Quote Originally Posted by Johanna
I have a feeling Indian cinema is become a bit more artistic and less kitsch. What do you think?
Quote Originally Posted by alexB
Quote Originally Posted by Johanna
Some of it is (at least used to be) incredibly silly, like insane co-incidences and people who are either too sugary nice or pure evil (not enough nuance in the characters).
You can’t do without twins, one of whom is lost in his/her babyhood, accidently slipping out of his/her mother’s hands and off the bridge into the foaming brine, when she habitually kicks her foot against a splinter, while running away from her evil uncle Raj, only later to be found by a Gipsy and raised into a feisty rapscallion who’s going to inevitably reunite with his/her meek and obedient sibling and revenge, this time both of them, their mothers tears (no need to remind you that since the moment the child perishes his/her mother’s day starts with crying her eyes out year in year out), childhood hardships and lost profit for the unlucky one.))
That's Seeta and Geeta. Is that the only one you've seen? It's an old movie, Bollywood changed quite a bit since then. But I suspect men shouldn't bother with Hindi movies at all, for the most part. There seems to be a lot of cynicism, narrow-mindedness, and prejudice towards Hindi movies which is a sad thing -- they are not all bad, you know. Among the heaps of crap there are gems. The things that I like about Indian cinema are its beautiful, vibrant colours, traditions and culture, music and dances. All those things absent from the Russian cinema.

There are now a lot of different Hindi movies, more seriously-minded and so on, like "Swades", which explores the problem of "brain drain", which India faces and which is very topical for Russia as well -- a lot of intelligent, educated people leave the country in search of greener pastures. Bollywood no longer makes only traditional "masala" movies which included all genres mixed into one -- melodrama, comedy, action. In this respect it's moving more towards Hollywood and not everyone likes this. Though modern Indian films are definitely less boring compared to the older ones.

Quote Originally Posted by Johanna
Shameless escapism!
Yeah, who doesn't like a bit of escapism? I'd say Hindi movies are about celebrating life and having fun.