2008 The year is drawing to a close and top-ten lists have already started hitting the Internet. While going through several list of the, ‘Best movies of the year- distributed and non-distributed,’ it’s sad and remarkable to see the omission of Indian films. Over the years, there seems to be either ignorance on part of film festivals, critics, organizers about our cinema or in a country of over billion people,we are not able to make one worthwhile film that could transcend boundaries and cultural space- irrespective of being Indian. Beside let’s make this clear- Slumdog Millionaire is not an Indian film as the media seemed to project, rather it’s a British film with an Indian context. And so instead of proclaiming this as our conquest on the global stage, we should lament why anyone from our own industry couldn’t achieve this feat. While it's high time we should move on from talking about our scripts reaching the Oscar library or the growth of Bollywood in the US and UK box-offic
ISSUE- no1 ISSUE- no2 Asim Ratan Ghosh discusses about the characteristics of post-modern cinema with examples from different significant post-modern films Today’s life is a post-modern one. Cinema and TV are shaping our lives - life styles and attitudes towards life. The social, economic and political problems have direct relationship with it. The cinema and TV serials are simulating a hyper-real world. They pretend to show a ‘real’ life. That world lures people. They try to search out that ideal life but without success. This failure creates hatred, frustration, anger and a sense of revenge. That is why the instances of suicide, homicide and other crimes and misdemeanors are gradually increasing. All over the world another phenomenon can be observed: social unrest and change of social order are taking place all over the world. In the economic front Capitalist flavour is almost lost. Multinationals are reigning the world. Economists call this ‘Late Capitalism’. This ‘Late Capitalism’
THE DELHI MANIFESTO Our cinema screen has become an ill-constructed, and conventional portal to a world we aspire of, rather than a mirror, which reflects us. Our emotions are guided by leitmotifs placed deftly, and religious beliefs exploited. Our spirit of inquiry has become dead and we have been reduced to mere receivers in the process. Cinema and television has replaced interaction with imposition of thought. Its thought. An artificial, fake and ill-created thought, a manifestation of our needs to escape ourselves. The medium has become a symbol of cheap entertainment, devoid of any examination of the form, and a victim of our collective need to create personalities, perfect alternate universes, and images of our aspiration. Our criticism has become trivial. Stories take precedent over the intrinsic qualities of the cinematic medium. Our film lovers are snobs, indulging in their wholehearted pseudo-intellectual diatribe, condemning the ignorant, and the ignorant have become so used
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