Bollywood in a mess; but the show will go on...

WHAT A way to begin a New Year! Most film critics posted a brief notice for their columns : No story. It in fact sounded more like an epitaph for Cinema-2000. The year just gone by saw big films, bigger films, even better films, but where was the audience? As a Bollywood wit put it: they had all gone looking for a story. As most Mumbaikars told me this week: films died at the box office because they were at best only proposals, without a story.

No story also meant that in the new year Bollywood wanted to begin with a clean slate. If the situation on the screen was bad -- a bare 15 per cent of the released films made money -- the situation behind the scenes was grim, even desperate. The long shadows of the menacing mafia, which had an all-pervasive influence on Bollywood, were finally forced to reveal their ``Chori chori, chupke chupke'' face. Gulshan Kumar's death was still fresh in the mind when Rakesh Roshan was attacked, the first visible sign last year that those whispers and meaningful silences sitting on frightened faces had some basis. It drove the best new find of the decade, Hrithik Roshan, very nearly out of films. A paper quoted him as saying he decided to continue because if he didn't ``they would win''.

Old-timers like director Bhimsen feel that whatever else may or not happen the ``Chori chori chupke chupke'' episode will lead to new financial arrangements in Bollywood. One of the reasons why the mafia is paying more attention to Bollywood is that Indian movies are now into big money and are solid foreign exchange earners. The mafia is only trying to fill an industrial vacuum. Here is a growing industrial activity -- cinema -- without enjoying the status of an industry or the discipline of an organised sector. There is no institutional financing or other benefit such as an insurance cover. The alternative to a Bharat Shah, who had been unable to save ``Chori chori chupke chupke'' or to a Jhamu Sugand, now under police scrutiny, is bank financing. But will it come?

There is no reason why it should not. The technicians are doing very well for themselves. Even Hollywood directors are taking note of the wonderful work done by them. One of them is buying rights for a dance sequence picturised on Urmila Matondkar in ``China Gate''. Explains Bhimsen: ``The lighting is much better, the new lenses are used with skill, and the quality of raw stock has improved considerably. The new directors know their hardware.''

All that cinema needs is better financial discipline and production pattern. Film-makers like Subhash Ghai, Yash Chopra and Ajay Devgan have already set up public limited companies which is the first step towards institutional financing. This year both producers and the Government are supposed to make significant moves in this direction.

Has cinema then priced itself out of reach of the poor? Well, it would seem that films are being made to cater to the emotional needs of those who can buy a Rs.100 ticket and spend a similar amount on Coke and popcorn. In the metropolitan cities it is the global audience, the gift of the new and ever growing corporate sector that dictates what the films should look like. That has led to foreign locales, a global sartorial culture, and to themes like the unwed mother (Kya Kehna) and discarding of the bhenji persona in favour of a Miss India lookalike (Khoobsurat) and to soaring costs. And, you might add, to mafia moneybags. If Bharat Shah and Sugand can be called in by the police, nothing is safe. If there is no panic, it is because the mafia's golden rule is total silence. Actors, directors and producers find the tension palpable. What is at stake is the heritage of Bimal Roy, Mehboob Khan, V. Shantaram and Satyajit Ray: the respectability of the medium?

The worst part is no one knows where to run for cover. ``We all feel like Abhimanyu who has got into a chakravyuh but doesn't know how to get out of it,'' admits Sunil Dutt. Film folks, he asserts, are the most law-abiding citizens. The police use them as an alibi for covering up their inadequacies. They give the police good media exposure and a ``do-gooder image''. There are at least eight film MPs in the two Houses of Parliament. ``Yet,'' moans Dutt, ``there is no concerted effort to clear the air and tell the nation that ten films(reportedly financed by the mafia) are just a drop in the ocean of 300 films and more released every year in the country.''

A man of many seasons and a Dada Saheb Phalke Award-winner, Hrishikesh Mukherji, is more forthcoming. ``Are the politicians any better than Bharat Shah and Sugand? Or even the bureaucrats and the police?'' he asks squarely. The fact is, he asserts, that the campaign to cleanse the film industry of mafia influence has to begin from the top. That is where the evil percolates from with an all-pervasive effect. ``We are living in kalyug,'' he concludes philosophically. ``Here dishonesty is the best policy.''

On condition of anonymity a film-maker says, ``Look, we all know that everybody -- the politicians, the police, the bureaucrats and the film-makers are financed by the mafia. But only we are being given the bad name. But we will survive like the system. The show will go on.''

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : Other States
Previous : Delhi plans to revamp public transport
Next     : Back for a second innings