, the stories of the stars who make the films, in-depth stories of every great Hindi film and its context, unmatched production quality and brilliant writing.

Customer Reviews:

You have to have this book!.......2003-05-02

This book has everything you could ever want in a book about Bollywood. The pictures are amazing, the text, written by the likes of Gulzar and Shyam Benegal is brilliant, and the physical quality of the book is so great you'd be proud to show it off. It is a must have for anyone remotely interested in Indian Cinema.

The book is pleasant surprise after seeing the fluff in the new release 'Bollywood Dreams'. Am relieved I chose this one.

Must have!.......2002-12-26

I was thrilled to know that a book was out on the market about Bollywood. Some of the other books were quite boring but this one will definitely stay on my coffee table.

Book Description

"Bollywood" - once a tongue-in-cheek term used by the English-language media in India - has become the dominant global term to refer to the prolific Hindi language film industry located in Bombay (renamed Mumbai in 1995). Characterized by music, dance routines, melodrama, lavish production values and an emphasis on stars and spectacle, Bollywood films have met with box-office success and enthusiastic audiences from Bombay to West Africa to Russia, and throughout the English-speaking world.

In Bollywood, anthropologist and film scholar Tejaswini Ganti provides a guide to the cultural, social and political significance of Hindi cinema, outlining the history and structure of the Bombay film industry, and its impact on global popular culture. Providing information and commentary on the key players in Bollywood, from composers to directors and stars, as well as material from current filmmakers themselves, areas covered in Bollywood include:

*Chronology
Main Themes in Hindi Cinema
*Key Characteristics of Popular Hindi Cinema
*Significant Filmmakers
*Significant Films
*Scholarship about Hindi Cinema
*Filmmakers Point of View

Customer Reviews:

just an introduction.......2006-06-23

Ganti's book is a brief but illuminating walk inside Bollywood. For someone who is perhaps not of Indian ethnicity, and knows nothing about Bollywood, the book explains much. You can learn about the sheer volume of production of movies each year. Though the budgets of each are lamentably much less than for a Hollywood movie.

The book also attests to India's increasing "soft power". Bollywood is one of India's main cultural exports, along with its cuisine. Several famous Bollywood movies are explained, in how they address universal human issues with an Indian touch.

critic.......2005-12-14

interesting and easy to read. A good first approach of the bollywood film industry. Not enough photos and no colours.

Bollywood 101.......2005-05-01

This little book by Tejaswini Ganti is the ideal introduction for anyone who wants to get to know Bollywood. Smart, concise, it's a very easy and informative read.

After an historical introduction to Indian cinema from the beginnings (just after the invention of cinema) to the glossy new millenium Bollywood of ZeeTV and NRI romances; Ganti procedes to a general presentation of the inner workings of the Hindi Film Industry (name usually prefered by scholars to the term Bollywood): how is a film made in Bombay ? who produces, how? who distributes, where? who has the power? This part along with the long historical introduction are the core material of the book, short but truly essential.

NB Ganti focuses on Bollywood (located in Bombay). for beginners who think that Indian cinema is Bollywood, take note: it's not. Therefore the book acknowledges Middle cinema, art cinema, tamil, telugu, bengali cinema but never deals with these topics.

After the "technical" part of the book, the rest is dedicated to an overview of the major films and personnalities of the profession. The major films chapter provides a very useful filmography that gives the neofit a very interesting selection of films to get to know Bollywood thru the ages. Each film has a detailed summary that sometimes includes historical insights or important trivia. Then there is the chapter about who's who in Bollywood, she lists major directors (although for most recent cinema many names are missing, as she herself underlines in the end notes), music and lyrics writers, actors and actresses (here again many recent actors and actresses box office sweethearts are overlooked but it's difficult to keep up with the star system and not all stars deserve such academic attention anyway, so if you're a Bollywood geek get over the absence of Salman Khan or Rani Mukherjee in that section).

The end of the book is a series of interviews with directors, actors, producers... and this is where you will eventually find the "new comers" such as ShahRukh Khan (in a really cute itw for that matter) ...

Ganti provides a short bibliography which is also very needed since ressources on Bollywood are not necessarily the easiest to find.

Overall a great little guide that can prove essential to any world cinema class or even (in my case) anthropology class.

as a complement to that guide I recommand Prasad's book Ideology of the hindi film a historical construction, a very insightful book with detailed analysis of such classics as Deewar for instance.

Talking Films: Conversations on Hindi Cinema with Javed Akhtar

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Talking Films: Conversations on Hindi Cinema with Javed Akhtar
Nasreen Munni Kabir
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0195649230

Book Description

This book features the well-known screenplay writer, lyricist and poet Javed Akhtar in conversation with Nasreen Kabir on his work in Hindi cinema, his life and his poetry. An original thinker and a brilliant conversationalist, Akhtar's sharp mind and unique skill in analysing films and his
own work will bring a new and rare insight into Hindi cinema. The volume includes a number of photographs.

Indian Popular Cinema: A Narrative of Cultural Change

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Gives Indian Cinema a perspective
Excellent, , informative and eminently readable.

Indian Popular Cinema: A Narrative of Cultural Change
K. Moti Gokulsing , and Wimal Dissanayake
Manufacturer: Trentham Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1858563291

Book Description

The book reviews nine decades of Indian popular cinema and examines its immense influence on people in India and its diaspora. Since it was published in 1998, Indian film has developed in new directions. As films today vie with Indian soap operas for popularity, film making in India has acquired 'industry status' and consequently has greater accountability to its public.

All this is reflected in this new and extensively revised edition of "Indian Popular Cinema". It tracks the rise of "designer cinema," reviews the increasingly significant Tamil cinema, and considers films made by Indians in the diaspora.

Customer Reviews:

Gives Indian Cinema a perspective.......2000-09-29

Most critics and scholars, especially in the west often dismiss and even ridicule popular Indian cinema owing to its idiosyncratic musical format, melodrama and playing to the gallery. This book provides a refreshing counter-argument, while analysing how popular cinema has affected the way of life in India, and how it might be significant to a western audience.

The book is well-researched and very enjoyable. Without going into too much details about specific films, it tries to highlight the trends and unique genres developed in Indian films over a century. Having grown up on Hindi movies all my life, I found the book interesting, but I think it is more relevant to the western audience. It provides a good introduction and starting point to those just discovering the magical world of Hindi movies.

For those who are into in-depth study of Indian cinema, I recommend "Encyclopedia of Indian Cinema" by Ashish Rajadhyaksha and Paul Willeman.

Excellent, , informative and eminently readable........1999-07-30

A knowledgeable and affectionate look at 90 years of Indian cinema, the cultural values it portrays and the influence it has had on the evolution of modern Indian society. I enjoyed it immensely and strongly recommend it both to cinema buffs everywhere and to all those interested in better understanding the complex web of traditions, prejudices and feelings that make India a compulsive focus of attraction to travellers and observers of social change.

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Brand Bollywood: A New Global Entertainment Order
Derek Bose
Manufacturer: Sage Publications Pvt. Ltd
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Behind the Scenes of Hindi Cinema: A Visual Journey through the Heart of Bollywood

ASIN: 0761935347
Release Date: 2006-11-14

Product Description

Based on original research, this book draws on the author's personal observations and extensive discussions with film makers, media professionals and market players. It is backed by data from a variety of surveys, audit studies and annual reports. Derek Bose uses these sources to arrive at conclusions that place the issue of media convergence in the framework of film development.

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I Love Bollywood

Bollywood: A History
Mihir Bose
Manufacturer: Tempus
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0752428357

Book Description

The first comprehensive history of India’s film industry, one that now rivals Hollywood.

Hollywood may define our idea of movies but it is the city of Bombay on the west coast of India that is now the center of world cinema. Every year the Indian film industry produces more than a 1,000 feature films, every day fourteen million Indians go to a movie and, a billion more people a year buy tickets for Indian movies than for Hollywood ones. The rise of Bombay as the film capital of the world has been remarkable. Bollywood takes the cinematic tech-niques of Hollywood and uses them to produce movies that bear no relation to the original, but have a compelling appeal, that, in the last half a century, has enthralled audiences throughout eastern Europe, the Middle East and north Africa. The movies themselves are a self contained world with their multiple song and dance routines, intense melodrama, a plot that contains everything from farce to tragedy, but always produces a happy ending. The men and women who create these movies are even more remarkable and it is this fantastic, rich, diverse story, a veritable Indian fairyland that Mihir Bose, a native of Bombay, tells with vivid brilliance, in the first comprehensive history of this major social and cultural phenomenon.

Bollywood movies may only recently have begun to be noticed in the west, but they have long defined the very concept of cinema for many millions across the globe. While the name Bollywood echoes and acknowledges its bastard American parentage the son has long since taken over from the father

Customer Reviews:

I Love Bollywood.......2007-05-26

My Bollywood viewing rampage teased my literary senses into finding a book about Bollywood and while at work I stumbled across Bose's A History. Though I've only seen a handful of Hindi films, I've struggled to accurately describe what I'm seeing as there really are few (if any) direct comparisons to Western films. Even the language of Western films seem to completely fail at describing exactly what Bollywood is at times. Bose starts the book at the beginning: film has just been invented and initially displayed in Paris it travels quite quickly to India.

However, Indian culture (still in the empire at this period) had to cultivate movies in a rather different way than Western (i.e. the U.S. film industry) films and these roots of the industry give Bollywood the flavor it has today. Some specific cultural nuances: going from an arm of the British Empire to an independent state, the massive amounts of cultures that reside, the Hindu and Muslim conflicts, somewhat strict and traditional sex/gender dichotomies, the language barriers of one country, etc.

An amazing read that I enjoyed but unless you're really into Bollywood or learning about Bollywood it's probably not for you (it's also a bit long winded in places). What I appreciated most about the novel in addition to the development of Indian film was (through necessity) the narrative development of the history of modern India.

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ESSENTIAL FOR YOUNG FILMMAKER

My Years with Apu
Satyajit Ray
Manufacturer: Faber and Faber
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 057117695X

Customer Reviews:

ESSENTIAL FOR YOUNG FILMMAKER.......2001-10-31

Anybody who dreams making a film should read this book. Ray, the master filmmaker tells us how to get your dream into a reality with dedication and courage. Excellently edited by Mrs Bijoya Ray.

Behind the Scenes of Hindi Cinema: A Visual Journey through the Heart of Bollywood

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A Visual Journey without Much Substance
The Best Book on Bollywood available
the lively, colorful world of Bollywood

Behind the Scenes of Hindi Cinema: A Visual Journey through the Heart of Bollywood

Manufacturer: KIT Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 9068321862

Book Description

"Behind the Scenes of Hindi Cinema is an insightful journey into the complex worlds of fantasy and reality inhabited by creative artistes. India is a unique country that exists in multiple centuries simultaneously. This book unravels the various mysteries and contradictions embedded in our centuries-old tradition. (…) Using defined sections and relevant case studies, the authors analyse the emotional ingredients that form the essence of India and Indian cinema." (Excerpt from the Foreword by Amitabh Bachchan)

Behind the Scenes of Hindi Cinema explores the inner world of Bombay film, the best known of India’s movie industries. Many aspects of Hindi cinema are brought to life on the pages of this richly illustrated book – from its beginnings to the present day. The use of songs to advertise movies, the role of censorship, devotion to god and family: these subjects and many more are illuminated. It reveals the symbolism of the divine role models Radha–Krishna and Ram–Sita at the heart of the main protagonists in many films, and the passion of the people working behind the scenes. It examines the changing face of the nation’s enemies, the marriage scene, lyricists and playback singers, and it sheds light on Tamil cinema, which rivals the Hindi film industry in output and popularity. The book concludes with an analysis of the mass appeal of Hindi film beyond India’s borders and the recent embrace of the much-hyped ‘Bollywood’ phenomenon in the West.

Customer Reviews:

A Visual Journey without Much Substance.......2006-11-13

Beautiful pictures, arty design, but not much of substance in this book. Its really more of a pictorial history. This book gives very little insight into modern Hindi films. Living in India, and watching a number of Hindi films, I find they are a window into Indian mindset and worldview. And if you suspend your irony, some moments of silly fun. Too bad this book doesn't unlock more of the secrets of Bollywood.

The Best Book on Bollywood available.......2006-08-10

I took on the task of doing an extensive study of the modern Bollywood cinema, in comparison to the current atmosphere of South Asia/India

Of all the Bollywood books I read, this one was, by far, the best one available

The book showcases aspects and foundations of the Bollywood cinema genre, including the roles of villains, hereos, heroines, etc, and how each of them tie into the common dramatic themes and stories of Bollywood films

In addition, the book is filled with EXCELLENT pictures, giving great visual justification to every major point and argument

Lastly, it does a good job of referencing many Bollywood films, both new and classical, giving readers a good opportunity to go back and review those films, if need be

Overall, this book is advertised and marketed as a sensational fanbook of Bollywood, but from an intellectual and film scholar perspective, I would conclude that this is the best book on Bollywood that I have read and studied, both sensationally and intellectually

Thank you for reading and Happy Buying!!!!

the lively, colorful world of Bollywood.......2005-08-30

The heavily-illustrated work imparts the carnivalesque style of the now globally popular Bollywood films of India--the exotic, often extravagant, costumes, the promotional stunts, the common themes such as traditional morality and romance and marriage, the blaring music, the theater and constant motion and sense of anticipation and surprise. In the foreword, Amitabh Bachchan explains the Bollywood films are "inspired by epic and folk theatre." In the early days of the films, movie moguls would send messengers with drums to announce a film's opening; like Indian royalty in ages past would have bells and drums sounded to call the public for an announcement. The often collage-like visual material is so vivid and jumpy that it can override the text. But for ones looking for material on the making and promotion of Bollywood films, social and religious subjects reflected in them, their distribution in the global entertainment system, and the marginal, yet influential Tamil cinema, it's found in substantive chapters by different writers knowledgeable in these areas. A timely, unique work on the Bollywood films whose mixed, yet focused content mirrors the mixed elements and vitality of such films.

Encyclopedia of Indian Cinema: 2nd Revised Edition

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Lovely!
time for a 3rd edition
critic
The best book on the largest national film industry
World's Most Prolific Film Industry

Encyclopedia of Indian Cinema: 2nd Revised Edition

Manufacturer: British Film Institute
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 085170669X

Book Description

The largest film industry in the world after Hollywood is celebrated in this expanded and updated reference work. Covering the full range of Indian cinema the new edition includes vastly expanded coverage of mainstream productions from the 70s to the 90s, and additional material on the stars that have made their mark this decade. For the first time the work also includes a comprehensive index of names. There is no comparable guide to this generously illustrated volume that captures the incredible vitality and diversity of historical and contemporary Indian cinema.

Customer Reviews:

Lovely!.......2007-05-13

The book was still shrink-wrapped, and in excellent condition. It arrived very quickly as well.

time for a 3rd edition.......2006-06-22

The book is perhaps the most comprehensive listing of Indian movies that exists. Even in its earlier first edition. An update was needed simply because of the prodigious output of Bollywood movies each year. The typical number is 700.

From thumbing through the text, you can see the great and diverse nature of Indian society. Even simply in the languages that the movies span. Many stars' names will be unfamiliar to a non-Indian reader. But the book gives the impression that here is a huge world of its own, to rival anything in Hollywood.

This book creates its own conclusion. The 2nd edition came out in 99. Seven years ago. High time for the author to furnish a 3rd edition to encompass the intervening years.

critic.......2005-12-14

complete from beginning to 1995 . A bit old fahion an few B & W photos. For specialists or students wanting datas

The best book on the largest national film industry.......2002-03-24

The Indian film industry is the largest film industry in the world making over 700 films every year in over 20 different languages. This book is a compendium of some of the greatest names in the Indian film industry along with summaries of some of the best films made in India from as early as 1897. I have thoroughly enjoyed reading it as a reference book. It is a must for any major library.

World's Most Prolific Film Industry.......2000-05-14

Reviewed by Amy Dadichandji Laly, For Pacific Reader, An Asian Pacific North American Review of Books, Spring 2000

The Encyclopaedia of Indian Cinema by Ashish Rajadhyaksha and Paul Willemen is perhaps the most exhaustive compendium of reference material compiled as a resource guide for film students and movie buffs around the world. Published by Oxford University Press, this ambitious book is produced in association with the National Film Archive of India and the British Film Institute.

The scope of the new revised edition includes a capsule chronicle of Indian history and milestones in the Indian film industry; impressive filmographies of major directors, actors, music composers, lyricists and scenarists; plot synopses of films; film and name indices; and a thorough bibliography on the history of Indian cinema.

From 28 films produced in 1931 to 948 in 1990 and 793 in 1995, India boasts the world's largest national film industry with dream factories in Mumbai, Chennai, Calcutta, Bangalore, and Hyderabad, churning out Urdu-Hindi Bollywood musicals and important regional art films. Assamese, Bengali, Bhojpuri, Gujerati, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Oriya, Punjabi, Rajasthani, Tamil and Telegu cinema is included in this paperback edition which covers a vast landscape from the birth of silent movies and talkies to mainstream productions and documentaries up to 1995.

Cinema is but another idiom of complex social, cultural, political, and historical influences especially in a country as diverse as India in its many regional languages, and ethnic and religious pluralism. The reader will find inspiring references to a number of art movements outside of the industry which informed filmmakers in their day. The entry on the Progressive Writers' Association, that brings into focus such stalwarts as Premchand, Ismat Chughtai, Ali Sardar Jafri, Krishan Chander, Rajinder Singh Bedi, Sadat Hasan Manto, among other luminaries, is especially invigorating. The Indian People's Theatre Association, Parsee Theatre, and political movements such as the Naxalite and Swadeshi, provide "elaborate cross-references to other, more directly, more cinematic entries."

The A to Z of this remarkable index of artistes starts with Khwaja Ahmad Abbas, a prodigious director and scenarist "mainly in the socialist-realist mode," to Zubeida, a real life princess, daughter of the Nawab of Sachin, who played the lead in "Alam Ara," India's first sound film released 14 March 1931. The Film index is chronological and starts with the release in 1912 of the 12 foot silent film "Pundalik" by P. R. Tipnis and N. G. Chitre, adapted from Ramrao Kirtikar's Marathi stage play about the Hindu saint. The last entry is a 158 minute megabudget Tamil musical, released in 1996 called "Kadhal Desum," written and directed by Kadir with Vineet, Abbas, and Tabu as lead players and music by A. R. Rehman. This is the only film entry for the year 1996.

Book Description

India is home to Bollywood--and to the largest film industry in the world. Movie theaters are said to be the "temples of modern India," with Bombay/Mumbai, the center of Bollywood, producing some 200 of the 800 films per year that are viewed by roughly 11 million people per day. In Bollywood Cinema, Vijay Mishra argues that Indian film production and reception is shaped by the desire for national community and a pan-Indian popular culture. Seeking to understand Bollywood according to its own narrative and aesthetic principles and in relation to a global film industry, he views Indian cinema through the dual methodologies of postcolonial studies and film theory. Mishra discusses classics such as Mother India (1957) and Devdsa (1935) and recent films including Ram Lakhan (1989) and Khalnayak (1993), linking their form and content to broader issues of national identity, epic tradition, popular culture, history, and the implications of diaspora. Persuasively arguing for the centrality of movie-going in the construction of self and community, Bollywood Cinema is an indispensable guide to Indian cinema for both scholars and fans alike.

Customer Reviews:

For academics only.......2005-08-21

It's conceivable that some scholarly professor living in some dimly-lit library on some hermetically-sealed university campus will be able to decipher this jargon-filled tome. For the rest of us, this book is a virtually unreadable barrage of dry, dismal, academic slang without even a single moment of levity. It's two-hundred-plus pages of "crucial cultural intertexts" and "structural homology" and "strucural displacement" -- and those three phrases came from ONE SENTENCE on page four!

How is it possible to write a book about Bollywood that is so utterly devoid of color and joy? The author has accomplished exactly that. It could be that this book might contain a few tangible ideas or meaningful illuminations, but they're buried so deeply under the weight of such pompous verbage that they'll never see the light of day. Bollywood has never been so tediously presented!

Wholeheartedly Recommended........2003-07-17

When I started this book, I had not imagined that this is going to be such a detailed analysis of characters, scenes and the movies themselves from Indian Cinema. It is such a wonderful attempt at explaining Indian Cinema that I simply couldn't help praising Vijay Mishra, and thanking him at the same time for my broadened horizons and perspective.

But I may add, get this book only if you know about Bollywood in little detail. This is not a text introducing Indian Cinema to someone unfamiliar to it. If you are a hindi movie fan, its a must must read, and I am quite sure you will find it very interesting and informative as well. I personally wholeheartedly recommend this book to everyone who wants to know about Bollywood and understand its psychology.

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