What Is Bollywood-Bollywood For Westerners

If you have any interest in family, fantasy, music, glitz, glamor, drama and romance, the one place you can find all these in abundance is in the magical world of Indian films. Brimming with colorful costumes, music and dance, magnificent sets ranging from Mughal palaces to chaotic Indian bazaars, epic love stories, religious and societal sentiments, and emotions galore -- the Bollywood movie is a true representation of the complex, unique and marvelous Indian psyche.

NAME AND LOCATION:

Bollywood is the name given to the Mumbai-based Hindi-language film industry in India. This term was created by combining Bombay (the city now called Mumbai) and Hollywood (the famous center of the United States film industry). Unlike Hollywood, which is a place in Los Angeles, California, a place that has become symbolic of the American movie industry, Bollywood is not a place but represents the Hindi movie industry as a whole.

STRENGTH IN DIVERSITY

India is such a diverse country so many different cultures and languages and each state keeps churning out movies by the dozens every month! Therefore, when the regional movies (Tamil, Telugu, Bengali, Malayalam, Kannada) are combined with Hindi movies -- Bollywood is considered to be the largest film industry in the world in terms of number of films produced, and maybe also the number of tickets sold.

HISTORY

The Indian film business has been creating Hindi films since the Thirties and movie business has always been profitable and thriving one for local businessmen, but it is only in the last couple of decades that Indian movies have gained recognition internationally. It is only in the last dozen or so years that one hears about commercial Bollywood movies being sent to represent the country at the Academy Awards in the United States of America or several other internationally acclaimed award ceremonies for film making. After the splash made by the Hindi movie "Lagaan" with almost won an Oscar, the first Indian movie to do so was "slum-dog millionaire" creating great exposure for Indian movies by making the international movie lovers aware of the world-class standards that Bollywood has achieved.

STYLE:

Bollywood films are usually musicals. Few movies are made without at least one song-and-dance number. Indian audiences expect some "masala" or spice in their movies to feel that they have got their money's worth. Masala in Hindi movies often comes in the form of "item numbers" which are fast-paced, sexy, dance numbers with upbeat loud music that has beats that energize and match the rhythm of the dancers.

All in all Bollywood films can be loved or hated, but not ignored. They can be seen as regressive or modern, but their quality and skill cannot be denied. In India people need movies to feel alive; in fact, Bollywood is like a religion and Indian Film stars are like deities! It may be said to be the one thing that Indians love more than cricket and the one thing that binds and brings together people of all religions, castes, classes and age groups. Some say it gives identity and individuality to 25 million Indians that have left her shores and whose generations that are still addicted to it. That's Bollywood!