Lights, camera, action! These three words have wielded magic over millions across the globe as a world of fantasy unrolls on the big screen before them. Cinema has captured everybody's imagination ever since the first men, women, and even a train showed up on screen. And this holds true in India too, where cinema is almost an addiction and has the power to create a frenzy matched only by the other “C” - Cricket.
Turn on the television, and you cannot miss the cinema programmes and news. Cinema gossip is a favourite topic of conversation with most. Isn't this proof enough of how much cinemas features in our lives, pretty much everyday?
Old but gold
This year, the first Indian talkie, Alam Ara, turns 80. Here's a little peek into the dawn of cinema in India.
Over a century ago when films made their way into India and the rest of the world, there was nothing glitzy or glamorous about them. In fact, the first screening of ‘actualities' (as films were then called) in India on July 7, 1896, included shots of the arrival of a train and workers leaving the factory. This visual replay of mundane life was itself then termed as “the marvel of the century”. It was screened at the Watson's Hotel, Mumbai, now known as the Army and Navy Building.
This ‘marvel' caught the fancy of many, including Harishchandra Sakharam Bhatavdekar, popularly known as Sawe Dada, and Hiralal Sen.
Sawe Dada, after being enamoured by the ‘moving pictures' bought a movie camera and projector from London and went on to record everyday events and special occasions on film. His first was “The Wrestlers” which was shot during a real wrestling match in Mumbai. This went on to become the first film to be shot by an Indian and the first reality documentary.
Hiralal Sen, meanwhile, filmed scenes from plays staged at Classic Theatre, Calcutta, and were later shown as added attractions after stage performances.
Though they confined themselves to filming real events, the founding of the Indian film industry is credited to the efforts and work of Dhundiraj Govind Phalke, or Dadasaheb Phalke, as we commonly know him.
In 1912, this art graduate purchased the equipment necessary for filmmaking, after raising a loan from a friend. With a desire to see Indian images on the screen backed by a completely indigenous effort,
Phalke started shooting for his commercial film “Raja Harishchandra” in 1912. It was released at the Coronation Cinema on April 21, 1913, and was a huge success.
Over a career span of 19 years, Phalke made 95 movies and 26 short films, thus sowing the seed of the one the largest and influential cinema industry.
Those were the times of the silent films and the period was dubbed as the Silent Era.
It was not until 1931 that the talkies, movies with sound, made their way into Indian cinema with “Alam Ara” – the first Indian talkie.
And there's been no looking back since then with the evolution of cinema paving the way for what we today see in fancy multiplexes in the company of push-back seats and pop corn.
