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Addicted to escapism, the audience rejected Baburao Painter’s effort to blaze a realist celluloid trail with Savkari Pash (1925), highlighting the blighted existence of farmers caught in the twin pincers of moneylenders and landowners. The advent of sound in 1931 with Alam Ara led to the consolidation of new entrants, infusion of foreign trained technicians and a plethora of fresh themes. The costumed glorious recounting of Phalke’s gods gave way to socials (Prabhat Studios), musicals (Bombay Talkies), philosophical literary adaptations (New Theatres) and action films (Ranjit and Wadia Movietone). Songs became a metaphorically evocative high, birthing the first de facto singing superstar, K. L. Saigal. Along also came the agony impaired archetype of Devdas (1935), deeply entrenching itself in audience psyche. The exalted glory of self-abnegation, epitomised by Saigal and P. C. Barua, was deified for the next 15 years. Inversely, Fearless Nadia (Hunterwali), Durga Khote (Amar Jyoti) and Shanta Apte (Duniya na Mane) blazed a trail by playing strong women characters, defining independent feminist icons of the era. Second World War impeded the flourishing industry leading to restrictions on the issue of raw stock but directors like Nitin Bose, Mehboob and V. Shantaram invented evocative cinema. War profiteering led to the generation of black money and nouveau riche parked their bootleg wealth in financing films. This catalysed the star system of demanding exorbitant remuneration, led by Ashok Kumar, whose film Kismet (1943) ran for three years. In 1946, Chetan Anand’s Neecha Nagar won the best film award at the first ever Cannes Film Festival. Post-Independence, hundreds of Left leaning poets, novelists and music directors were enlisted kindling the golden age of Indian cinema. Patronised by Guru Dutt, Raj Kapoor, B. R. Chopra and Bimal Roy, this era was dignified by elegant prose and exquisite music, spawning a matchless creative fusion never equalled since. Socially conscious entertainment like Pyaasa, Awaara, Naya Daur and Sujata heralded India’s presence on global stage and for the first time in history, filmstars became bigger than political leaders. The coming of colour in the 1960s acquainted moviegoers with hypnotically glamorous foreign locales like Paris, Tokyo and Lisbon, reiterating a still chaste Indian psyche untainted by greed and painted in rainbow hues. Leading ladies like Sadhna and Sharmila Tagore presented alluring revamped images of Hollywood divas as the mischievousness of Shammi Kapoor’s Elvis avatar made way for the sensitive boy-next-door Rajesh Khanna’s four-year romantic reign commencing with Aradhana (1969). Collapsing establishments, corrupt raj, lawlessness and failure of political leadership in the 1970s, compounded with massive urban migration led to the conception of the first macho metro persona of the ‘angry young man’. Denied equality, employment and justice, this hero (created by Salim-Javed and personified by Amitabh Bachchan) bore cudgels on behalf of a disgruntled citizenry, which cathartically applauded every punch he delivered. Shorn of creative quality, the abominable 1980s largely went by in a haze of cloned big-budget multi-starrers and vulgar southie remakes loaded with double entendres. The precipitous decline was further exacerbated by falling footfalls of families in theatres with the arrival of video. The devolution was finally arrested by a return to Indian values saga, Maine Pyar Kiya (1989). As Indian economy unlocked, the population got younger and aspirational and development models were relocated from hinterland to the cities in the 1990s, the audience demographic transmuted too. Quick to cash in on were a new breed of directors like Aditya Chopra, Farhan Akhtar and Karan Johar targeting niche youth markets with growing disposable pocket money and inundating them with foreign brands and flashy lifestyles. As Shyam Benegal ruefully commented, "Rural India has fallen off the map of movies." Making a vital rearguard charge opposed to ‘cinema without a soul’, the new millennium welcomed induction of digital technology, significantly reducing the cost of production and encouraging mavericks like Anurag Kashyap, Nagesh Kukunoor and Dibakar Banerjee to challenge established order and succeed, like the angry young man of yore. For a side-show attraction with a projected expiry date of 10 years, cinema has survived to sustain a century and become a billion dollar industry. The mystical movies enchant us all.
Essential viewing for popular cinema enthusiasts till 1989 (Post-1990 films are in recent memory and have repeated satellite airplay). 1930s: Achhut Kanya, Duniya na Mane, Amrit Manthan, Pukar 1940s: Padosi, Chitralekha, Roti, Khazanchi, Anmol Ghadi, Sikandar, Andaz 1950s: Mother India, Madhumati, Albela, CID, Shree 420, Footpath, Do Bigha Zameen, Chalti Ka Naam Gadi, Baiju Bawra, Kaagaz Ke Phool 1960s: Mughal-e-Azam, Ganga Jamuna, Upkar, Sahib Bibi aur Ghulam, Waqt, Guide, Bhuvan Shome, Kabuliwala, Haqeeqat, Padosan 1970s: Sholay, Pakeezah, Ankur, Anand, Bobby, Purab aur Paschim, Deewar, Chupke Chupke, Rajnigandha, Junoon, Gol Maal, Aandhi 1980s: Kalyug, Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron, Parinda, Arth, Tezaab, Utsav, Mr India, Ardh Satya, Shakti, Masoom, Chashme Buddoor
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